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A Cool Customer

A brewery stored its beer in a cellar some distance from the bottling
plant. The cellar was cooled by pipes that circulated a saline
solution from a central cooling unit. The main pipe that connected
this cooling unit and the cellar happened to pass near the cellar of
a retailer.

The brewery's owner eventually discovered that the retailer was using
the saline solution to cool his own cellar. He sued the retailer for
theft, but the judge ruled, "In accordance with Article 242 of the
Criminal Code, theft is the unlawful appropriation of commodities
belonging to another party. In the present case no theft has been
committed, since the saline solution was not misappropriated; rather,
it was returned in its entirety to the brewery's main pipe."

The brewery owner appealed the case, arguing, "The issue is not the
theft of saline solution but the theft of energy. If the saline
solution is used to cool the defendant's cellar in addition to my
own, I have to pay more for electricity to operate the central
cooling unit."

The court of appeals ruled: "The saline solution acquires heat from
the retailer's cellar; therefore, energy belonging to the brewery is
not being stolen. On the contrary, the brewery is receiving
gratuitous energy from the retailer."

This story appeared in a German scientific monograph, "Questions of
Thermodynamical Analysis," by P. Grassman. In propounding it in May
1990, Quantum added, "We all agree the judge was wrong, but not
everyone can correctly explain his error. Can you?"

October 7, 2021October 5, 2021 | Science & Math

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