TRANSFORMITY
Charles François (2004). TRANSFORMITY, International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics, 2(2): 3618.
| Collection | International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics |
|---|---|
| Year | 2004 |
| Vol. (num.) | 2(2) |
| ID | ◀ 3618 ▶ |
| Object type | General information |
- “The emergy by unit energy”
Being emergy the total energy used to produce the emergence of some field condition or system, S. ULGIATI et al., state that transformity “has thermodynamic significance indicating the position of an item or process in the energy hierarchy of the universe” (1992, p.1121).
For example “Solar transformity (is) the solar equivalent energy directly and indirectly required for a joule of product” (Ibid).
In many cases the indirect requirements of energy in some production process are forgotten. This leads to over-optimistic evaluations of production in terms of energy use, as shown for example by D. PIMENTEL (1977).