The Forms of Energy

Energy is the ability to do work. In science class, we learned that there are many forms of energy and that all of the forms are very important. An informative website I visited explained that all of the types of energies can be placed into two different categories – kinetic and potential energy. Kinetic energy is any type of energy that has to do with motion, like of waves, atoms, molecules, substances or objects. Mechanical energy falls into this category since it is energy associated with objects moving from one place to another. Examples of mechanical energy are water in a waterfall and sound. Another type of kinetic energy is heat energy, which is the internal motion of atoms. Heat energy can change temperature and phases of matter (solid, liquid and gas.) Furthermore, electromagnetic energy is when moving electric charges have the ability to do work. Examples of this are when power lines carry electricity to homes and lightning strikes the Earth. Radiant energy is a form of electromagnetic energy which travels in transverse waves. This includes X-rays, gamma rays, radio waves, light and solar energy. The second category of energy is potential energy which is stored energy and the energy of position. A type of potential energy is chemical energy. This energy is released when bonds of atoms are broken. I feel that chemical energy is very important to humans, along with the other types of energies of course, because it is the energy that is released when we digest our food. The atom bonds that are broken when we eat food are stored in our body to be used later on in other forms of energy, like mechanical energy. In addition, stored mechanical energy is the energy that is stored in objects by the application of force. Examples are a compressed spring toy or a stretched rubber band. In addition, nuclear energy is when the nucleus of an atom splits and energy is released in the form of heat energy and light energy. This also occurs when nuclei collide at high speeds and fuse together. An instance of where nuclear energy occurs every minute and second is on the Sun. The Sun’s energy comes from nuclear fusion. Lastly, another type of potential energy is gravitational energy. This is the energy of position or place. An example of this could be hydropower, such as water that is in a reservoir behind a dam.

All of the information in this post was found on this website:

http://www.eia.doe.gov/kids/energyfacts/science/formsofenergy.html