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Required resources

Recent years the use and production of biodiesel as part of a sustainable future energy structure has been widely discussed. With this lesson plan you can teach your motor mechanic students how to produce their own low-tech biodiesel.

Required ressources

Lab resources

One liter each of various vegetable oils, example: linseed, sunflower, grape, olive, palm, peanut etc.
Transparent containers for chemical separation process for each group.
Apparatus and containers for heating the oils.
Separation additives for the Oil per liter - Methanol 250 ml (CH3OH) and Sodium hydroxide 6g (dry) (NaOH - caustic soda, lye).
Rubber gloves and protective eye-ware.
Strainers and funnels for bottling the biodiesel once separated.
Storage containers for the biodiesel once the separation process are completed.
Measuring cups and teaspoons and or weighing scales.

IT resources

The use of ICT tools to document and present the experiment is a fun way for the students to reflect on the proces of the experiments.

If you are somewhat unexperienced or feel insecure using ICT tools for teaching you might consider doing an interdisciplinary theme with a media class from the school conducting "a documentary" on how to make biodiesel.

If you have a partner school in another country you can consider sharing your presentations on Youtube or elsewhere on the Internet - on a weblog perhaps - where your students can comment on each other's presentations. What kind of oil do they use in the other countries?

Hardware

Laptop/desktop computers with Internet connection
Digital camcorders, cameras or mobile phones with a camera - perhaps tripods for cameras
USB cable for connecting the digital device to the computer
Scanner and printer
Data projector for displaying demonstrational videos and links.

Software

Movie editing application i.e. iMovie or similar.
Microsoft PowerPoint or Apple Keynote application.
Audio application i.e. Windows media Player or iTunes.
Photo editing software i.e. Photoshop or similar.
Word processing application i.e. Microsoft Word or Apple Pages.

Internet Ressources
Search engine - www.google.com - www.video.google.com
Online encyclopedia - www.wikipedia.org
Online Video sharing - www.youtube.com
Online Blogs search - www.blogger.com - www.twitter.com
Social Networks - www.ning.com - www.emechanic.ning.com
Web conferencing - www.skype.com

Making biodiesel

Making biodiesel front page
Introduction, aims and target groups
Required ressources
Lesson plan
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