The book Chemistry on a Budget contains inexpensive chemistry labs that are useful with easy to obtain materials.
There are two versions of each lab, one with a ten-question conclusion and one with directions for a full lab report. This way the teacher has the option! Each lab is two pages to allow for one two-sided handout.
You can buy this lab book for $23 at amazon.com or lulu.com. It will take 1-2 weeks to get to you -- Order Now. It’s a great resource!
http://www.amazon.com/Chemistry-Budget-Marjorie-R-Heesemann/dp/0578129159/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1389410170&sr=1-1&keywords=chemistry+on+a+budget
http://www.lulu.com/shop/marjorie-r-heesemann/chemistry-on-a-budget/paperback/product-21217600.html
*Some of you have already purchased my lab book – be sure to check out Page 141 !
“About 3 billion of the world’s poorest people burn wood, charcoal or dung in smoky, open fires to cook their food and heat their homes. Millions die annually from lung and heart ailments caused by cooking with solid fuels, according to the World Health Organization.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/these-cheap-clean-stoves-were-supposed-to-save-millions-of-lives-what-happened/2015/10/29/c0b98f38-77fa-11e5-a958-d889faf561dc_story.html?utm_term=.83f2e546ccf1
In my experience, outdoor cooking fires are usually for summer barbeques and camping, not daily life. At first I didn’t see the need for this technology, but after considering the effects of daily exposure to fire smoke, it made more sense.
“To address the increased environmental health risk faced by more than 3 billion people in the developing world who burn solid fuels (e.g. wood, charcoal, dung, crop residues and coal), EPA works to increase the use of home cooking and heating practices that are:
- Affordable
- Reliable
- Clean
- Efficient
- Safe
https://www.epa.gov/indoor-air-quality-iaq/clean-cookstoves
Here is a PBS video report from 2015:
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/building-cleaner-cookstoves/
The United Nations is involved:
http://www.unfoundation.org/what-we-do/campaigns-and-initiatives/cookstoves/
as is Nigeria:
“The Nigerian Alliance for Clean Cookstoves will be governed by an Advisory Board that is made up of top representatives of government from the energy, health, finance and environment sectors, as well as the international community, NGO community, among others. The Advisory Board’s purpose is to guide the Nigerian Alliance for Clean Cookstoves in all matters, including decisions related to its mission, programmatic focus, policies, funding, and growth.”
http://nigeriacleancooking.org/
“Based on results reported by partners this year and careful analyses of the trends in available data, an estimated 20.6 million stoves and fuels were distributed in 2015, of which 13 million (63%) were clean and/or efficient. Cumulatively, an estimated 82 million stoves and fuels, including 53 million clean and/or efficient, have been distributed since 2010.”
http://cleancookstoves.org/resources/reports/2016progress.html
Another cook stove project in Latin America is Stove Team International:
“StoveTeam is a nonprofit, 501c3 organization, that helps local entrepreneurs establish factories in Latin America. These self-sustaining businesses produce safe, affordable, fuel-efficient cookstoves to replace dangerous open cooking fires. Ecocina factories have produced more than 56,334 stoves, improving the lives of more than 422,505 people.
StoveTeam's model has been awarded the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Partnership for Clean Indoor Air Award for Developing Local Markets for our innovative approach creating local employment while improving health and reducing air pollution.”
http://www.stoveteam.org/
This 10/29/2015 editorial in the Washington Post provided various criticisms of this technology:
“ ‘[C]lean’ is a nebulous term. Of those 28 million cookstoves, only 8.2 million — the ones that run on electricity or burn liquid fuels including liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), ethanol and biogas — meet the health guidelines for indoor emissions set by the WHO. The vast majority of the stoves burn wood, charcoal, animal dung or agricultural waste — and aren’t, therefore, nearly as healthy as promised. Although these cookstoves produce fewer emissions than open fires, burning biomass fuels in them still releases plenty of toxins. ‘As yet, no biomass stove in the world is clean enough to be truly health protective in household use,’ says Kirk Smith, a professor of global environmental health at the University of California at Berkeley and the leading health researcher on cookstoves.
That’s not the only problem with the stoves. Some perform well in the lab but not in the field. Others crack or break under constant heat. The best cookstoves burning clean fuels won’t protect poor families from disease if those who use them continue to cook over open fires as well — which many do.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/these-cheap-clean-stoves-were-supposed-to-save-millions-of-lives-what-happened/2015/10/29/c0b98f38-77fa-11e5-a958-d889faf561dc_story.html?utm_term=.83f2e546ccf1
Past blog posts about Combustion reactions include:
01/22/2014 Combustion of a Hydrocarbon
05/28/2014 Organic Chemistry – Chemical Reactions
11/25/2014 Predicting Products of a Combustion
Reaction (5th Rxn Type)
*This Blog contains several entries that would be helpful to your chemistry classroom. Check out the Topic List to help you to find past Blog entries.
Also, Write To Me about your successes, challenges, or questions in the Chemistry Classroom.
Remember, buying a copy of the lab book Chemistry on a Budget can be very useful to your Chemistry classroom with labs and class article ideas.
Have a great weekend!