How Many Types of Energy

Introduction

Energy is stated as the ability to do work. ‘Energy is neither created nor destroyed. It just can be transferred from one form to the other”, this is the statement of the law of conservation of energy. People use energy to drive cars along city roads, walk around a park, run a bicycle, drive a boat through the water, make ice in freezers, cook food on stoves, or manufacture products. There are many forms of energy such as heat energy, mechanical energy, light energy, motion energy, electrical energy, chemical energy, and gravitational energy. Mechanical energy is further classified into two general types of energy: Potential energy and Kinetic energy.

With respect to physics, energy is the quantity that is transferred to a body and converted in the performance of work, and then in the form of heat and light etc. The SI (International System) unit of measurement for energy is the joule (J). The common forms of energy include kinetic energy, potential energy, elastic energy, chemical energy, radiant energy, and internal energy. All living organisms simultaneously take in and release energy. The most common 5 types of energy are Electrical Energy, Chemical Energy, Mechanical Energy, Thermal Energy, and Nuclear Energy. We will be discussing these types of energy in this article.

Various Types of Energy

The types of energies are described as follows:

• Electrical Energy: Electrical energy is related to electrical forces on electrically charged particles which are associated with the movement of electrically charged particles. These electrically charged particles are electrons in wires. This type of energy is supplied by the combination of electric potential and electric current. They are often referred to as electric voltage because electric potential is measured in volts or voltage. Electric energy is delivered by an electrical circuit. For example, electrical energy is provided by an electric power utility. Motion or movement of electrons(current) is not required. For example, if there is a voltage difference in an electrical circuit or in combination with charged particles, such as static electricity, the moving electrical energy is then converted to another form of energy. For example thermal, sound, motion, radio waves, light, etc. Electrical energy is usually in the units of a kilowatt hour (1 kWh = 3.6 MJ). It is the product of the electrical power in kilowatts multiplied by time in hours. Electric energy is measured using an electricity metre, which monitors the total electric energy delivered to the customer. For example, in an electric heater, the electrical energy is converted into heat energy. An electric heater uses electrical resistance for converting electrical energy into heat energy. Another example of computers where small amounts of electrical energy are rapidly passing through millions and trillions of transistors, where the energy is both moving and non-moving.

• Chemical Energy: Chemical energy is the energy of chemical materials that are released when they undergo a simultaneous chemical reaction and chemically transform into other materials. For example, stored chemical energy includes food, batteries, and gasoline. Breaking chemical bonds and re-building of chemical bonds involves energy, which is either absorbed by chemical substances or evolved from a chemical system. If chemical reactants with relatively weak electron-pair bonds convert to stronger bonds, energy is released. And therefore, relatively weakly bonded compounds and unstable molecules store chemical energy. The energy that can be absorbed or released because of a chemical reaction between chemical substances is equal to the difference between the chemical energy content of the products and the reactants if the initial and final temperature is constant.

• Mechanical Energy: In physics, mechanical energy is the sum of kinetic energy and potential energy. The principle of conservation of mechanical energy states that if an isolated physical system has only conservative forces, then the mechanically stored energy is constant. The potential energy increases if an object moves in the opposite direction of a conservative net force. The kinetic energy increases if the speed (not the velocity) of the body changes. In all real physical systems, nonconservative forces, like frictional forces, change the mechanical energy by a small difference. The kinetic energy is conserved In elastic collisions, but in inelastic collisions, some mechanical energy is converted into thermal energy. The equivalent energy loss between mechanical energy and the observed increase in temperature was discovered by James Prescott Joule and so the energy has SI unit as Joule.

• Thermal Energy: The internal energy of a body changes in a process in which chemical potential energy is converted into non-chemical potential energy. In such a process, the system can change its internal energy by doing work on its surroundings, or by losing or gaining energy as heat. The converted chemical potential energy is now internal energy, however, the chemical potential energy is now thermal energy. Thermal energy is the contributor to internal energy or to enthalpy. The term thermal energy is the energy carried by a heat flow, although called heat or quantity of heat.

• Nuclear Energy: Nuclear potential energy is the energy of the nuclear element particles inside an atomic nucleus. The nuclear element particles are bound together by a strong nuclear force. Weak nuclear forces provide the potential energy for radioactive decay. Nuclear particles like neutrons and protons are not destroyed in fusion and fission processes. The energy from the Sun is the best example of this form of nuclear energy conversion. The process of hydrogen fusion converts about five million tonnes of matter per second into electromagnetic energy, which is radiated into space.

Conclusion

So to conclude, energy is in every matter that we consume, transform, or use. Energy regulates our body's internal metabolism. Conservation of energy, which is the law of conservation of energy states that energy is converted into different forms, but not created nor destroyed. So we need to save energy and think about the sustainability of the earth.