The sun's energy is explained with simple examples

THE SUN ENERGY

Every living thing on this earth lives and moves because of the energy produced by the never-ending nuclear “furnace” of the sun. You can see why this is so if you consider the origin of your own energy. 

You get it from your food. Fruit, vegetables, and meats must have stored up or potential energy. Fruit and vegetables grow, thrive and ripen in the sunlight. The sun beats down on them with considerable heat and stores up energy in the form of starch and other carbohydrates. 

The same is true of meat which is the flesh of other animals, which in turn thrive on the grain and clover of the fields. So, indirectly, the meat that we eat is the sun’s stored-up energy in the form of fats and proteins.

The energy that runs our factories and railroads, and supplies the power to light our homes, is due to the sun. Wood and power to light our homes are due to the sun. Wood coal and oil that produces the necessary heat really represent sunlight that has been stored up for years and years in the form of chemical energy.

The electric power furnished to a great many communities in the vicinity of large natural waterfalls is obtained from the heat energy of the sun. let us consider Niagara Falls and trace this energy from its source to see how many times it is transformed.

To begin with, the heat energy of the sun acting upon the great lakes and the oceans produces the moisture which in time condenses into rain. This rain swells the lakes and fills the rivers, resulting in the falls at Niagara. Just before the Niagara River flows over the falls it has enormous potential energy, and as soon as it drops, this potential energy becomes kinetic energy. 

This kinetic energy of the mad, onrushing water below the falls is led into turbine pits and made to rate huge wheels, thus transforming the kinetic energy of the river into mechanical kinetic energy. 

The electric energy is sent out by wires far and wide, furnishing power for numerous factories, street car lines, electric railroads, lighting, etc. By taking advantage of this power the various communities transform this electric energy back into mechanical energy and in the case of illumination, this energy is transformed into light and heat. It is obvious then that all these various changes in energy can be traced back to the heat energy of the sun.