A sure-fire way to quiet the know-it-all at any party, ask the question: "How much does electricity weigh?"

The answer may surprise you - and I'm not telling!

Electricity's pretty light

as almost every part of matter has a weight, you can say that an electron has some weigth too. Unfortunately, electron are not electricity.
electricity is a vector (a force) and is not submitted to gravity (unless you live near a black hole), so there is probably no way to measure this.

The weight depends on what size battery you need ;)

The transmission lines in Ohio are sagging from the heavy load.

The weight depends on what size battery you need ;)

How many readers of this will be weighing their batteries before and after charging? The results of this would be surprising to many people.

Yeah... my wife is one of those types, she'll believe anything I tell her, except the truth. For the first two years we were together, she thought my middle initial C stood for Claudufius. When she laughed at that, I told her it was my Grandfather's name. She stopped laughing and apollogised for it :)

My Electro weights just under 2 pounds, but I should double check that in the manual.

Reminds me of the smoke weighing scene in the film 'Smoke' or was it 'Blue in the face'...?

Damn you guys...

Well let's see the weight of a battery shouldn't be an indication of the weight of electricity, because batteries conduct electricity or store (to be more accurate) through a chemical process.

I think it comes down to what is electricity? Is it electrons?

this is going to keep me up for another 15 minutes at least.

Does the expression mass equals energy equals mass, mean anything in this situation? Does a fully-charged battery weigh more? Has anyone else checked this?

leave it to me to stumble on this two weeks later.

ok I'm going with electricity has no weight. I.E. does cable weight more when there is current going through it? I don't think so.

I believe that any weight transfered out of a battery is probably just some chemical reaction that is turning those chemicals into energy, and since energy doesn't have mass (right?) then I'm saying that electricity (as energy) has no weight.

Now the real question is " why is there air?"

Now the real question is " why is there air?"

It keeps a Blonde's head from going flat?

...Touche...

I like Peter's answer. Very cunning.

The question is dimensionally incorrect as far as I can see. Bit like asking how fast a drivers licence is or how how bright is the colour yellow.

If the question can be interpreted as, 'How much does electrical energy weigh'?

Then the answer is the same as for any other energy. Get the Mass from E=MC^2, which will be next to undetectable in any ordinary application and then calculate what it weighs by using the local value of gravity.

Simplest smart alec answer might be 'mass times acceleration, same as everything else' or 'about six times on earth what it would be on the moon'.

as almost every part of matter has a weight, you can say that an electron has some weight too. Unfortunately, electron are not electricity.
electricity is a vector (a force) and is not submitted to gravity (unless you live near a black hole), so there is probably no way to measure this.

That's right, and the thing about energy and mass is right, but what was the answer? I would hazard that it is possible, or it is irrelevant because it has no practical effect (and lets not get into the thing a bout a light wave having a nominal weight, or that gravitational objects bend light).

Oh, why didn't I study physics.

Lets see, electrons traveling make electricity, electrons are not electricity, so unless electrons way more when they travel etc etc, we can temporally take them out of the equation, this leaves that electricity is actually some form of fundamental "information" rather then real (now I'm going to spook you out). If it is information and part of e-mc2, then maybe the whole equation is just information, just wait, I'll write it down, yep totally confirmed, it looks like information on the page to me, so this brings me to the startling realisation, if it's all information, how do we know that we are not stuck in something like the Matrix..?

Now the travel of electrons through space produces a "vector", that warps the em part of space. Because the vector warps em space it could increase resistance to movement, and enough of them would make your device fly off the planet as if defying gravity, as the planet moves and the device slows down. Therefore, electricity has a gravitational resistant weight but a practical energy weight?

;) (now to, weight, for all the guys who actually know the answer to stomp on me, or look for flexible mirrors and bendy spoons ;)

But does electricity weigh the same while travelling through differing mediums? Does an arc travelling through the air weigh as much as a flow through copper (or gold for that matter)? How 'bout when you drop a TV in a bathtub (I guess in that case it would cause "dead weight"). Who came up with this daffy question anyway???

