In this activity, students use a plastic soda bottle to make and test the temperature of a bottle ‘greenhouse’ and demonstrate how light energy is transformed into heat energy.
By the end of this activity, students should be able to:
- demonstrate how light energy is transformed into heat energy
- explain how this activity is an example of the law of energy conservation.
Download the Word file (see link below) for:
- introduction/background notes
- what you need
- what to do
- discussion questions
- extension idea.
Related content
This article explains how greenhouse gases are upsetting the delicate balance of energy in the atmosphere, the greenhouse effect.
Find out where Aotearoa’s greenhouse gases come from and how production-based emissions compare with consumption-based emissions. disocver more about how scientists measure greenhouse gas emissions.
Useful link
Student activity from the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR) about the greenhouse effect on Earth in comparison to that on Venus and Mars.
Greenhouse gases are compared by a metric known as the global warming potential.
