ScienceFreePrintable

Renewable Energy Activities

A free science worksheet ready for your classroom. Open in Kuraplan to grab the print-ready PDF, customize it for your students, or generate a fresh version in seconds.

Download now

Name:Date:

Renewable Energy Activities

A coastal town in Aotearoa is planning cleaner ways to power its homes. Explore how renewable energy works, compare options, and make a recommendation. Use the information and table on this sheet.

Energy choices

Renewable energy comes from sources replenished naturally on a human timescale. Solar, wind, hydroelectric and geothermal energy are renewable. Coal, oil and natural gas are fossil fuels formed over millions of years; using them releases carbon dioxide. Renewable systems can also have environmental effects, such as changing river habitats or altering landscapes.

1.Choose the best definition: renewable energy is energy from sources that…

are naturally replenished on a human timescale
never affect the environment
are always available at every moment
cost nothing to build

2.Select all the renewable energy sources in this list.

sunlight
coal
wind
natural gas
moving water
heat from inside Earth

3.Match each energy source to the way it can generate electricity.

Solar
Wind
Hydroelectric
Geothermal

Moving or falling water turns a turbine.
Sunlight is converted to electrical energy by photovoltaic cells.
Moving air turns turbine blades.
Heat from underground provides hot water or steam to drive a turbine.

Read the town’s energy snapshot

The town’s electricity team estimates the share of its yearly electricity generated by each source. The values are a fictional planning example, not an official New Zealand statistic.

Source

Hydroelectric

40%

Geothermal

25%

Wind

20%

Solar

15%

4.Use the snapshot. What percentage of the town’s electricity comes from renewable sources? Show how you worked it out.

5.Which source supplies the largest share, and how many percentage points larger is that share than wind?

6.A student says, “Because all four sources are renewable, they can produce exactly the same amount of electricity at every hour.” Explain why this claim is not necessarily correct.

Make a careful recommendation

The town is considering a new wind farm. Wind turbines generate electricity without burning fuel, but their location matters: construction and turbine operation may affect habitats, views and nearby communities. No single energy source is perfect, so planning involves weighing benefits and impacts.

7.Complete the sentence: Compared with burning coal, generating electricity from wind generally releases carbon dioxide during operation.

8.Complete the sentence: Wind turbines generate electricity without burning fossil fuel, so wind power generally releases carbon dioxide during operation than burning coal.

9.Give one possible benefit and one possible impact of building a wind farm near the town.

10.Write a short recommendation to the town council: should it investigate the wind farm proposal further? Give a decision and support it with two reasons, including one consideration that planners should check.