23 Facts About Potential energy

In physics, potential energy is the energy held by an object because of its position relative to other objects, stresses within itself, its electric charge, or other factors.

Term potential energy was introduced by the 19th-century Scottish engineer and physicist William Rankine, although it has links to Greek philosopher Aristotle's concept of potentiality.

Potential energy is associated with forces that act on a body in a way that the total work done by these forces on the body depends only on the initial and final positions of the body in space.

Chemical potential energy, such as the energy stored in fossil fuels, is the work of the Coulomb force during rearrangement of configurations of electrons and nuclei in atoms and molecules.

Thermal energy usually has two components: the kinetic energy of random motions of particles and the potential energy of their configuration.

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Potential energy is the energy by virtue of an object's position relative to other objects.

Potential energy is often associated with restoring forces such as a spring or the force of gravity.

Elastic potential energy is the potential energy of an elastic object that is deformed under tension or compression .

Potential energy is a function of the state a system is in, and is defined relative to that for a particular state.

Gravitational energy is the potential energy associated with gravitational force, as work is required to elevate objects against Earth's gravity.

Factors that affect an object's gravitational potential energy are its height relative to some reference point, its mass, and the strength of the gravitational field it is in.

Amount of gravitational potential energy held by an elevated object is equal to the work done against gravity in lifting it.

Singularity at in the formula for gravitational potential energy means that the only other apparently reasonable alternative choice of convention, with for, would result in potential energy being positive, but infinitely large for all nonzero values of, and would make calculations involving sums or differences of potential energies beyond what is possible with the real number system.

Negative value for gravitational Potential energy has deeper implications that make it seem more reasonable in cosmological calculations where the total Potential energy of the universe can meaningfully be considered; see inflation theory for more on this.

Gravitational potential energy has a number of practical uses, notably the generation of pumped-storage hydroelectricity.

Gravitational potential energy is used to power clocks in which falling weights operate the mechanism.

The commercialization of stored Potential energy that is then converted to electrical Potential energy when needed by an electrical grid, is being undertaken in the United States in a system called Advanced Rail Energy Storage .

Chemical potential energy is a form of potential energy related to the structural arrangement of atoms or molecules.

The electrostatic potential energy is the energy of an electrically charged particle in an electric field.

Magnetic potential energy is the form of energy related not only to the distance between magnetic materials, but to the orientation, or alignment, of those materials within the field.

Conversely, like poles will have the highest potential energy when forced together, and the lowest when they spring apart.

Nuclear potential energy is the potential energy of the particles inside an atomic nucleus.

The Potential energy from the Sun is an example of this form of Potential energy conversion.