Energy Sources Types - MCQ Game Online
Energy source types
Our world runs on massive amounts of energy each day. We use energy to power important utilities, such as providing electricity to our houses, fuelling our cars and vehicles, and allowing us to cook tasty meals properly with sufficient heat.
The modern world uses several energy source types to meet the demands of a growing population. Energy can be extracted from many places, and energy sources are primarily divided into two categories – renewable and non-renewable energy.
Non-renewable energy can come in the form of coal, petroleum, underground deposits of natural gas, and other types of fossil fuels. These sources are rich in carbon and come from the remains of deceased organisms that have slowly transformed into fuel by the high heat and pressures beneath the Earth for hundreds of millions of years.
The term ‘non-renewable’ stems from the fact that the Earth possesses a finite amount of these resources. In the future, our supply of fossil fuels may be exhausted forever; as of now, however, there is still plenty to go around. As of the present day, non-renewable materials continue to be the most popular form of energy source.
It doesn’t cost much to extract resources like coal, methane and petroleum, which helps save money in obtaining and processing it for energy. However, the burning of these materials also releases pollutants such as carbon dioxide, sulfur, and nitrogen oxides. When these pollutants are present in the soil, water or air, they can cause a variety of diseases and other harmful conditions and disturb the natural ecosystem.
On the other hand, renewable energy sources can be obtained through naturally-occurring phenomena, such as sunlight, wind, running water, and the Earth’s own volcanic activity. It can also encompass resources such as biomass, or the organic waste from farming and other industries, which can easily be replenished.
Due to the potential hazards that combusting fossil fuel can bring to the environment, people support renewable energy as a safer and more sustainable alternative.
Solar energy is currently the most prominent type of renewable energy. It harnesses sunlight into electricity through the photovoltaic cells in its panels. Several panels can power a home, and miniature panels are regularly used for consumer appliances today.
Windmills – or wind turbine generators - produce energy when the movement of the air turns its large turbines. A single turbine can generate enough electricity for roughly 500 households per month. Tens to hundreds of these turbines compose a wind farm and often power multiple cities.
Hydroelectric power plants convert mechanical energy from moving water into electricity. The most important component of these plants are dams – barriers through which large quantities of water flow.
One of the more fascinating types of renewable resources is geothermal energy. The Earth constantly churns rock, magma, and other materials beneath the surface, releasing massive amounts of heat. This heat can be easily accessed in hotspots such as volcanoes and hot springs. Geothermal plants use this heat to quickly turn water into steam, which is then used to power steam engines.