A power balance for waves in resonant dissipative media is formulated, which generalizes well-known expressions for dielectric wave energy density, wave energy flux, and dissipated power density. The identification of the different terms with wave energy density and flux remains only phenomenological. The result is better viewed as an equation for the evolution of wave intensity. In that form, its consequences are discussed in particular in relation to anomalous dispersion. A discrimination is made between boundary and initial value problems. For boundary value problems, anomalous dispersion is shown not to lead to unphysical results. In contrast, for initial value problems the solution for the evolution of wave intensity is shown to be at fault in the case of anomalous dispersion. Further illustration is provided by consideration of wave dispersion in a medium of charged harmonic oscillators and of ordinary-mode dispersion in plasma. Both are characterized by anomalous dispersion and show marked differences in the solutions of the dispersion relation solved either for complex wave vector at real frequency, k(ω) (applicable to boundary value problems), or for complex frequency at real wave vector ω(k) (applicable to initial value problems).
The energy of a wave packet