does a one bar electric fire exhibit electron decay?

Question

I know you guys have spent a lot of time proving that electrons don't decay, but could somebody explain what comes out of my one bar electric fire when I switch it on - particularly if its not infrared electromagnetic radiation?

Answer 1

Electrons carry energy around, but the do not appear and disappear under ordinary conditions.

Imagine we have a barbecue and a bucket of water we want to heat. We will use a round about method. We takes some rocks and put them on the barbecue until they get hot. Then we put the hot rocks in the water.

When the rocks get hot, they gain energy. They may even get red hot and glow. They lose energy in the water. No rocks are created or lost.

Likewise, no energy has been created or lost. It just changed form and moved around. Chemical energy in the charcoal became heat when the charcoal burned. The heat moved from the fire to the rocks to the water.

Answer 2

What you have is a resistive heater; the electrical energy goes through a high resistance metal, just like in a toaster, and the wire heats up.

This is conversion of electrical energy to heat; no electrons are lost in this process, but infrared photons are created and radiated towards you by the reflectors.

The efficiency of modern resistance heaters approaches 100%; see http://energy.gov/energysaver/electric-resistance-heating

Answer 3

You may notice that electrical wiring is always done in pairs - current (electrons in motion) flowing one direction in one conductor and the reverse direction in the other conductor. That's because the same quantity of electrons entering a device (lamp, heater, motor, battery, generator) has to leave it. The energy radiated in the heater (or radiated in a light, or work done by a motor) comes from electrons moving from a higher potential (wire at a higher voltage) to a lower potential. The product of potential and rate of flow of electrons equates to the power transferred, and power over a given period of time equates to the total work done. Nowhere in any of this was an electron created or destroyed, simply moved across a potential difference.

In the case of your heater, the energy released as an electron moves through the bar from one conductor to the other (across a difference in potential) ultimately produces photons which carry the infrared or visible light energy from the device.

In summary, the electric fire is an example of the creation of infrared photons due to the movement of electrons, and has nothing to do with electron decay.