williams@kirk.DEC (John Williams 223-3402) (03/21/85)
Impossible. Some will get dissipated by electro magnetic waves. Even DC will experience this due to outside disturbance. John
williams@kirk.DEC (John Williams 223-3402) (08/06/85)
If a space heater were 100% efficient within a perfect closed environment, then the temperature of the room would rise to infinity (?). The idea behind the second law is that some of the energy is always lost to the environment. That is, the efficiency of the chamber is based not only on the heater, but also the insulator. John.
morse@leadsv.UUCP (Terry Morse) (08/07/85)
In article <3478@decwrl.UUCP>, williams@kirk.DEC writes: > > ... The idea behind the second law is that some of the > energy is always lost to the environment. That is not the idea behind the second law. If you could conceive of a perfectly insulated enclosure with a 100% space heater in it, the second law would still tell you that the process is irreversible. Even though no energy has passed into the environment, entropy has nevertheless been increased. The second law will tell you little about how much "leakage" one may expect out of a system; it will tell you accurately the direction of a process, though. -- Terry Morse (408)743-1487 { seismo!nsc!cae780 } | { sun!sunncal } leadsv!morse