Irreducible mass and energetics of an electromagnetic black hole

The mass-energy formula for a black hole endowed with electromagnetic structure (EMBH) is clarified for the nonrotating case. The irreducible mass Mirr is found to be independent of the electromagnetic field and explicitly expressible as a function of the rest mass, the gravitational energy and the kinetic energy of the collapsing matter at the horizon. The electromagnetic energy is distributed throughout the entire region extending from the horizon of the EMBH to infinity. We discuss two conceptually different mechanisms of energy extraction occurring respectively in an EMBH with electromagnetic fields smaller and larger than the critical field for vacuum polarization. For a subcritical EMBH the energy extraction mechanism involves a sequence of discrete elementary processes implying the decay of a particle into two oppositely charged particles. For a supercritical EMBH an alternative mechanism is at work involving an electron–positron plasma created by vacuum polarization. The energetics of these mechanisms as well as the definition of the spatial regions in which they can occur are given. The physical implementations of these ideas are outlined for ultrahigh energy cosmic rays (UHECR) and gamma ray bursts (GRBs).