G4 project ideas: Fossil Fuels

[BustinJieber]

Trolled kthx

Edited October 29, 2010 by BustinJieber

[sweetnsimple786]

I'm glad you want to figure it out for yourselves.

Please think about the topics some more and give us some details on what interests you. There's so much here... narrow this down by yourself or with your classmates. We help with narrowing down and plausibility but what you've posted shows nothing about what you want to do or thought on your part. What catches your eye? What do you want to do? Nothing too specific, but what do you think?

Personally, the garbage one appeals to me. Biodegradability. Space issues. Landfills. Recycling. Decomposers.

[ibmonkey]

ours was basically testing how much caffeine affects you and how much you would need to consume before its lethal.

[Tilia]

The umbrella topics the school has provided us with are:

The Science and Ethics of alternatives to fossil fuels

The Science and Ethics of Security

The Science and Ethics of Getting rid of garbage

The Science and Ethics of Space Exploration/Travel

The Science and Ethics of Water

Broad ideas or vague suggestions are appreciated, don't go too into details as we would like to think of the topic ourselves too =(

YOu can do anything! These topics include a lot, so do whatever comes to mind. Remember that the experiment isn't assessed, so you donät have to worry. Ours was about making boats, trying to make them move. We ended up with most of the boats remaining stationary, one moving backwards, one being fast and one catching fire.

Alternatives to fossile fuels sounds fairly easy, one could for instance doiing something on energy density.

[BustinJieber]

Please assess the current one that we have =)

It falls under two umbrella topics: The Science and Ethics of alternatives to fossil fuels AND The Science and Ethics of Getting rid of garbage.

The idea is to make blends of different fossil fuels with household garbage, including but not limited to used cooking oil (sunflower, canola, olive) and biodegradable organic material.

We would like to burn the mixture and compare it to 100% gasoline, and see how high of a temperature the resulting flame could heat a beaker full of water. Depending on the calculated energy output, and the comparison with conventional fossil fuels, it may be viable as a fossil fuel 'alternative', that also is effective at getting rid of garbage.

However, we haven't quite worked out how to burn the mixture, and we haven't inquired into the required calculations

Please, poke holes in or suggest any additions/alternatives!

[sweetnsimple786]

Okay... seems a little complicated but cool. Like Tilia said, the experiment itself doesn't matter as much, but I have great respect for people who really want to take advantage of the G4 opportunity to do something fun and complex. =)

So if you were to burn the garbage, you could use calorimetry to see how much energy [well, heat] was released.

Now seeing how much of the energy you can harness to do work is a lot harder.

No engine is completely efficient. I think Carnot efficiency is good at ~67%, although it's different for different machines.

So to figure out how you'd take the energy released from the garbage to power something... whoo, I don't know. If you really wanted to take it to this step, you could make this part research based rather than experimental, but I think you'd be fine stopping at how much heat is released from garbage with different components.

Can you burn 100% gasoline? Doesn't it evaporate quite readily, being an alcohol?

I think it'd be interesting to look at different kinds of fuel from different gas stations nearby. Like we have regular, premium, plus and diesel as variant fuels at each gas station, but many gas stations boast a special fuel-efficient/restorative ingredient. BP and Chevron, I know for sure. I'm not sure which kinds of gas stations you have around your town/city.

[Tilia]

Theorethically, it ought to work. We never did any caliometry during our chemistry labs, so I don't how if it works practically, but consult your teacher. A suggestion: Do not make it too serious and complicated, G4 project is your only opportunity to do labs without it having to be serious and lab reports etc etc, so save some energy to the more serious assessments.

[BustinJieber]

The topic deadline is due in a few days, and still no ideas...any suggestions/guiding tips? Much appreciated : |

[JoeG]

Biodiversity is always an easy topic to do. As long as you live in a location that has a river, field, or forest, you can do it easily.

I recommend that you examine a body of water, as it is usually easier to find animals with nets in the water, than chasing down animals in a forest.

There are many variables you can chose. You can chose pH, temperature, amount of pollutant X, distance from shoreline, etc.

P.S. I did a Biodiversity Group IV project, and it worked out pretty well.

Edited September 8, 2010 by JoeGuff