Like fossil fuels come from organic matter that grew because of the sun. Is there any form of energy on that cannot be traced back to the sun in some way?
Like fossil fuels come from organic matter that grew because of the sun. Is there any form of energy on that cannot be traced back to the sun in some way?
Nuclear (fission) energy did not originate in our sun, it originated in some other sun a long time ago, or potentially a neutron star merger.
Tidal energy originates from gravitational collapse and the conservation of angular momentum when our planet and moon formed, and does not rely on our sun, but similarly originated in the dust clouds that formed our solar system which were put there by some other sun.
Geothermal is a hybrid of these two, with some combination of nuclear decay heating and gravity-driven heating.
Hydrocarbon, wind and hydroelectric all heavily involve our sun somewhere in the process though.
Tides are from the pull of the moon’s gravity. And the moon formed from another body colliding with the Earth. It’s not just due to angular momentum and the moon forming out of cosmic dust like the Earth did.
Without angular momentum it would have fallen back down to the Earth instead of going into orbit. It’s the orbit specifically that powers the tides, not just it being there.
But yeah, you’re right. Beyond providing the materials dust was not involved.
Tides don’t rely on the sun but are affected by the sun.
They said “tidal forces,” not “tides.” Tidal forces refer to the differential of gravitation between two points on an object. It applies in any situation where gravity is a factor, although typically only very large massive objects experience noticeable effects. That said, the concept of spaghettification (objects being stretched out as they approach a black hole’s event horizon) is based on the fact that tidal forces near a black hole would be so enormous they would be observable for even small objects like people.
Hm. Touche.