Introduction:       

          Dear readers,

          Are you ready to go through a very interesting journey to the future? I swear it is not going to take you to a zombie apocalypse or another pandemic disease; how about something bright? I am Sarah, an electrical engineering student who is looking forward to digging deeper into the world of energy sources and electrical inventions. I have always been interested in the way life changed between the decades, and repeatedly thought about meeting someone from the past to see how he would react to the basic lifestyle, events, inventions that we have today, is he going to think that I lost my mind? Absolutely, therefore I believe that the future has much more than what our minds can accommodate. I am going to describe a world where burning fossil fuels is not the main option to provide heat or generate electricity anymore. In fact, it has become a highly threatening option to humankind, and consequently, each person bears a big part of the responsibility of providing himself with power. The world`s scientists has come together to figure out methods to manage the energy situation, renewable energy sources – including nontraditional ones -, ways to save as much of it as possible, alongside having clear energy systems with taking security and diplomacy in consideration. I hope to be able to open the horizons for you to create a vision of the energy and power field in 2100.

Spoiler alert: This Sci-fi essay contains the life events happening after 77 years from now.

 

2100 the Time for Energy Revolution

             Energy in all its forms has always taken a huge demand from humans, it is basically the element that gives them the righteous life conditions for living. Right now, in 2100, with the wide increasing population on the earth planet, relying on fossil fuels is not even close to producing enough energy. And here comes science`s role to take over and manage the energy systems, find efficient renewable energy sources, provide energy saving methods and inventions, come up with solutions that stopped many power sources, making it become every person`s duty to use these sources and systems responsibly and follow up with the energy managing plans.

            When talking about renewable energy sources the four elements of matter must be taken into consideration: Air, sun, water, earth. Nowadays, each building has its own mini vertical axis wind turbine - a device that connects blades with an electrical generator that makes it able to turn wind kinetic energy into electricity- on the top of it, which provides the building with the amount of electricity it needs most time of the year. The thing about vertical axis turbine design is that it doesn`t have to be put in a certain position to spin according to wind direction; which makes it the right choice for places with unstable wind direction such as residential places.  As for days with no wind, every building now has solar panels that turn thermal energy from sun`s heat into electrical energy, and it works now more effective than ever because scientists found ways to stop the big part of solar power that is reflected back to space. By building devices that hang in the sky, some of them can absorb those reflected radiations and save the energy for later usage, and some are giant mirrors with calculated positions – considering solar panels direction too - that will reflect the radiations back to earth.

           In addition to renewable energy sources, and looking into the earth element, most places now have artificial plant leaves that scientists discovered and developed to be able to simulate photosynthesis; due to the increasing responsibility to save our planet from the global warming, which was caused by our huge mistake of burning extreme amount of fossil fuels in the past. This technology – just like the real photosynthesis- converts sunlight into chemical energy to benefit the living creatures on this planet. Another source I must mention is glacier ice – the ones in Antarctica and Greenland specifically-, ways were found to melt this ice by using chemical reactions, then using another chemical reaction to evaporate water turning it into water gas. Afterwords, this gas is pointed at electrical generators that work by changing the magnetic flux to create electromotive force. Also, there has been a great development in using running water to generate power. Right now, the sewage sawyers have such generators to take advantage of the running water there, turning kinetic energy into electricity.

            Furthermore, I must mention some of the non-traditional inventions that work on creating and saving energy. One of the most affected fields in this improvement is the transportation field, for example: Magnetic bicycles are used by a big number of students and workers, these bicycles working mechanism is having similar magnetic poles facing one another but with different sizes allowing the magnetic discord to do its work in giving a first push to the bicycle, then the wheels that have two opposite magnet poles and metal peace inside with a spring keep it going. Another example is the flashlight shoes – a device that has an electrical generator with magnetic field and a battery- so every taken step using these shoes causes half circular flip in the generator, which create alternative current, and the battery saves it. This invention alone increased the desire for people to walk and take public transportation, gave them a healthier lifestyle, and it definitely gave the average taken steps for each person in a day a big boost. Also, elevators nowadays work mechanism is converting chemical energy into kinetic energy, using calculated amounts of ingredients to start chemical interactions that will make the elevator reach the required height.

             Another thing I need to tell you about is the biotechnology revolution that happened at this time era. Scientists took huge inspiration from the biological and chemical structure of the world`s creatures, there curiosity to know how it functions and how it works took over, leading into discovering many beneficial inventions to the power field. One such example is the creation of solar panels from Papaya fruit enzymes, those panels are now used everywhere as a result of their low cost, big porosity, and how they don’t need high temperature levels to be made. But the unbelievable thing about them is that they are attached to every smart device such as: cell phones, laptops, and smart watches, this way these devices charge daily just by being exposed to any light form. Another example is the discovery of a kind of anaerobic bacteria that provides itself with the power needed to do its vital operations by using the electrons produced in the oxidation operation of its enviromental surroundings, this bacterium is used to create microbial fuel cells to generate electricity and sanitize ground water.

