Talk:Renewable Energy

Is there a reason to include the thermal energy here. It is not the renewable energy.

(Yndesai (talk))


 * According to the definition described in the introduction it is. Perhaps you could provide some counter balance by explaining why some might not consider it a renewable energy and cite some sources? What properties of thermal energy are seen as renewable, what properties of thermal energy are seen as not being renewable, how thermal energy is and isn't renewable, etc. would be a good way to explain thermal energy and allow readers to decide for themselves whether thermal energy is indeed renewable or not. --dark lama  11:42, 24 December 2010 (UTC)


 * By thermal energy it means something like potential energy ie internal energy. To explain let us assume a ball kept on first floor has internal energy (because of this internal energy it can fall upto ground lever), this internal energy is let us say = 1kcal, then we take that ball to 5th floor and now it has internal energy = 5kcal. Now this increase in internal energy is due to storage of energy which was spent to take ball from floor 1 to 5. Also to recover this internal energy ball needs to fall upto ground floor. Now in thermal energy parlance let's say some water is at temperature 15oC it has energy equal to let's say 150Kcal. Now, if we heat it to 30oC the thermal energy becomes 300Kcal. We can now extract this delta thermal energy of 150Kcal by cooling water to 15oC. This essentially means that energy used to heat the water is only extracted. To qualify this as renewable energy the heating of water in first place should have been done using renewable sources. Hence in general terms thermal energy do not fall under renewable energy BUT certain thermal energies such as solar thermal, Geo-thermal or Ocean Thermal and some more such group of thermal energy comes under renewable energy. Since in such category of thermal energy the heating in first place is done using renewable energy. I would rather  put Thermal Energy as one of the method used to under storage. That is by heating available medium you store renewable energy as thermal energy and extract the same when needed. This is what happens in solar thermal energy. Refer to wikipedia] for clear explanation. ([[User:Yndesai|Yndesai (talk) 01:12, 25 December 2010 (UTC))


 * I mean explain this in the thermal energy chapter of this book. Not for my benefit, but for the benefit of the readers of the book. You could use the above explanation as a bases to begin that chapter. You would want to clearly explain whatever you think the Wikipedia article can explain directly in the book rather than refer readers to Wikipedia though. After that the chapter should probably cover what Solar, Geo, and Ocean thermal energy is and how people use it. --dark lama  12:12, 25 December 2010 (UTC)