Thanks Patrick, very much
appreciated.
Glad the handbook finally
recognizes that current is associated with energy dissipation, not
energy collection.
Transfer of energy alone,
is work-free. Any source of potential (including, e.g., an electret)
radiates energy continuously. The "static field" in space is still
composed of photons, and a photon in space is moving at light speed.
As Van Flandern points out, a static field is analogous to a
waterfall, but not to a FROZEN waterfall. It appears "static", but it
is really a steady state energy flow of its component parts all in
motion at light speed.
Always gets us back to the
source charge problem. Any discussion of potential energy in a
circuit, potentializing a circuit, etc. is not adequate until the
source charge solution (available from particle physics but not in the
Maxwell-Heaviside electrodynamics model at all) is
discussed.
Best wishes,
Tom Bearden
10 / 11 / 03
Dear Colonel Bearden,
I was looking at Ivor Catt's website and came across this
interesting reference:
Standard Handbook for Electrical Engineers - 10th
Edition (1968) by Fink & Carrol - McGraw Hill, pages 2-12 -to 2-13
A significant point about this
phenomenon is the fact that electromagnetic energy flows
predominantly through dielectrics (non conductors). Metals are
conductors for current but non conductors for the flow of energy,
while dielectrics are good conductors for the flow of energy.
Near the surface of a transmission line conductor, the Poynting
vector is slightly inclined towards the conductor's surface, thus
giving rise to a small component of energy flow into the conductor.
This component of the electromagnetic wave causes the conductor
current, which in turn causes a loss but does NOT contribute
usefully to the power transmission.
The usually accepted view that the conductor current produces the
magnetic field surrounding it must be displaced by the more
appropriate one that the electromagnetic field surrounding the
conductor produces, through a small drain on its energy supply, the
current in the conductor. Although the value of the latter (the
conductor current) may be used in computing the transmitted energy,
one should clearly recognize that physically this current produces
only a loss and in NO WAY has a direct part in the phenomenon of
power transmission.
Obviously the last paragraph is likely to cause a good deal
of healthy speculation, and you will not be surprised to know that
it has not appeared in any edition since 1968. It seems paradoxical
to say that the calculation of what is described as a 'loss' can
help estimate the magnitude something that is a completely
'unbounded', at least as far as this description goes.
As you say, we are back to Poynting vs Heavisde, and Lorentz's 2
dimensional surface integration of an energy which is '2+n
dimensional'.
Given that we have a model of the electron, it sometimes seems that
we don't even need an 'energy flux' model to describe conduction
current. Surely the 'free electron gas' has enough residual energy
to power conduction once a voltage is applied? Ivor Catt goes all
the way and claims that conduction current doesn't really exist, but
that seems highly contentious. Anyway, on with the research !
regards
Patrick