A kilowatt-hour is a unit of energy. Do you not know what a unit of energy is? Wrong! Energy is the calculation of power*time, and when the time has elapsed, it's over, done deal! You need to learn what a kilowatt-hour really is! Energy is not mass or matter, it is a calculation of work done over a period of time! Duh?
Nope. Your own example disproves that. When you drop an ice cube in the water, it melts and the temperature equilibrates but the energy is still there, all of it. It just moved from the water to the ice. Einstein would disagree with you about the equivalence of matter and energy: E = mc[sup]2[/sup] The nuclear bonds in matter contain potential energy, the same as chemical bonds contain potential energy.
There are people on this forum who are smarter than me (though you don't appear to be one of them). If I'm wrong, I'm sure sombody will point out my mistakes. In the meantime, are you seriously suggesting that the earth isn't moving?
So when I pay my energy bill every month the energy is still there, somewhere? Where is it? If I operate a 100 watt light bulb for 10 hours, starting at 1 PM, and the energy consumed was 1 kw-hr at 11PM, what is the energy distribution at 11PM? Where is the pile of 1 kw-hr? What was the distribution of energy in the bomb before the bomb went off, and why didn't the bomb self destruct if there was that much energy distribution in that relatively small volume?
Sideshow, you've got to keep in mind that Motor Daddy denies relativity, denies that the speed of light is constant in all frames, in fact denies just about every aspect of mainstream science. He inhabits his own universe with it's own idiosyncratic rules, which don't apply to the universe the rest of us inhabit.
It goes back to the power plant, through the ground. That's why your house has to have a ground wire. You're not paying for the energy itself; you're paying to have it flow through your wires. Some of the electrical energy has been convertd to heat energy and is spreading out throughout your house. The electrons, as mentioned above, go back to the power plant to get another boost of energy from the generators. If we're talking about a Little Boy bomb, the energy is concentrated in two uranium objects before the blast. When they are brought together, they reach "critical mass" and they do self-destruct. Their energy is then physically distributed by the disintegration products flying off in all directions and further dstributed by transfer of heat (kinetic energy) to the atmosphere and other innocent bystanders. They teach all this stuff in high school science, you know.
Yeah, nobody has ever heard of a kilowatt-hour before. They all have piles of energy all over the place, like an energy hoarder, garbage bags full of it, that they paid for, just don't know what to do with.
I figured it was something like that. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! In any case, it gives me a chance to clarify things in my own mind - and somebody may correct some misconceptions that I have.
So I don't really consume energy as much as I let it flow through the wires and be evenly distributed? What if there is a guy at the power plant that has to crank a handle in order for me to have energy? Does he have to eat? Does he have to work harder if I turn on the oven? If he doesn't work harder and eat more will the flow continue?
That's right. You consume flow. You consume air in the same way. It flows in, it flows out. It doesn't magically disappear in your lungs. Yes, he has to digest chemical (potential) energy to produce mechanical energy. The food he eats (chemical potential energy) requires solar energy, mechanical energy in the form of tractors and trucks, more chemical energy in the form of fuel, etc. It's all about moving energy from place to place. Yes, he does. That's why power plants work near their capacity in winter when the demand is higher (or in summer for those of you in hot climates).
Do you know what work is (force*distance)? How about torque? RPM? HP? Do you know how work is measured over a period of time when cranking a handle of various loads at a defined RPM?
Still with me sideshow? I'm still trying to get to the bottom of your "energy distribution" "pile of energy" statements. It's not going so well for you, is it? I can see where you'll be running into a few minor technicalities here in a short short!!
I'm still with you, just not 24/7. Everybody but you seems to understand , so I'd say it's going pretty well. Do you know what "work" is? Have you heard of the "heat death" of the universe? The entropy of the universe is increasing, i.e. the energy is spreading out. When it is spread out evenly thoroughout the univese it no longer has any potential to flow. If energy can't flow, no "work" can be done; nothing can move; the universe is dead.
You'll have to be more specific about what you don't understand. It's in the same place. It's just flatter.
Where is the pile of 1 kw-hr at 11PM? The 1 kw-hr was never is one place, it was work done over 10 hours. It was a calculation of energy for 10 hours of 100 Watt light bulb operation. You are in effect saying that there is calculations of power and time spread out all over the place!!
Have you ever seen infrared imaging? Where red indicates hot spots, orange and yellow are cooler, blue is cold, etc? Imagine that as a two dimensional graph where red is the highest point, yellow and orange somewhat lower and blue even lower. When you drop your ice cube into your water, the ice cube is the lowest point on the graph and the water is the highest. As the ice melts, the high point lowers and the low point rises. The peaks are still in the same places but their height has changed. When the system reaches equilbrium - i.e. the temperature is constant - the graph becomes a flat line; there are no peaks; energy can no longer flow. Of course. The energy content of any point in the universe is constantly changing and can be calculated at any time.