Energy carrier

Energy carrier

An energy carrier is a substance or phenomenon that can be used to produce mechanical work or heat or to operate chemical or physical processes (ISO 13600).

It is any system or substance that contains energy for conversion as usable energy later or somewhere else. This could be converted for use in, for example, an appliance or vehicle. Such carriers include springs, electrical batteries, capacitors, pressurized air, dammed water, hydrogen, petroleum, coal, wood, and natural gas.

Hydrogen is a energy carrier for use in distributing renewable energy. Electricity is used to produce hydrogen by electrolyzing water, which is then used to power a hydrogen vehicle. The power is later derived from the hydrogen in the car's fuel cell which recombines hydrogen and oxygen, producing electricity, heat, and water. This principle may be put to use in the production of heat and electricity in households. Currently both hydrogen cars and household generators are in small scale production and use.

Note that Coal, oil and natural gas are energy sources which were extracted from the earth (fossil fuels). They already contain stores of energy previously "charged"; whereas springs, batteries, hydrogen "etc." typically contain energy derived from a power plant or solar panels.

Energywares form a proper subset of energy carriers. Solar radiation is an energy carrier that is not an energyware.

ISO 13600

ISO 13600 series (ISO 13600, ISO 13601 and ISO 13602) are intended to be used as tools to define, describe, analyse and compare technical energy systems (TES) at micro and macro levels [http://www.internationalenergyworkshop.org/pappdf/Grob.pdf] :

*ISO 13600 ("Technical energy systems — Basic concepts") covers basic definitions and terms needed to define and describe TESs in general and TESs of energyware supply and demand sectors in particular.

*ISO 13601 ("Technical energy systems — Structure for analysis — Energyware supply and demand sectors") covers structures that shall be used to describe and analyse sub-sectors at the macro level of energyware supply and demand

*ISO 13602 (all parts) facilitates the description and analysis of any technical energy systems.

Related topics

* Capital goods
* Coefficient of performance
* Embedded energy
* Energy-use system
* Energy pay-back
* Energy resource
* Energy service
* Enthropy
* Exergy
* Passive and low energy architecture (PLEA)
* Renewable resource

ee also

* Energy crisis
*
* Energy storage
*
* Enthropy
* Future energy development
* Hydrogen economy
* ISO 14000
* Liquid nitrogen economy
* Lithium economy
* Methanol economy
* Solar power
* Vegetable oil economy
* Wind power
* Zinc economy

References

* "European Nuclear Society info pool/glossary: Energy carrier" [http://www.euronuclear.org/info/encyclopedia/e/energy-carrier.htm]

External links

* "Boron: a better energy carrier than hydrogen?" [http://www.eagle.ca/~gcowan/Paper_for_11th_CHC.html paper by Graham Cowan]
* [http://www.iso.org/iso/iso_catalogue/catalogue_tc/catalogue_detail.htm?csnumber=22366 ISO 13600 Technical energy systems -- Basic concepts] : gives the basic concepts needed to define and describe technical energy systems.


Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Поможем написать реферат

Look at other dictionaries:

  • energy carrier — noun A substance or phenomenon that can be used to produce mechanical work or heat or to operate chemical or physical processes (). Solar radiation is an energy carrier that is not an energyware …   Wiktionary

  • Energy storage — is the storing of some form of energy that can be drawn upon at a later time to perform some useful operation. A device that stores energy is sometimes called an accumulator. All forms of energy are either potential energy (eg. chemical,… …   Wikipedia

  • Energy density — For energy density in the sense of energy per unit mass, see specific energy. For energy density of foods, see specific energy. Energy density is a term used for the amount of energy stored in a given system or region of space per unit volume.… …   Wikipedia

  • Carrier Lifetime — denotes in semiconductor physics, is defined as the average time it takes an excess minority carrier to recombine.Carrier Lifetime play an important role in bipolar transistors and solar cells. The energy released due to recombination can be… …   Wikipedia

  • Carrier generation and recombination — In the solid state physics of semiconductors, carrier generation and recombination are processes by which mobile electrons and electron holes are created and eliminated. Carrier generation and recombination processes are fundamental to the… …   Wikipedia

  • Carrier scattering — Defect types include atom vacancies, adatoms, steps, and kinks which occur most frequently at surfaces due to finite material size causing crystal discontinuity. What all types of defects have in common, whether they be surface or bulk, is that… …   Wikipedia

  • Carrier-to-noise ratio — In telecommunications, the carrier to noise ratio, often written CNR or C/N , is the signal to noise ratio (SNR) of a modulated signal. The CNR is the quotient between the average received modulated carrier power C and the average received noise… …   Wikipedia

  • Carrier lifetime — A definition in semiconductor physics, carrier lifetime is defined as the average time it takes for a minority carrier to recombine. The process through which this is done is typically known as minority carrier recombination. The energy released… …   Wikipedia

  • Energy crisis — An energy crisis is any great bottleneck (or price rise) in the supply of energy resources to an economy. It usually refers to the shortage of oil and additionally to electricity or other natural resources. An energy crisis may be referred to as… …   Wikipedia

  • Energy shield — An energy shield is a form of technology commonly found in science fiction, but also in development for real life space travel [ [http://space.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn11623 feedId=online news rss20 Deflector shields could protect future… …   Wikipedia

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”