My Bio Class

The semester is coming to an end and all I can say is, this class was a lot better than I thought it would be. I didn’t have a good lab class experience my first semester at Harper college and was worried about taking this class, but I’m glad I did. I thought Crystal Peirce was excellent at teaching students and making the class fun and not boring. I would recommend her to anyone wanting to take the class. Crystal Peirce will always be one of my favorite teachers at Harper College.

I enjoyed the Labs a lot throughout the semester, even though it was a longer period, still managed to enjoy it. Some of my favorite labs were the Jars and the sampling of soil/dirt lab. I will never forget having to go inside Harpes lake and other bodies of water. I thought that was a super cool experience to do. Also, be able to see moving organism from collected water from Harper was very cool as well, especially seeing those freaky worms. I also really enjoyed my lab group as well; they made the class even more enjoyable than it was already.

“BASF proposes that they are collaborating with EDF Energy North America to improve the energy balance and reduce CO₂ emissions of two of its production sites in Texas. The agreements underline BASF’s commitment to sustainability. Manufacturing products for sustainable solutions, reducing emissions from our processes and using non-fossil fueled energy sources all of these efforts help lead us on our continuing journey of sustainability. BASF’s energy portfolio further enhances the company’s advancement toward its climate protection goal of CO₂ neutral growth until 2030.” This is good for the Enviromental because as mentioned before it reduces emissions and non-fossil fuel energy sources which we need to start saving on. This is important to the people because less emissions prevent premature deaths, reduces hospitalizations and emergency room visit, reduces incidences of dementia, and reduces crop losses. Which also help less global warming emissions, which benefit quality of life for people.

BASF advances renewable energy commitment with wind and solar power contracts

These challenges are very important to help keep a healthy Environment and learning about natures environment in your surrounding areas are very important on keeping it clean and safe. I’m doing a couple challenges because I don’t know how to remove some of them. The variety of challenges I’m fulfilling are Use a reuseable water bottle (Freshwater + Oceans), Dishwasher efficiency (Freshwater + Oceans), and keep my community clean (Land + Forest). I picked water bottle action because it’s important to reduced amount of plastic one is using in a single day to help protect the oceans and animals from harm. Using a dishwasher is a lot easier and quicker than handwashing everything in the sink, and having to do the dishes almost every day makes this challenge kind of easy. Lastly, picking up garbage off the ground should be action everyone does when seen. I try and pick garbage that’s either in the pool or on the floor at my job to keep the environment clean. I picked this one because I usually feel guilty when I walk past trash on the floors, so I do my best to pick up around me. Most of these actions I will keep fulfilling afterwards because I have been doing them before the challenge started. If money wasn’t a problem, I would try and help keep plastic out of oceans and forest. It’s important keeping water and other animal homes clean and safe because everyone rely on them for survival.

Solar Glass!

What is it? —> Solar glass is suitably transparent window material but also captures the sun’s energy and converts it into electricity. 

Cause and Effect! –>  High-performance solar cells can achieve 25% efficiency or greater, but maintaining transparency means sacrificing the efficiency with which light is converted into electricity. But different researchers are working on fixing this problem, which is allowing more light to go through the windows.

Who designed them? —> Transparent solar panels were pioneered at Michigan State University and are now being installed commercially.

I picked this because it was really fascinating, and I never heard of it before. I thought it was going to deal with something with solar panels, but it’s like the future of solar panels. If we replaced sky scrapper window with this solar glass, it would be beneficial for the Environment but also saving us from wasting energy and polluting the Earth. There is so much glass in our world and this could be a huge impact towards the right direction.

These 10 technologies are most likely to help save planet Earth | ZDNET

Windows now function as transparent solar panels, here’s how | World Economic Forum (weforum.org)

Photovoltaic Glass for Buildings – Onyx Solar

The Article “Environmental Pollution in Japan- Statistics & facts” published by Catharina Klein, Dec 19, 2023, is about the impact of pollution quality in Japan and how is the Japanese government dealing with this major problem. “Environmental pollution in Japan – statistics & facts | Statista.” Before digging deep in the article its best to know what effects air pollution can do to a human being. Being exposed to air pollution can lead to depression, anxiety, psychosis, and dementia, this is why it’s such a big deal. According to the article, the death rate in Japan is only rising and is at 44 thousand annually. The main cause of this is due to power plants, automobiles, and industrial facilities. This doesn’t just effect humans, but also the wildlife, bodies of water, and even the planet. Japan is one of the largest producers of plastic, but it’s not always a positive thing because it causes a lot of pollution called “microplastics“. The Japanese Government has made laws to help prevent the pollution for example in 1970, the water pollution control act was put in affect and prohibits the discharge of wastewater that does not meet the effluent water quality standards. The Japanese also promoted businesses, homeowners, and etc, to reduce recycle & reuse. But unfortunately, only 20% people recycled, and it’s been at a low steady rate for over a decade now. The Japanese are not really doing their best to counteract the climate change and receive criticism due to it. It’s kind of sad to think that a lot hasn’t changed to help prevent pollution, not only Japan but the whole world can do better to put a stop to pollution/climate change. Let’s hope things turn around for the best in the future or even the present to put a stop to pollution.

So far, I’m really enjoying the class which I’m happy about because I had a really bad experience with a different lab class before I took this class. My mindset coming into this class was very negative and I was not looking forward to the lab’s aspect at all. Especially the lab being long as well, was making me dread this class. But overall, so far, I’m really enjoying the class and the labs aren’t as dreadful as I thought they would be. Surprisingly the time goes by pretty fast in my opinion, which is nice. Being able to use the microscopes in class was pretty fun because I haven’t used one since 8th grade, so it was nice being able to experience using one again. It’s always interesting to see what you may find/see under a microscope. Being able to create/design your own ecosystem was very fun, it’s going to be exciting to see what changes may have occurred as months go by. One thing I’m def not excited about for this class is having to go to a different location for lab in the future. I’ve never really enjoyed bio in high school too much, but taking this class might change my opinion.

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