Argumentative Essay: Coal Energy Or Wind Energy

Coal Energy vs Wind Energy The United States alone burns more than a billion tons of coal every year, making up more than half of the electricity used in the US from coal power. However, burning fossil fuels also causes 78 percent of the United States global warming emissions, 32 percent being from coal. In order to combat these pollutants and hopefully cut down prices different cleaner, and renewable energy alternatives are being used instead. One of these newer and effective forms of renewable energy is wind power, in order to understand the way these affect the environment, the process of each needs to be understood. Coal power starts with the coal arriving at the plant where it with be converted into energy at. The coal is first fed into a machine called a “pulverizer” where it is crushed into a very fine, black powder. The coal is then mixed with hot air in order to enable a cleaner more efficient burn in the furnace. As the coal burns it heats a larger boiler above the furnace, which creates steam from the water. The steam converts heat …show more content…
There are 2 types of wind turbines, a drag type which has a high torque but slow turning speed and a lift type which, because of the blade design, creates a lot of air pressure and is spun much faster. Because of the lift type being able to spin faster, they are more often used for creating large amounts of energy at a time. Wind turbines are similar to coal power because as the wind rotates the blade, the axle of the blade rotates a generator similar to the one inside of the coal plant. The blades rotate a large magnet in the center of copper wires and the current is harnessed from it. The mechanical energy is changed to electrical and then goes on the same sort of path that the coal plant does, into a transformer to up the voltage and finally back down when reaching a house or neighborhood, however this time with no