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How does a capacitor store energy?
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Nathalie Morette, former PhD Student at LPEM-ESPCI Paris
Bookmarked Answers Answered Aug 25 Follow 15 more
When a capacitor is being charged, there is initially no charge on either plate, so topics

that the electric eld intensity between the plates is zero. To move the rst Find your friends on
increment of charge from one plate to the other requires no work. Later Quora
increments of charge transferred from one plate to the other must have work
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done upon them against the electric eld of the charged plates. If the potential good answers
dierence between the plates is V, the amount of work W done in transferring
charge q from the plate at low potential to the plate at higher potential will be Ask your first
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W=Vq
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Notice that the dierence in voltage measured when moving from a point A to a
point B corresponds to the work which would have to be done per unit of charge,
against the electric eld, to move the charge from A to B.

The relationship between the potential dierence and the charge q on the plates
is given as q=CV (1)

Thus, the work W done in transferring charge q from the plate at low
potential to the plate at higher potential, against the electric eld is : W=qq/C

To nd the energy stored in the capacitor when it has been charged to its nal
potential dierence V by transferring charge Q from one plate to the other, we
must add all the increments in energy, and in the notation of the calculus

W=dW=qq/C (from 0 to Q)

from which W=1/2*(Q^2/C) (2)

By substituting the value of Q from (1) into (2), we may nd alternate expressions
for the energy of a charged capacitor.

We obtain W=1/2*(CV^2) and also W=1/2*QV (3)

When the voltage across a capacitor is increased (see simulation below), it

draws current from the rest of the circuit, acting as a power load. Current is
going in the negative side and out the positive side, like a resistor. In this
condition the capacitor is said to be charging because there is an increasing
amount of energy being stored in its electric eld. An increase in the voltage
leads to an increase in the electric eld. The more voltage you have, the more
potential dierence you have, the greater the electric eld.

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When a capacitor is faced with a decreasing voltage, it acts as a source

supplying current as it releases stored energy. Current is going out the
negative side and in the positive side, like a battery (see simulation below). In
this condition the capacitor is said to be discharging. Its store of energy, held in
the electric eld, is decreasing now as energy is released to the rest of the
circuit.

In the same way, when a capacitor is faced with an increasing negative

voltage, it acts as a load (Current is going in the negative side and out the
positive side). The electric eld is in the opposite direction.

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When we decrease the distance between the two plates, we are increasing the
electric eld since E=V/r (r is the distance between the plates).

The previous equations illustrate one application of capacitors, that is, to store
electrical energy. From another point of view, the energy of a charged capacitor
may be said to reside in the electric eld between its plates. The energy of a
parallel-plate capacitor may be expressed as W=1/2*CV^2=1/2*0*A*V^2/r

Dividing this equation by the product Ar, the volume of the space between the
capacitor plates, we nd W/Ar=1/2*0*V^2/r^2

However, the quantity V/r is the magnitude of the potential gradient, which is
equal to the electric intensity E in the space between the plates.

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Thus, the energy per unit volume in the space between the plates is
W/Ar=1/2*0*V^2/r^2=1/2*0*E^2. The energy per unit volume in an electric
eld is proportional to the square of the intensity of the electric eld.
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