Plants convert electromagnetic energy to what kind of energy?

Answer 1

Plants convert solar energy into chemical energy (i.e. Glucose which is then broken down into ATP or adenosinetriphosphate). The whole process is called photosynthesis which can be broken down into 2 sub processes.

The two sub processes are the light reaction, where the light energy is used to make the molecules ATP and NADPH (an energy carrying molecule), and the dark reaction which converts the products of the light reaction into glucose.

However, electricity (electron transfer) is an important part of photosynthesis. When the light hits the Chlorophyll in the leave of the plant, two electrons are knocked free and are intercepted and transferred down a long chain of proteins called the Electron Transport Chain. These proteins turn the electrical energy into mechanical energy as the pump protons across a membrane. This causes one side of the membrane to be positively charged (because of the high concentration of protons) and the other side negatively charged due to the presence of oxygen, which has a natural tenancy to be negatively charged. This difference in charge is exploited as energy during ATP (Adenosine Triphosphate) synthesis.