Imagine a day without vehicles. No cars, buses, trucks, rideshares.

It's almost impossible to imagine, right? Transportation is an integral part of our everyday lives. The average American drives more than 15,000 miles and spends 54 hours stuck in traffic every year. Ouch.

Today, transportation makes up nearly 30% of our energy use in the United States and most of our oil consumption.

We're thinking differently about how to travel in a sustainable way. Introducing the latest in mobility innovation!

https://www.nrel.gov/news/video/transportation-energy-basics-text.html

Prompt

Research is a crucial part of the studio process and can help you generate lots of new, creative ideas and solutions. To get as much access to useful information as possible, we'll each take on a small portion of the research and then move on to brainstorming!

Work in small teams and choose from the following list: solar, wind, hydropower, geothermal, biomass, or tidal. 

Each group will have about 30 minutes to research and learn about their renewable energy system. Then, you will share your knowledge with the rest of the class. This will be a casual share-out. This research will be quick and collaborative. 

Instructions

Research your selected energy source. 

• Great resource: http://www.landartgenerator.org/LAGI-FieldGuideRenewableEnergy-ed2.pdf
• Another great resource (with more resources at the bottom): United Nations: Renewable Energies
• There are a few high-quality videos linked in the Resources tab above.

Next, in your groups, you will make a poster of your energy system to share out to the class. On a larger piece of paper (at least 11 X17), make a poster that includes:

•  3 key takeaways (useful information, things you didn't know before).
• A sketch or diagram of how the system works, describing how the energy source works. Try to make your drawing clearly convey the process of energy generation and transmission. Use arrows, labels, and colors to add to your sketch.

Share your poster with the class.  Then, together, reflect:  How does this research inform your ideas about the future of transit and personalized mobility? What are you most excited about for the future of transit? Are there opportunities you think should be explored? 

Deliverables

Post your an image of your poster in the Responses tab above.