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In the local orthonormal tetrad, the components of the photon number current areThey are respectively the photon number density and the photon number flux. Thus $J^{\mu }$ is the photon number four-current, not an energy current or an electric charge current. Photons carry no electric charge. For the isotropic background,Integrating the covariant Boltzmann equation over the invariant mass-shell measure, with vanishing momentum-boundary flux, giveswhere $C[f]$ is the collision operator in the covariant streaming equation. ThereforeCollisionless photon propagation satisfies this condition, as do Thomson scattering and ordinary Compton scattering when all participating photons are counted: each collision has one incoming and one outgoing photon. Photon emission, photon absorption, bremsstrahlung, double Compton scattering and electron-positron annihilation in cosmology or its inverse generally give a nonzero number source. A cancellation of net creation and destruction can nevertheless make the integrated source vanish even when individual number-changing reactions occur. Cosmological redshift itself changes photon energy, not photon number; in an expanding homogeneous universe a conserved photon number current gives ${\bar{n}}_{\gamma }\propto a^{-3}$.

Photon absorption removes a photon and transfers its energy and momentum to matter. It contributes a negative photon-number collision source. It differs from Compton scattering, which redistributes a photon's energy and direction while preserving the count. The integrated source can vanish if photon emission and absorption balance.

In an orthonormal tetrad, $J^{\hat{0}}=\int f{d}^{3}p$ is the photon number density and $J^{\hat{i}}=\int f{e}^i{d}^{3}p$ is its number flux. Integrating the Boltzmann equation gives ${\nabla }_{\mu }{J}^{\mu }=\int C[f]d^{3}p/E$ when momentum-boundary terms vanish. Collisionless propagation and photon-number-conserving scattering give zero divergence. Photon emission, photon absorption, electron-positron annihilation in cosmology, bremsstrahlung and double Compton scattering generally do not. This is a number current, not an electric charge current: photons are neutral.