Evidence That Magnetic Energy Shedding in Solar Filament Eruptions is the Drive in Accompanying Flares and Coronal Mass Ejections

Both in solar regions of strong (100 - 1000 G) magnetic field (active regions) and in regions of weaker magnetic field (quiet regions), filaments of chromospheric material reside in sheared magnetic fields over magnetic inversion lines. Such filaments, and hence the sheared fields that they trace, often erupt in flares and coronal mass ejections. This paper shows that the apparent decrease of magnetic energy in observed filament-field eruptions is of the order of the total energy of the flare and/or coronal mass ejection in which the erupting filament is embedded. This quantitative match supports the long-standing tenet that the flare energy comes from the preflare magnetic field, and indicates that the magnetic energy dumped in a filament-eruption flare comes from the erupting flux tube.