What happen to most of the energy in the ecosystem?
The main energy source in an ecosystem is the sun which provides light energy. Once energy is lost to the environment as heat, it cannot be recycled as energy flow is non-linear . Thus, energy has to be continually be supplied to the ecosystem. In this case it is in the form of light energy.




1) in all ecosystem, the ultimate source of energy comes from the sun

2) light energy from the sun is converted to chemical energy by plants during photosynthesis

3) Energy in these plants is passed from each trophic level to another by feeding. some of these energy is used up by the animals and some energy is lost to its surrounding by heat energy

4) the flow of energy through the ecosystem is non-cyclic. this means that once the energy is lost to the environment, it will never be able to return to the same system orr organism that produced it
hence, energy cannot be recycled

5)Trapped chemical energy in dead organisms, egested and excreted materials are released by decomposers. These decomposers use some of this trapped energy for respiration and lose the rest as heat

EVENTUALLY, all the energy is lost to the environment in the form of heat.