Question: How do you create energy from the earth

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  1. Energy isn’t ever created, it is only transformed from one form to another. Most of the energy we use comes from burning something, somehow, and then making use of the explosion to make something move mechanically, which can then eg be converted to electricity. So – oil, gas from the ground is burnt – or falling water spins a turbine – or geothermal energy boils water which spins a turbine. Ultimately all of the energy we use has come from the sun.

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  2. Think Matthew cover the question well! 🙂

    Matthew – does Geothermal energy originate from the sun?

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  3. we [society] just need to figure out how we can use energy more efficiently

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  4. Great question.

    There are lots of different ways to extract energy from the Earth.

    You can burn something like coal, but once you’ve burnt it, that’s it’s gone.

    You can force a nuclear reaction to take place with either uranium or thorium, but once again these are limited resources.

    You can harness the power of the wind or water to drive turbines. Pretty much unlimited energy from the wind, only limited by how many turbines you have.

    You can utilise the Earth’s heating capacity to heat water and drive turbines, which is geothermal power. This is an effectively unlimited resource.

    Or, you can harness the power of the Sun, either directly by converting light into electricity through solar panels although these aren’t that efficient, or indirectly, by using it to heat water. Solar power is great, because it’s effectively unlimited.

    Solar energy is not really from the Earth, but it’s probably the best source, if you can maximise its efficiency. That is currently the problem!

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  5. What they said.

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