used in the stellar synthesis of fissile elements is not included for nuclear fission. The energy returned includes only human usable energy and not wastes such as waste heat. Nevertheless, heat of any form can be counted where it is actually used for heating. However the use of waste heat in district heating and water desalination in cogeneration plants is rare, and in practice it is often excluded in EROI analysis of energy sources. Competing methodology In a 2010 paper by Murphy and Hall, the advised extended ["Ext"] boundary protocol, for all future research on EROI, was detailed. In order to produce, what they consider, a more realistic assessment and generate greater consistency in comparisons, than what Hall and others view as the "weak points" in a competing methodology. In more recent years, however, a source of continued controversy is the creation of a different methodology endorsed by certain members of the IEA which for example most notably in the case of photovoltaic solar panels, controversially generates more favorable values. In the case of photovoltaic solar panels, the IEA method tends to focus on the energy used in the factory process alone. In 2016, Hall observed that much of the published work in this field is produced by advocates or persons with a connection to business interests among the competing technologies, and that government agencies had not yet provided adequate funding for rigorous analysis by more neutral observers. Relationship to net energy gain EROI and Net energy (gain) measure the same quality of an energy source or sink in numerically different ways. Net energy describes the amounts, while EROI measures the ratio or efficiency of the process. They are related simply by or For example, given a process with an EROI of 5, expending 1 unit of energy yields a net energy gain of 4 units. The break-even point happens with an EROI of 1 or a net energy gain of 0. The time to reach this break-even point is called energy payback period (EPP) or energy payback time (EPBT). Economic influence Although many qualities of an energy source matter (for example oil is energy-dense and transportable, while wind is variable), when the EROI of the main sources of energy for an economy fall that energy becomes more difficult to obtain and its relative price may increase. In regard to fossil fuels, when oil was originally discovered, it took on