system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: What happens to electricity when it dissipates.

Let's say you have a malfunction at a power station, and 50,000 volts go into the ground, and it dissipates.

What exactly happens? As we all know, energy can not be created or destroyed, so what happens to the electrical energy? Does it change into something else, or what?
gpt
The vast majority dissipates as heat. Some will go into chemical reactions in the soil. At the point of entrance,  a high current through a small enough area will get so hot that light will be emitted.