Principle of Conservation of Energy

7.3  Principle of Conservation of Energy

 

Definition
  • According to the principle of the immortality of energy, energy cannot be created or destroyed but can change from one form to another

  • The following shows two brief examples involving changes in energy forms

 Simple pendulum swing:

 

  1. The pendulum in position A has maximum gravitational potential energy

  2. The pendulum moves from position A to position B causing the gravitational potential energy to change to kinetic energy and the kinetic energy to be at maximum

  3. The pendulum moves from position B to position C causing the kinetic energy to decrease, the kinetic energy changes to gravitational potential energy and the gravitational potential energy is in the maximum state