"so unless electrons way more when they travel"

They do. But you'd be amazed how little practical use knowing that is in everday life. :)

To stir up the thread a little more consider that you don't need electrons to have a current flowing. It could be positrons, or muons, or protons.

In a conventional electronic circuit, the magority of the energy is not carried kinetically by the electron, ie inertia, but in the magnetic field surrounding the wire.

The thing that tickels me most about the living in a simulation idea, is that while its possible to estimate the amount of computer memory that would be required, we can nothing about how fast it is. We could be running on a CPU that only as fast as ENIAC was, with just a massive amount of memory.

Bruce,

Electrons weight will certainly be different according to the permiability and permitivity of the medium (as well as how numerous they are). Or how easily magnetic and electric fields are to established to put it in a non mathematical way.

Only the total energy is easy to predict the weight of, not where it is actually stored. The total weight of the energy will be the same.

http://www.drexel.edu/univrel/dateline/default_nik.pl?p=releaseview&of=1&f=20060508-01

;)
(not saying it's suitable for this application, but just an example of memory density).

Yes, I actually figured a eventual conceptual design for my 3D technology, and a processor is not even necessary, memory speed is important relative to the speed of the simulation, field updates would be very slow without it. But using a transparent matrix using light to transfer information, would allow full speed over vast distances. But, I could also be implying that the universe it self has actual structure, that is an post Matrix like abstraction of some greater reality (but we are not allowed to talk about that stuff here even if it is more real then reality ;)

Look like the teaser works.

There is a definite answer, and I'm waiting to see if anyone stumbles on it - or just knows it outright.

Look like the teaser works.

There is a definite answer, and I'm waiting to see if anyone stumbles on it - or just knows it outright.

Robert,

OK, you got me curious and I did some research:

First, there are many definitions of electricity, none of which are really very good or should I say accurate and they are often at contradition with each other. There are many definitions---- just electrons and protons, electromagnetic field energy, the flowing motion of an electric charge, the amount of imbalance between quantities of electrons and protons, the flowing motions of electrical energy through whatever, and on and on.

Depending on which one you use, it weights nothing or weights very little. For example, in a copper wire each atom weights about 115,000 times more than the weight of an electron. If each atom uses one electron to supply the flow, then the electricity would weigh about 115,000th of the weight of the copper wire. Of course in a A/C circuit the electrons just vibrate and actually move no distance at all. They stand still and vibrate. In a D/C type circuit, it flows slower than maple syrip. The reason we say that it moves at about the speed of light (depends on the conductor) is that it starts the vibration almost instantly in all of the atoms of the complete circuit. What actually moves is the current, not electrcity.

Anyway, thanks for the question. I learned one hell of a lot and then again I became much more confused! :)

Mike

There is NO weight to electricity!. It's just moving electrons and wire. There is no transfer of mass or weight involved.

Chuck

There is NO weight to electricity!. It's just moving electrons and wire. There is no transfer of mass or weight involved.

Chuck

First of all, you state that it is just "moving electrons!" Electrons have weight! You need to give us your definition of electricity I guess.

I'm not giving up my info sight yet, but let's just say that your statement is far to simplistic. I guess I could email it to you.

:) Mike

Robert, Mike ... folks, I work for a billion dollar energy company, the second largest nationwide, an electric utility with more than 2.3 million customers!

Now, in the spirit of transparency, I'm the media manager, a communications professional --not an engineer and certainly not technically inclined.

I did pose this question to one of our seasoned engineers. What I wrote in my earlier post was verbatim from his voice message he left me late today. I'll revisit him tomorrow for a more detailed explanation!

Chuck

Robert, Mike ... folks, I work for a billion dollar energy company, the second largest nationwide, an electric utility with more than 2.3 million customers!

Now, in the spirit of transparency, I'm the media manager, a communications professional --not an engineer and certainly not technically inclined.

I did pose this question to one of our seasoned engineers. What I wrote in my earlier post was verbatim from his voice message he left me late today. I'll revisit him tomorrow for a more detailed explanation!

