Climate Change Resilience: Preparing for Power Loss

• This short video highlights a no-energy solution to indoor lighting in Rockaway, New York, where businesses and homes were impacted by Superstorm Sandy. 
  
• Students will learn about "day-lighting," a creative solution that uses reflected sunlight during the day to light buildings, which creates less strain on the power grid and provides more security during power outages. 
  

Positives

• This video is short and sweet, giving a good example of how engineering can help us adapt as the world faces more frequent and intense storms, more heat waves, and the potential loss of electricity associated with those events. 

Additional Prerequisites

• Students should know something about electricity, power grids, and blackouts.
• Students should be familiar with Superstorm Sandy.

Differentiation

• Science, and physics classes could use this video when discussing the properties of light, reflection, and refraction.
  
• This video can help spur student ideas for helping us mitigate and adapt to climate change without using complicated new technologies. 
• Other similar resources include this other video by the AMNH and this interactive resource about electricity use in households.