Comprehensive_Tap131

Comprehensive_Tap131 OP t1_iugpp4l wrote

Reply to comment by abat6294 in ELI5: I was looking into gravity and energy and discovered why you can't harness energy from gravity. Carry bowling ball up a hill, let it fall from a cliff, the energy doesn't come from gravity, but from you carrying it up the hill, potential energy? I then pictured it as charging aKamehameha? ELI5 by Comprehensive_Tap131

Literally not energy from gravity, scientifically

Edit: That energy comes from sunlight

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Comprehensive_Tap131 OP t1_iugooq8 wrote

Reply to comment by Em_Adespoton in ELI5: I was looking into gravity and energy and discovered why you can't harness energy from gravity. Carry bowling ball up a hill, let it fall from a cliff, the energy doesn't come from gravity, but from you carrying it up the hill, potential energy? I then pictured it as charging aKamehameha? ELI5 by Comprehensive_Tap131

To take advantage of gravity for energy you need to go from am area of high gravitational potential to lower gravitational potential. Do the highest levels of Earth's atmosphere contain enough potential to take advantage of an area of high gravitational potential moving to an area of lower gravitational potential?

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Comprehensive_Tap131 OP t1_iugo9ma wrote

Reply to comment by abat6294 in ELI5: I was looking into gravity and energy and discovered why you can't harness energy from gravity. Carry bowling ball up a hill, let it fall from a cliff, the energy doesn't come from gravity, but from you carrying it up the hill, potential energy? I then pictured it as charging aKamehameha? ELI5 by Comprehensive_Tap131

Basically asking as you carry that bowling ball up hill to a higher altitude are you simply storing potential energy? To be released whenever? Bowling ball sits there for 100 years until ground erodes and it then flies down to sea level or whatever. Is that really simply the storage of potential energy? I put energy in that bowling ball by carrying it uphill?

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