Table of Contents Coal Changes Everything The World Runs on Fossil Fuels Fossil Fuels Damage the Environment Humans Harness Wind Power 10 Turning water into power 12 Nuclear Power Is cleaner but Not Safer 14 Energy from Earth itself 16 Solar Power Leads the Way 18 Transportation uses a lot of Energy 20 Implementing Alternative Energy Is Not Easy 22 New Alternative Energies still Being Discovered 24 Some countries already using mostly Alternative Energy 26 Fact Sheet 28 Glossary 30 For More Information 31 Index 32 About the Author 32
Coal Changes Everything Energy needs in the 1700s were was used to heat homes and keep simple Industry and manufacturing pots boiling Fossil fuels we know had not developed yet There was no today such as coal and oil were machinery to power Animals did the available but not widely used hard work plowing fields and pulling One fossil fuel that changed the equipment Windmills crushed grain world was coal It was used for or pumped water But people have thousands of years as a heat always burned materials source Coal burned hotter than for energy Wood wood or other materials and made less smoke It was The Industrial Revolution led to the growth of factories and jobs great at producing steam to power steam engines of ships and trains Steam power helped industry develop This time period of growth in manufacturing was called the Industrial Revolution It began in Europe in the 1700s By the 1800s the Industrial Revolution had reached the United States Soon more uses were found for coal By 1875 coal was used to heat furnaces in factories that produced steel Building and manufacturing took off Then in 1880 coal was
MINING COAL 300 million There are two methods to extract coal from the ground Most coal mined in the United States is near Estimated age in years of the oldest coal found in the United States the surface Machines remove layers of rock to get at the coal Underground mines can be 1 000 feet 305 m deep and miles long Machines dig for coal and send it to the surface Coal was discovered thousands of years ago It was not widely used as fuel until the 1700s Coal was used heavily during the industrial Revolution in the 1700s and 1800s Steam power helped industry develop Oil became the dominant energy source for transportation in the late 1800s During this same time period oil was also being used more often Oil gives off light when burned and was first used in lamps as a lighting source But its potential was soon discovered as a fuel source It became the dominant energy source S for transportation around the world The use of fossil fuels has continued today But oil and coal are limited resources The need to develop new energy sources has become more important used to generate electricity for the first time Homes began using coal for heat and for
