Ask an Expert

Answer: Turning down your thermostat to 68°F from 70°F during the day and to 63°F at night could save you up to 20% on your heating costs.

Answer: An electromagnet is a magnet in which the magnetic field is produced by a flow of electric current. It consists of a coil of copper wire wrapped around an iron core. You can change (or stop) the strength of an electromagnet by adjusting the amount of electricity flowing through it.

Answer: Cell phone chargers are known as “energy vampires,” because they draw a lot of energy by being plugged in when phones are already charged or not even connected to them. In fact, only 5% of the power drawn by a cell phone charger is used to charge the phone. The other 95% is wasted when it is left plugged into the wall! To stop this energy waste, get yourself (and your family) in the habit of unplugging all chargers––including iPod chargers––when not in use.

Answer: Stored energy (also called “potential energy”) is the energy in matter due to its position or the arrangement of its parts. For example, a coconut hanging on a palm tree has stored energy because of its position suspended in the air. When the coconut drops from the tree and falls to the ground, its potential energy is converted into energy in motion (also called “kinetic energy”). Another example that illustrates the difference between these two types of energy is a twisted-up rubber band used to fly a toy airplane. The rubber band contains potential energy that is converted into kinetic energy when it untwists and turns the propeller.

Answer: You can't see electricity when it is flowing through a circuit. But if electricity leaves the circuit, as it does when someone is shocked, you can see a spark. The spark isn't electricity itself. It is a flame that occurs when the electricity travels through the air and burns up oxygen particles.

Answer: Well, yes and no. Yes, because you need energy to make anything happen—it’s what makes anything and everything move, change, and/or grow. Everything that happens does so because of energy, and all living things use energy. But everything in the world does not use energy. For example, a rock on the ground and a car parked in a driveway do not use energy while they are sitting still. However, if you want to move the rock, or drive the car, you need to use energy to do that.

Answer: Shoes hanging on a power line don’t get burned for the same reason that birds standing on a power line don’t get shocked: they don’t give electricity a path to the ground, so electricity stays in the line and does not go through them. But if the shoes were to touch a power line and a power pole at the same time, they would provide a path to the ground and would get blasted with electric current. It wouldn’t be pretty!

By the way, if you ever see someone throwing shoes up onto a line, tell them to stop! The shoes can damage the power line, or someone trying to get the shoes down could be seriously shocked or even killed.

Answer: Yes! Manure can be made into a gas containing methane. (Methane is the same energy-rich gas found in natural gas.) Certain types of bacteria emit this gas as they consume manure collected in special air-free tanks. The mixture of gases produced in this way, called biogas, can then be used in some modified car engines instead of gasoline, or burned in a boiler to generate heat or electricity.

Answer: Just like manure, other types of organic waste emit methane as they decompose—or rot—in the landfill. Landfills can collect and treat the methane and then sell it as a commercial fuel, or they can burn it to generate steam and electricity. Today, there are almost 400 gas energy landfill projects operating in the United States.

Answer: One lightning strike can carry up to 30 million volts—as much electricity as 2.5 million car batteries.

Answer: Replacing one incandescent light bulb with an energy-saving compact fluorescent bulb prevents about 1,000 pounds of carbon dioxide from being emitted to the atmosphere from power plants, and saves about $67 dollars in energy costs over the bulb's lifetime.

Answer: Ben Franklin’s famous key did give off an electric spark. But lucky for Franklin, the kite was just drawing small electrical charges from the air. If the kite had been struck by lightning, Franklin would have been killed!