Using Simple Circuits as Thermal Models for Your Home

• Autores: Adele Poynor
• Localización: The Physics Teacher, ISSN 0031-921X, Vol. 52, Nº. 2, 2014, págs. 102-103
• Idioma: inglés
• Texto completo no disponible (Saber más ...)
• Resumen

  • In 2009, President Obama proposed an initiative to decrease our country's energy consumption and dependence on fossil fuels. One key to this plan was to decrease the amount of energy used to heat and cool our homes through government incentives. The EPA estimates that the average American household spends over $1000 annually for heating and cooling. 1 One of the most cost-effective ways of decreasing energy use in your home is to stop air penetration and increase the amount of insulation by installing insulated doors, insulated windows, and cavity wall insulation. But not all options are equally effective, nor do they have equal costs. So how can consumers determine which option improves their homes' insulation the most? In this paper, I present an analogy to simple resistor circuits that can be used by introductory students to answer this question.