Chuck

Guess I could wait for Robert to chime back in and see what he has to say, but have your engineer check out this website:

http://www.amasci.com/miscon/whatis.html

Mike

The question is not the weight of electricity, but "How much does electricity weigh?"

'Weigh' is a verb that means to determine weight.

Electricity doesn't weigh.

The question is not the weight of electricity, but "How much does electricity weigh?"

'Weigh' is a verb that means to determine weight.

Electricity doesn't weigh.

Check your dictionary again, and let the answer "weigh" on your mind.

OK, I'll let you guys off the hook.

Actually, this is one of the most confounding brain-teasers I've ever heard of and, is itself a conundrum of information, mis-information and contradictions. Once you really start researching this it will blow your mind.

The fact is, there is not one answer to the question. What we call "electricity" doesn't really exist.

There are two main components of "electricity":

- Coulombs of electricity and;
- Joules of electromagnetic energy

Obviously every piece of matter has an electrical charge but the method in which we "force" an electrical field and create "energy" has more to do with creating either a vibration of matter within a conductor (AC) or making energy flow in one direction (DC).

Check out this website, it goes over in all the contradictory detail what the answer is - and isn't: http://www.amasci.com/miscon/whatis.html

I have a friend who works at the Jet Propulsion Lab in CA, he sent over a description that mirrors the website above, but it's so full of techno-jargon that it just makes your head spin.

The short version to the answer? Electricity is both weightless and, has mass. The ultimate brain-tease.

Robert,

Thanks for the thread and I found the same site as you. It is really good reading! I saved it.

Mike

The fact is, there is not one answer to the question. What we call "electricity" doesn't really exist.

There are two main components of "electricity":

- Coulombs of electricity and;
- Joules of electromagnetic energy

Obviously every piece of matter has an electrical charge but the method in which we "force" an electrical field and create "energy" has more to do with creating either a vibration of matter within a conductor (AC) or making energy flow in one direction (DC).

Check out this website, it goes over in all the contradictory detail what the answer is - and isn't: http://www.amasci.com/miscon/whatis.html
..
The short version to the answer? Electricity is both weightless and, has mass. The ultimate brain-tease.

Ha, ha. As we were contrasting, different ways of viewing it. But, yes, electricity has mechanisms that weigh something, but in itself apparently weighs nothing as it is in the form of energy. So the question, in experiment, is, can you even increase the weight of something (wire for example) by increasing the amount of electricity in it (without forming some gravitational defying service). But then again, the nominal weight of the photon, and that energy and mass are supposed to be interchangeable in the formula e=mc2.

"Weighing" is like saying how much does the color red on my car weigh, the paint weighs something, the colour is just an side affect from another process.

So electricity is the transference of energy by a particular mechanism, and in particular form. Putting in the form and mechanism definition would give you a good definition.


What is energy, space, answer that one?

What is energy, space, answer that one?

Aw heck, why don't we just tackle the biggest of all questions: How did we get here?

I'll jump off this one...

(^_^)

What is energy, space, answer that one?

This one is easy, at least for me!

Energy: is what I have less of each day as I get older!

Space: is what I have less of each day, because of being an old pack-rat!

NEXT! :)

Aw heck, why don't we just tackle the biggest of all questions: How did we get here?

I'll jump off this one...

(^_^)

Easy enough, an Australian cosmologist came up with the same answer I did years ago.

Two alternatives: Energy is carried by unique unseen particles in space (that are represented by a photon virtual particle on their own), or energy is transfered by a mechanism is space.

Going on the second one. Energy is transfered by a mechanism in space, which causes distortions in the em part of space. The curve of space (to use common simple terminology) also stores energy. So maybe energy is a distortion in space. I'll leave the rest of my idea, but it is pretty obvious.

Which reminds me, did that guy, in the 90's that thought that electrons etc existed over time, and could explain the effects of quantum mechanics, ever prove anything? It might fit in with this theory.