Assignment Overview & Goals: This lab has two activities.

The first looks at energy

use in your home state and how it has changed over time. The second is a brief
activity focused on looking at whether solar power could be a viable option to offset
Belmont’s energy use or at your house.

Assignment Instructions: Please complete the two activities below and submit a .doc
or .docx file with your responses to questions to blackboard by lab time next week.
This assignment is worth a total of 20 points. 10 Points for Activity 1, and 10points
for Activity 2

Due Date: Submit to Blackboard By Thursday After Spring Break

Activity 1: Renewable Energy and Your State

Each student will answer the following question.

Go to the website: https://windexchange.energy.gov/states/

On this website, select either the state you are from originally from or another of your
choosing.

1) What is your state and what proportion of the energy portfolio is made up of
renewable, nuclear, and fossil fuels? Write these three numbers down.

Renewable: 28.64
Nuclear: 23.68
Fossil Fuels: 47.67

2) Scroll down on the page for your state and look under the header policies and
incentives. Determine how many cities (if any) in your home state (or chosen
state) have commitments to 100% renewable energy (and also note the date).

3 cities with 100% commitments to renewable energy by 2030:

• Minneapolis
• St. Paul
• St. Louis Park
 3) Go to the following website: https://windexchange.energy.gov/maps-
data/321 and determine your state’s total installed capacity of wind power vs. it’s
potential.

Installed capacity: 4,578 MW

Potential capacity: 183,000 MW

4) Describe the variation between these two numbers for your state and why there is
such a large gap.

I imagine the largest opposition to wind energy is the negative visual aesthetic it
presents. The southern portion of Minnesota is largely prairie land (best location
for wind farms) and contains the majority of the urban sprawl which would
oppose the visual intrusion. It also contains a lot of farm land. The north is
largely forested and contains a large amount of protected land.

5) For your state, make a graph that shows how wind installation has changed from
1999-2020. If your state is one of the white states (with no installation yet), then
use TN instead. *Hint – to do this, you’ll have to figure out what the data is from
1999-2020 by using the scroll bar at the bottom. Here’s a picture of what you
should be looking at.

MN Wind Power Installed Capacity

5000
4500
4000
3500
3000
2500
2000
1500
1000
500
0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22

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Activity 2: Google has been working on an exciting project for the last few years
called project sunroof. This program calculates how much solar capacity is available
on a given roof and looks at how much cost savings someone would have if they
installed solar panels on their home. Please complete the following activity and
answer the questions below.

Go to the Project Sunroof website. https://www.google.com/get/sunroof and enter

your home address. If the home address where you live is unavailable, then you can
use the address for Janet Ayers Academic Center or any other building on Belmont’s
campus (1803 15 Ave. S. Nashville, TN 37212).
th

Using this website, answer the following questions:

1) How many available hours of usable sunlight are there on your roof per year?

1548

2) How much (if any) does Project Sunroof estimate this would save you over 20
years?

$7000

Next, scroll down the screen and look at the box that says “Your potential
environmental impact.” At the bottom of this in blue, there is a button that should say
“See total solar potential for this zip code.” Select this and answer the following
questions:

3) What is the percentage of buildings that are solar-viable?

89%
 4) Are there any existing solar installations (some areas this will be yes –
if so record the number)

12

5) Scroll down and then see if solar was installed on the rooftops here, how many
cars being removed from the street this would be equivalent to. Record this
information here.

32.6K

6) Based on what you’ve seen here, do you think solar is a good option for your
home or Belmont? And for your zip code
Solar would be a good option for my current house. The roof face a good direction for solar collection
and there is ample roof space to cover 100% of the electrical usage. It would also be a good idea for the
zip code since a large percentage (89%) is viable for solar installation.