Gibbs Free Energy, all on it own, is concept that would be quite difficult to grasp – especially when you are trying to grasp the concept in passing. This is why we have set up an tire site devoted to explaining what Gibbs Free Energy is, how it works, and the concepts that are pertinent to the study of Gibbs free energy.

First and foremost, Gibbs Free Energy is named after the man who discovered it as a thermo-dynamic quantity, physicist Josiah Willard Gibbs. Gibbs Free Energy is also preferably called Gibbs Energy or Gibbs Function, and Gibbs himself originally referred to it as available energy. According to Josiah Gibbs, the Gibbs Free Energy of a body is

“The greatest amount of mechanical work which can be obtained from a given quantity of a certain substance in a given initial state, without increasing its total volume or allowing heat to pass to and from external bodies, except such as at the close of the processes are left in their initial condition.”

Essentially, Gibbs free energy is the greatest amount of expansion that you can get out of a closed system in thermodynamics, with the maximum amount being only achievable if the equation itself is completely reversible.

We will provide you with a much simpler and easier to understand definition of Gibbs Free Energy in this section of the site.