The Myth and Truth of Energy Conservation and Global Warming
Can Sustainable Energy Prevent Climate Change?
Over the past few decades the world-wide conversation about climate change has developed its own jargon. Ask many of the people preaching "energy conservation" what they mean by the term and they will explain that we need to waste less energy. However, as every undergraduate physics student learns, the amount of energy in a closed system cannot change even for a second.
The law of energy conservation states that while energy can change form, or flow from one place to another, it never disappears. If you burn wood, the chemical energy stored in the log becomes heat - another form of energy. When you drive your car, the chemical energy in the fuel changes into a combination of motion and heat. Touch the hood of your car after you've driven around for a while and you'll see what I mean when I say heat. While it does change form, energy is always conserved.
Energy doesn't change, entropy does - but what is entropy?
The field of thermodynamics (literally the study of the flow of heat, or energy) includes several related terms, one of which is "entropy." In the simplest terms, entropy can be described as the amount of disorder. When we burn fuel, we're simply moving energy from one form to another, without changing its total. What does change, however, is the amount of disorder. One of the laws of thermodynamics states that in a closed system entropy can never decrease. In other words, as time goes by, everything gets messier.
If you have a teenager in your household you probably have a good intuitive grasp of this concept. Try forcing your teen to tidy up the clothes strewn about his room. Likely you'll find them hidden under his bed or pushed into a dark corner of his closet. In the process of moving the mess from one place to another, even more mess is generated as other stuff is pushed aside to make room for the pile of clothes. In the case of energy, the least organized form is heat. When our cars move, our lights shine, our homes heated, the energy we "use" simply becomes heat. This is why whenever we do anything, entropy is increased.
If energy conservation isn't the problem, what is?
Nearly all energy available to mankind comes from the sun. Plants convert the sun's energy into the chemical energy in sugar. Sugar from plants then supports the entire food chain, from the tiniest animals all the way up to man. Over millions of years some of the energy from the bodies of dead plants and animals became chemical energy stored in oil and natural gas. As we burn these fossil fuels, we increase entropy. Replacing the use of fossil fuels with more solar energy, wind energy, hydroelectric energy and other renewable sources will allow us to run our machines without fear of running out of resources. Still, over time, entropy will increase and we will find ourselves living in a hotter place.
So what difference do renewable energy sources and increased efficiency make?
There is no longer much doubt among main-stream experts that man-related emissions trap more solar radiation in our atmosphere. This is the main cause of global warming, which is the true issue we face. Energy is always conserved and entropy always increases, but reducing our use of energy, and changing its sources to renewable ones will help slow global warming.
Oil in the ground has almost no impact on the Earth's climate, but when burned it releases greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. These greenhouse gases increase the ability of our atmosphere to trap the sun's energy, heating it up. Renewable energy sources and increased efficiency will reduce greenhouse gas emissions, slowing global climate change. With little or no man-made greenhouse gas emissions, increasing entropy would still heat up the atmosphere, but much more slowly. Hopefully this will give us enough time to learn how to solve the longer term issue of increasing entropy.
Published by Opher Ganel
Researcher, teacher, photographer, storyteller. Creativity is my escape from the day-to-day. View profile
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7 Comments
Post a CommentAren't we full of ourselves? Do you REALLY think that in the blink of an eye which represents how long we've been "industrialized" and burning our sinclair-goo that is so much a burp when compared to what nature has been spewing for eons, that WE can 'break' the earth???
C'mon man!!! We not only are over confident we have short memories AND most importantly we have hack scientists with money grabbing agendas in bed with governments. Ever hear of 'climate-gate'? We can no more screw up this planet or her living entropy.
Aren't volcanos and animal flatulence also primary greenhouse gas producers? The developing world becomes wealthier and is working its way up the protein chain. The increased numbers of livestock will moot any attempts to limit emissions from coal plants . Additionally, one decent Mt. Helen sized eruption wipes out the effect of a million Priuses. Carbon sequestration is inordinately expensive and is but a token step. Time would be better spent coming up with a good Gas-X bovine equivalent.
Just got done arguing with wifey about the heat (she says it doesn't help to turn it down at night and up in the morning, I say it does), and now stumbled upon this at a SOMEWHAT higher level! I see little hope in convincing people to use less gas. Drivers around here still do things like accelerate into traffic lights that are turning red, laying patches when the lights turn back green, constantly driving alone in SUVs. Ridiculous. -- Mike
The Earth is not a closed system, energy is constantly transfered to and from the earth, for example the moon steals energy slowly moving to a higher orbit.
Entropy has been increasing in the universe for fourteen billion years and on this planet since it coalesced out the remenants of long dead stars the role Entropy plays in the enviroment is unbelievably miniscule.
Im not sure how you reach your conclusion that entropy will naturally cause heat. your entropy problem is twofold the transfer of energy from highly ordered states ie hydrocarbon chains to free hydrocarbons in the air, and the disorder of each of these constituents relative to each other which when in the air the problem s essentially moot as the atmosphere is already in a state of near maximum entropy anyway.
the atmosphere on a molecular scale is incredibly disorderly its almost perfectly symetrical in that you can pick any axis of symetry you like in a sample and it will look pretty much the same total entro
It must be funny to write about global warming while experiencing Antarctic winter. Alas, seems that the solution lies with reaching a paradigm leap in battery technology. I.e., if we can convert heat into stored electricity in a truly efficient way (high percentage conversion), we'll reduce entropy and Middle East petro-dollars. Shabbat Shalom from Arizona.
At our current level of knowledge it is impossible to reduce the overall entropy of a closed system. However, note that this does leave two loopholes. First, as time goes by, our understanding of the universe increases, and we may learn something new that does allow entropy to decrease. Second, the Earth is not a closed system. For example, Earth radiates heat into space. Thus, if we reduce the heat trapping efficiency of our atmosphere (e.g. by sequestering carbon, etc.) we may be able to go back to a meta-stable situation. The bottom line of the article is that currently we do not have a way of reversing entropy, but that having more time to figure this out is better than having less time.
How would you propose we go about "solving" increasing entropy given that, as you stated, entropy inevitably increases in a closed system? The only theory I've heard which might help involves a parallel universe and somehow transferring our entropy there, which, if even possible, is certainly not likely in the next few hundred years.