May
2015
Artifact 1: First Blog
Original Post:
Searching for an interesting blog for this first assignment, I stumbled across this intriguing yet eye catching article. This post was about a new founded system that turns sewage waste into purified drinking water, electricity, and clean ash. Bill Gates was the one of the first people to try the engineered drinking water. After you get past the idea that he has just drank water derived from sewage waste, it doesn’t seem so bad after all. This machine is self sustaining as it runs on steam creating electricity that is derived from the dried sewage “sludge.” The prototype for this machine is located a little north of Seattle. This project is still well under construction as they aim to almost completely reinvent the toilet. Although this seems like a great idea to input into developing countries, I feel the cost to create and upkeep the machine may be probable issues. On the up side, we would be saving energy and our environment by recycling human waste.
I chose this blog post because it immediately caught my eye with the title and it’s uniqueness. At first I could not believe that there was an actual machine that could do the impossible. Knowing that there are endless possibilities to reuse natural materials to create sustainable energy is quite mind blowing. Those who are unable to have easy access to clean and safe water are at risk of many health diseases and illnesses. We take advantage of having purified drinking water at the tips of our fingers. I think this is the beginning of a bright future for our environment but for those countries who are limited to resources. I hope that one day the world will be able to run on less expensive and environmentally friendly resources to save our earth from depletion of natural resources. We are already on our way of saving the earth with the electric cars, increasing the awareness of recycling, and now using poo to create drinking water.
Reflection:
I chose this particular article because I was truly fascinated by the technological advances that are being made to better our world. It is vital to our future that we find ways to use our available resources to harvest sustainable energy that will reduce our carbon foot print. I think it is so awesome that Bill Gates is using his success to fund projects such as these to better our environment. The fact that he and his and his research team could construct a working machine using fecal matter to produce several different resources that we take for granted has the potential to reduce other confounding issues by re-using our external waste. I thoroughly enjoy reading about these kinds of articles as it fuels my interest in finding alternative ways to make our world a “greener” place.
This article fulfills the requirements for the first blog post assignment. We were instructed to post an article that was interesting to us. I think this post also envelops my passion for saving the environment and wanting to reduce the amount of natural resources that we are quickly depleting from the earth. I think this could educate my classmates and peers about the work and effort our society is putting in to reduce the trash we are collecting on this earth as we damage our ozone layer and wrecking the beauty of the earth. This also shows my classmates who felt like reading the article on the type of person I am. Given this class never meets outside of the blogs and internet discussion, I wanted to show my peers one of my interests that I hope will motivate them to help save our earth.
I also learned how to work this new blogging system. Before this class I had no idea that the UO blogs existed nor did I know how to set one up. I find this internet blogging engine very useful and easy to use. I think more classes should incorporate blogging into their course. I feel being able to blog interesting posts that they find intriguing or a good representation of their personality is a good way to enlighten other people about different issues that we may not be aware of.
Future Goals:
In retrospect of this article, I hope to further my interest in participating in the research and study of finding alternative ways to use our resources into sustainable fuel. Although my major limits my ability to further my research, I hope to find different movements or organizations that will allow me to help them brainstorm more ideas or add input to their ongoing research. I hope to further educate my peers and other people about these types of studies and research that is going on in hopes of peaking interest in saving the environment.
Bibliography:
Price, R. (2015, January 6). Watch Bill Gates Test A New Machine That Turns Poop Into Clean Water. Retrieved May 4, 2015, from http://www.businessinsider.com/bill-gates-sewage-water-electricity-2015-1
Table of Contents:
Artifact 5: Personal Adornment
Artifact 6: Creative Spirituality