            A very significant event that has a great affection in 2100 is the ability to apply Nuclear Fusion and take advantage of the massive power it produces. This energy source ingredients are quite available and the amount of power it produces is much more than the power produced by Nuclear Fission. If we are taking energy security into consideration, this is the option that we are looking for; because it creates a brief amount of radioactive materials- comparing with Nuclear Fission-. Also, transferring Nuclear Fusion fuel is safer, easier, and needs less strict rules and conditions. All these advantages took place because scientists were able to provide high temperature levels for the atomic nuclei combining to happen, and the credit goes to astrophysicists and astronautics for researching, and the multi space trips they took to be able to know the elements of the stars and conditions that led into having this enormously high temperature. Due to the huge work, they were able to create the perfect conditions to reach the high temperatures in addition to chemical interactions.

            Energy security is also an important topic to cover, and the awareness towards it grew a lot; since renewable energy sources are used in every building and house, it was a must to have people learn about dealing with those systems and devices safely. Another thing that benefited this topic was the widespread and improvement of Artificial Intelligence, fireplace and heaters has sensors that connect to AI which can recognize their surroundings by sensing body hormones, and with that they recognize when a child is getting closer -from sensing it hormones- and send a heard alert, so adults around pay attention. If the child reached a certain distance and was not removed, they quickly raise a protection shield to avoid getting the child burnt. Also, those AI connected heaters can sense when a room reaches a certain temperature then works on keeping it stable with the changes of temperature throughout the day, these sensors are more useful in the nighttime.

            Continuing the idea ahead, using gas or diesel fuel to heat water is prohibitive because of the dangers and fire explosions it can start. People now use solar water heating systems that are attached to heat containers that saves heat energy to the times of the year when the sun doesn’t show much power. But that doesn`t mean that cold weather countries should worry, buildings now have huge satellites that collect the sound and light energy from thunder and lightning to save it and convert it into thermal energy using it to heat water. Also, some institutions use electrical resistance circuits for heating purposes.

              A major form of energy that no one can deny its importance is electrical networks, the electrical sources are different kinds of generators and energy conversion as mentioned earlier. The controlling devices are different types of transistors and switches.one thing worth mentioning is that most devices have built in electrical transformers which reduces the problem of not being able to use some device in different countries, and it is a brief way transforming direct current to devices that need it.

              One more thing, it is significant to mention the steps taken to manage energy for individuals and all society. We can confidentially say that people in 2100 have become involved in the energy field more than ever, each person can now be aware of the amount of energy produced, stored, consumed, and needed in their basic daily life by using phone applications. All buildings have saved energy backup for times of crisis, and society is conscious of the importance of saving energy because of the hard time we have been through earlier due to the immoderate usage for energy.

              For a fact, the energy field has expanded and thrived in this lifetime -2100-, but that doesn`t mean that it has had enough with improving. Scientists, engineers, and astronautics are constantly putting hard work together to find more renewable energy sources, have lower cost energy systems with more efficient performance. A big priority goes to extending the world of energy systems and taking advantage of the topography of our beloved earth to have the best usage of those systems. This planet needs to sincerely flourish and grow while we live on it and make it a better place for the upcoming generations.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Epilogue:

As a university freshman that majored in electrical engineering, writing this essay opened for me the horizons of knowledge, research, imagination and helped me to dig deeper into the world of STEM majors. I tried to give a comprehensive look at the energy situation in the future, and to cover as many topics as possible according to this field. It fed the science loving part of me that wanted to learn more about possible energy sources, energy saving inventions and much more improvements and effective solutions. The Sci-fi genre is something that has always taken a huge interest from me, and I constantly wished for an opportunity to improve my skills in expressing my imaginary thoughts and vision of variable things in this world. Writing this essay has been like traveling on a short trip to the future, I honestly enjoyed writing every single line.

-Sarah Sharayah

 

Underlined green terms are ideas that are not my own ideas, or not my own description of them, but I felt that they are worth mentioning.

Here are their sources:

Vertical axes wind turbine: Wind turbine - Wikipedia, papaya fruit solar panels: Researchers organically engineer solar cells using enzymes in papaya fruit (techxplore.com), anerobic bacteria : Electrified Bacteria Clean Wastewater, Generate Power | NASA Spinoff.

Other ideas are from my own imaginary creation, and for the ideas that already exist I used my own thoughts to develop them to work more effectively or find solutions to the problems that are stopping them from being used and spreading at the main time. The main source for my scientific explanations is my own understanding for different physics sections that I studied and researched about deeply in physics science subjects at high school senior year. Also, I relied on chemistry and biology subjects, especially the chapters connected to energy converting and technology. I can say, this scientific background took a huge part of the ideas written in this research, depending on critical and reverse thinking.