PLAYING WITH CLEAN ENERGY: A MULTIMEDIA GUIDE

The theme of clean, renewable energies is of extraordinary importance, either for environmental protection or for economic reasons. From an educational point of view, the treatment of this topic allows to introduce and to deepen various questions regarding the inter-conversion of the energy among its various forms (i.e., gravitational, electric, radiant and so on). This may be done at various levels: from a purely qualitative one, suited for a primary/middle school level, to a quantitative treatment to propose in the high schools. In this context, we present here a multimedia tool, developed by using the Java programming language, intended as an interactive guide to build functioning models of energy-conversion devices. Proposed devices, all of which may be constructed by employing easily fond materials, comprise: i) simple electric lamps circuits illustrating the conversion among electric, radiant and thermal energies; ii) wind-operated electric generator (Savonius turbine); iii) hydroelectric generator; iv) solar energy devices (photoelectric and thermal). All of these devices are visually and interactively illustrated, as are the outstanding physical principles.