-Original Message-
From: Jones Beene jone...@pacbell.net
To: vortex-l vortex-l@eskimo.com
Sent: Fri, Feb 8, 2013 1:06 pm
Subject: RE: [Vo]: Heat Engines Simplified
From:David Roberson
Always remember that energy is energy and that heat energy is justone of many
types available. Generally, there is a process that willconvert one form into
another, and some are easier to work with than others.
This is not accurate.There is “high grade energy” – such as electrical and
“lowgrade energy” such as heat.
You can give it additional names and that is ok, but it is still energy. Show
where the conservation of energy does not apply and I will agree. Do you
consider radiation as low grade energy? If so, what is the criteria that you
use to define it?
I am not trying to say that heat energy is easy to convert into other forms,
but I suggest that this is possible in theory. That is the purpose of my post.
I want to help others understand the basic principles and not concentrate upon
the complexities that make the subject so difficult to understand. Help me
take the mystery out of the subject.
There are always lossesgoing from low-grade to high-grade, and only going the
other way can losses beavoided, but often there are losses that way as well.
Losses? Where is the energy going that is lost? You should state that it is
difficult to convert heat into electricity directly or other types of energy
you refer to as high-grade. This does not mean that it is impossible. If you
know of why it is impossible, please indicate the theory that makes that true.
All of the energy can be converted into radiation given enough time. Do you
accept that as true? And again, what is the criteria used to define high-grade
versus low-grade energy?
There are NO circumstanceswhere low grade energy can be converted to high
grade energy withoutsubstantial losses.
Nothing has actually been lost. That is a bad term to use that helps to
complicate the understanding of others. Why not rephrase it to say something
like: Only a relatively small amount of the heat energy from a source can be
extracted by most processes and converted into electrical energy of other non
heat types. The energy remains that is not converted, but becomes more
difficult to convert since the temperature of the material containing this
energy source is lowered.
With IR heat toelectricity – which is the extreme case, the losses are
typically 95% andthey are not avoidable, so to reduce them to 75% would be
miraculous –and in fact this has never been accomplished in practice.
Why bring up the practical issues when theory is being discussed? The use of
the words not avoidable is improper unless you know of a proven theory that
makes this happen. I assume you are aware that radio waves can be captured by
the right antenna structures and most of the energy collected. Light emitted
by an atom can be absorbed completely by a second atom without loss of energy.
I would expect that IR radiation can be treated in a similar fashion to these
other members of the family.
So, what is practical and what is possible are two different things. I am
discussing what is possible to help others understand the principles involved.
Please follow up on your thoughts if you have scientific proofs to support
them. I would love to explore this subject in detail.
Jones
