Nuclear Energy

Mrs. Sehgal

Evander Childs High School

Energy Crisis…

…. Alternate Sources are needed

Due to the recent Blackout in New York as well as a few other states in United States and Canada, the existence of energy crisis has become a very important problem facing the government. The gasoline prices have jumped up, heating oil prices have been raised, the cost of electricity and gas also increased due to this black out.

Your local government is thinking of putting more money towards the research into Alternate Sources of Energy to generate Electricity instead of the traditional from Fossil Fuels considering that fossil fuels are present only in limited quantity on earth. These include using Solar energy, opening a Nuclear Power Plant, Hydroelectric Power generation. Your local government is very much interested in starting a Nuclear Power Plant in your neighborhood. Your neighborhood is a highly populated area. You have been appointed as a representative of your community by the Environmental Protection Agency to discuss about the benefits and drawbacks of opening the Nuclear Power Plant in your neighborhood and give your opinion about solving this problem. Being given a responsible position of representing your neighborhood, you have to be well educated as to know all the alternatives and then answer if Nuclear Energy is an appropriate answer to the our energy crisis?

Working in a group of 3, your task consists of two main parts:

A WRITTEN PAPER

Submit a typed paper about 3-5 pages long. It must have a cover page showing the Title, Date, Teacher’s name and the names of all the Group members. You must include bibliography at the end. You have to follow the Public Policy Analyst Model (PPA) to complete your paper; the steps of this model are given below.

1-Define the problem

2-Gather Evidence of the Problem

3-Identify the causes of the problem

4-Evaluate the existing Policy

5-Develop Public Policy Solution

6-Selecting the Best Policy after analyzing Benefits and Risks

AN ORAL PRESENTATION

You will be given 5-7 min of time for oral presentation in front of the class about your findings on this topic. All the members of the group should be able to answer questions about your findings.

1. Each member of your group must be assigned a job for appropriately completing your project. In order for you to understand the problem, read the four Hyperlinks listed in the resources section of this TIPS WebQuest. Each member may read one (or two) of these and discuss with each other, noting down the important points of your interest. You may also read more references as you work on your paper if you need extra information about the topic.

2. There are 6 work sheets, one for each of the 6 steps of PPA model. You will need these worksheets in order to complete your written report.

Find these at the end of each of the following PPA hyperlinks. Read these carefully. To get to the first worksheet click on the hyperlink, “Define the Problem”, you will see a yellow screen with some information, read this part, you may click on the “See the example” given to help you in completing your worksheet. You will see two work sheets for each step, but you can type your answers only on one of them (MSWORD), click on it and answer the questions 1-4.

1-Define the problem

2-Gather Evidence of the Problem

3-Identify the causes of the problem

4-Evaluate the Existing Policy

5-Develop Public Policy Solution

6-Selecting the Best Policy after analyzing Benefits and Risks

3. Follow the same steps to complete other 5 worksheets. For every worksheet there is an example given to help you complete it for your problem.

4. Now, you may start typing your paper making sure to follow the proper steps using your worksheets and other resources listed below. The completed report should answer the following questions.

A) What do you mean by Energy crisis? (worksheet 1)

B) Show the Proof that it exists and the reasons that contributed to its existence (worksheets 2 and 3)

C) Compare Nuclear Energy with other alternate sources of energy such as wind power, solar energy. (Finding the best solution)

D) Discuss the benefits and risks involved with Nuclear energy (worksheet 4)

E) Evaluate different energy sources for their Effectiveness and Feasibility (worksheet 6)

F) Can your policy be easily enacted by the Govt. agencies? Will it produce results that will lessen the present energy crisis? (worksheet 5)

Use the following websites to help you research your paper:

www.goggle.com

www.yahoo.com

(these two can be used as search engines to look for various sites)

http://www.nuc.umr.edu/~ans/QA.html

(This site explains the need for nuclear energy, its uses and risks compared to other sources, cost analysis etc.)

http://www.lehman.cuny.edu/depts/langlit/tbj/02septoct/a5.pdf

( The article describes the concerns over possible terrorist attack on Indian Point Plant and some statistics about its use)

http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/nuclear/page/at_a_glance/reactors/in_point.html

(This paper gives the location and statistics of total KWhrs of energy produced at the Indian Point Power Plant)

http://www.sparkingreaction.info/news_18340495-B079-4297-81CE9AC4BCCD2579.shtml

(This paper describes the security lacks at the nuclear power plant and its vulnerability to terrorist attack)

http://www.nytimes.com/pages/national/nationalspecial2/

(This site contains many articles and pictures of New York City during the blackout.)

Text Book Environment Science by Holt (pages. 283-286)

Your project will be graded based on several criteria as described below.

Criteria

Points

	Unsatisfactory Less than 65	Satisfactory 70-80	Good 80-90	Excellent 90-100
Organization	Audience cannot understand presentation because there is no sequence of information.	Audience has difficulty following presentation because student jumps around.	Student presents information in logical sequence which audience can follow.	Student presents information in logical, interesting sequence which can be easily understood.	____
Content Knowledge	Student does not have grasp of information; student cannot answer questions about subject.	Student is uncomfortable with information and is able to answer only rudimentary questions.	Student is at ease with content, but fails to elaborate.	Student demonstrates full knowledge (more than required)with explanations and elaboration.	____
Visuals	Student used no visuals.	Student occasional used visuals that rarely support text and presentation.	Visuals related to text and presentation.	Student used visuals to reinforce screen text and presentation.	____
Mechanics	Student's presentation had four or more spelling errors and/or grammatical errors.	Presentation had three misspellings and/or grammatical errors.	Presentation has no more than two misspellings and/or grammatical errors.	Presentation has no misspellings or grammatical errors.	____
Delivery	Student mumbles, incorrectly pronounces terms, and speaks too quietly for students in the back of class to hear.	Student incorrectly pronounces terms. Audience members have difficulty hearing presentation.	Student's voice is clear. Student pronounces most words correctly.	Student used a clear voice and correct, precise pronunciation of terms.	____

New York State Performance Standards: 

Science 

S5 Scientific Thinking

S5c Uses evidence from reliable sources to develop descriptions and explanations.

S5d Proposes, recognizes, and analyzes,

S5e Identifies problems; proposes and implements solutions;.

S5f Works individually and in teams to collect and share information and ideas.

S6 Scientific Tools and Technologies

6b Records and stores data using a variety of formats.

S6 Acquires information from multiple sources.

S7 Scientific Communication

S7d explains a scientific concept or procedure to other students.

S7e Communicates in a form suited to the purpose and the audience.

E English Language Arts

E1c: Read and comprehend informational materials.

E2a: Produce a report of information.

E3c: Prepare and deliver an individual presentation

Using this WebQuest, you should have been able to learn the present energy crisis facing the world and the various alternate energy resources that can be used, especially the nuclear energy, its comparison with other resources. Also, you should have learned to use the websites to get the information for any research topic. You should now be familiar with different steps of the Public Policy Analyst for solving problems.

In our next WebQuest we will study the Air Pollution caused by burning Fossil Fuel.