Energy considerations

The variously proposed mechanisms by which the WTC highrises have been turned from erect buildings to piles of smoldering rubble all seek to explain the forces necessary to initiate and propagate these destructions. Viewed with the eyes of a phycist, "force" was applied over a certian "time" along certain "distances", creating "heat" and doing "work". In short: "energy" was transformed.

Many Conspiracy Theorists (CTers) claim that plane impacts and fires would not be sufficient to explain collapse initiation. Some go even further and claim that obervations like "pulverisation of concrete and steel" or "molten steel" would require more energy, heat or force than was available in the common storyline.

So we need to look at the energy available, and the energy (supposedly) needed for various CT claims:

• Potential energy of the mass of each twin tower in the gravitational field (GPE)
• GPE of building WTC7
• Kinetic energy of Flight 11
• Kinetic energy of Flight 175
• Chemical energy of the jet fuel in either plane
• Chemical energy of the combustible office contents, per floor
• Energy release of high explosives, per mass unit
• Energy release of thermite, and derivatives, per mass unit
• Capabilities of Directed Energy Weapons (DEW)
• Energy required to heat, and melt, various relevant metals
• Energy required to break structural steel
• Energy required to "pulverise" concrete

If a CTer claims that the energy available as GPE, combustibles, and kinetic energy was insufficient, and proposes a different mechanism such as high explosives, thermitic incendiaries, or Directed Energy Weapons (DEW; for example lasers),  then it is clear that this method should add a substantial amount of energy in relation to the available energy. Certainly, adding 10% would not suffice, since that is within the margin of error of many of the considerations listed above. We don't know the mass of each building precisely, and we don't know precisely how much concrete was turned into pieces of what sizes to compute the fracture energy. We have no precise idea about how much metal was heated to what temperatures at what time. I suggest that any CTer claim that rests on the assumption that the energy contained in the buildings and planes alone was insufficient to explain the destrcution, must propose a method that adds, at least, 50% of that energy.