Why does energy transformations occur

When the fuel is burnt, the hot gas rushes out of the rocket due to the great heat and pressure produced by the release of chemical energy in burning. Energy transformation is when energy changes from one type to another.

While energy can be transferred or transformed, the total energy always remains the same. In a Flash Diagram showing how different forms of energy can be converted to another form of energy.

Energy Conversion: Transfer and Transform Energy transfer is the movement of energy from one location to another. Burning Questions. What is energy transfer? What is energy transformation? What are some examples of energy transformation? A light is switched on.

Sound filters out from speakers. These are all forms of energy-motion, light, and sound. Energy is the ability to make things happen. Every action is connected to energy in one form or another.

Objects can have energy due to their movement or their position. Scientists measure energy in joules J. It takes about one joule for a person to lift an apple one meter off the ground. Eating the apple provides the human body with about , J. Every form of energy, including movement, stored energy, heat, and light, can be measured in joules. The amount of kinetic energy KE in joules that an object has is determined by the equation , here m equals the mass of the object in kilograms and v equals its velocity in meters per second.

If two objects have equal mass, the object that is moving faster has more kinetic energy. The diagram at the top of the next page shows calculations for the kinetic energy for three vehicles. If two objects are moving at the same speed, the object with more mass has more kinetic energy than the object with less mass. As shown in the diagram, Truck A and Car B are traveling at the same speed. Notice that a change in speed affects energy more than a change in mass. If a car doubles its speed, its kinetic energy increases by a factor of four.

A truck with four times the mass of a car has four times as much energy as the car when they travel at the same speed.

Potential energy is energy an object has due to its position. Potential energy does not involve motion, it is dependent on the interaction between two objects and the forces involved. This is considered stored energy. Consider a book on a table. Together, the book and Earth have potential energy. Gravitational potential energy is the energy resulting from the gravitational forces between two objects. Raising an object above the ground increases the gravitational potential energy because work has been done on the object against the force of gravity.

Gravity is a force that is described as a field, meaning there is a region in space that has this force at every point. Gravitational potential energy GPE is related to the mass and height of the object, and acceleration due to the gravitational field.

If you lift a 2. The gravitational field of the book is not considered because the field of an object only affects other objects. Potential energy can also be affected by other field forces between objects.

For example, a magnetic field exerts a force on a paper clip that pulls the paper clip toward a magnet. The field forces around charged particles are called electrical fields. When a charged particle or object is moved a distance against the force of this field, its electric potential increases. You constantly use energy in your daily activities. When you turn on the lights or heat food in a microwave, you know you are using some type of energy.

They begin to move faster and spread out, creating a lower density of molecules at the bottom of the pot. These molecules then rise to the top of the pot and are replaced at the bottom by cooler, denser water. The process repeats, creating a current of molecules sinking, heating up, rising, cooling down, and sinking again.

The third type of heat transfer—radiation—is critical to life on Earth and is important for heating bodies of water. With radiation, a heat source does not have to touch the object being heated; radiation can transfer heat even through the vacuum of space.

Nearly all thermal energy on Earth originates from the sun and radiates to the surface of our planet, traveling in the form of electromagnetic waves, such as visible light. Materials on Earth then absorb these waves to be used for energy or reflect them back into space.

In an energy transformation , energy changes form. Generally speaking, the higher on the hill this ball is, the more gravitational potential energy it has. When a force pushes it down the hill, that potential energy transforms into kinetic energy. The ball continues losing potential energy and gaining kinetic energy until it reaches the bottom of the hill.

In a frictionless universe, the ball would continue rolling forever upon reaching the bottom, since it would have only kinetic energy. On Earth, however, the ball stops at the bottom of the hill due to the kinetic energy being transformed into heat by the opposing force of friction.

Just as with energy transfers, energy is conserved in transformations. In nature, energy transfers and transformations happen constantly, such as in a coastal dune environment. When thermal energy radiates from the sun, it heats both the land and ocean, but water has a specific high heat capacity, so it heats up slower than land.

This temperature difference creates a convection current, which then manifests as wind. This wind possesses kinetic energy, which it can transfer to grains of sand on the beach by carrying them a short distance. If the moving sand hits an obstacle, it stops due to the friction created by the contact and its kinetic energy is then transformed into thermal energy, or heat.

Once enough sand builds up over time, these collisions can create sand dunes, and possibly even an entire dune field. These newly formed sand dunes provide a unique environment for plants and animals. A plant may grow in these dunes by using light energy radiated from the sun to transform water and carbon dioxide into chemical energy , which is stored in sugar. Energy cannot be created or destroyed which is called the conservation of energy ; however, it can be transformed from one type into another.

In fact, every useful process transforms energy from one form to another. There are many different forms or types of energy. Some examples of everyday energy transformations are:. Some forms of energy are more useful than others. Using energy always makes it less useful, even though no energy is actually destroyed. Kinetic energy and electricity are the most useful forms.

These are "high-quality" because they can be transformed almost completely into any other type of energy.