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Where is it windy?

Students will learn how topography and elevation affect wind speed in this lesson. By creating model landscape and wind farms, students will begin to predict areas where the wind is fastest. Students will also learn to analyze topographic and wind speed maps.

The Details

Image
Grades
10, 
11, 
12, 
6, 
7, 
8, 
and 9.
Time Required
1-2 class periods
Downloads
  PDFs

Next Generation Science Standards

Disciplinary Core Ideas

  • ESS3.C Human Impacts on Earth Systems
  • ETS1.A Defining and Delimiting an Engineering Problem
  • ETS1.B Developing Possible Solutions
  • PS3.B

    • Cross-Cutting Concepts

  • Cause and Effect
  • Energy and Matter
  • Patterns

    • Learning Objectives

    – Understand how topography and elevation affect wind speed
    – Be able to identify optimal locations for wind farms based on wind speed
    – Know how to interpret topographic and wind speed maps

    Materials

    – Box fan (more than one is better)
    – Objects of different sizes that will not blow away
    – 20 wind flags for the model (tape some string or tissue paper to a popsicle stick and place it in a piece of clay to hold it up)
    – US Wind Speed Resource Map at 80 Meters
    – Map of US Wind Turbines
    – New York State Wind Farm Map Utility Scale Wind Turbines in United States Map
    – Student reading passages and student worksheets
    – Projector

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