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Dumb Question

Shirosaki

Shirosaki

The Hollow Within
Dec 29, 2008
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I'm sure this is a dumb question, but I don't know much about it so I'll ask anyway!

You know how power plants work by burning coal or whatever, which heats up water and the steam turns a motor/turbine or whatever which generates electricity? Why don't they use some of the generated electricity to then heat the water, or even turn the motor/turbine itself? Therefore saving non-renewable fuel.

Thanks for reading :)
 
Shirosaki said:
I'm sure this is a dumb question, but I don't know much about it so I'll ask anyway!

You know how power plants work by burning coal or whatever, which heats up water and the steam turns a motor/turbine or whatever which generates electricity? Why don't they use some of the generated electricity to then heat the water, or even turn the motor/turbine itself? Therefore saving non-renewable fuel.

Thanks for reading :)
Click to expand...
Simple: The energy you receive from the turbines is not enough to heat so much water.
A lot of energy is mostly lost to heat, whenever it converts from one type to another! Really, efficiency isn't nearly always optimal.
 
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If somehow you would be able to use 100% of the energy that went into heating the water; if you want to heat the water again using only the electricity you just generated, you would have to use all of that electricity and nothing would leave the power plant.
 
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Not a dumb question at all.

The thing with energy is that it can't be destroyed, only converted between different forms. And in doing so always lose energy in the process; the output energy is always lower than the input energy.

Lets invent a fictional "energy unit" and say that the coal has 100 potential "energy units". You use it to heat up water and you lose a few "energy units" because not all of the energy in the coal is used to heat the water; some of it is "lost" because the heat energy that the coal gives off also warms the it's general surroundings. Modern power plants use this "excess" heat energy to heat up the very plant it self. Then you lose even more "energy units" when you convert the steam into mechanical energy to propel the turbine because spinning the blades creates friction and heat energy.

There's probably more to it, but I'm no power plant engineer, but that's the gist of it. This applies to everything. When a car engine is said to be "more efficient" is translates into it losing less of the energy of the gasoline as heat energy and converts a larger portion to mechanical energy to propel the car.
 
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There are solutions dont get me wrong...But that would completley obliterate the term DEPENDANCY.... And you can figure that one out for yourself.
 
basically what Tsuyu said, but far less technical.

Nature is a greedy bitch, she taxes everything.

now how about this for an idea?

Basically, harnessing the power of WoW nerds (who, lets face it, need excersize)
we rig a workout gym to generate energy to both a powerplant and my washing machine.
the result? free energy, exercise for WoW players, and a lower electric bill for me.
it sounds great, i know, but no doubt you're wondering how we can make all the WoW players leave the safety of their hot pockets and computer chairs? simple. we pay them in girlfriends. with that, not only will they be willing to work out, but also the fact that they don't have a choice in their "employment" will never legally be brought into question. everyone wins!
View attachment 257
 
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JohnDoe said:
I have noticed a fatal flaw in your design, cheez. And that is that the motivation for these wheel rats that you call WoW nerds will not work. WoW nerds have no interest in a love life outside of WoW because giggety with girlfriends typically requires looking away from a computer screen, which they will not want to do. I propose you make it so that 5 hours of running supplies them with enough electricity for an hour of WoW, on low-end machines on the lowest settings. This will power the world 20 hours out of the day, they still get their WoW fix and they get exercise.
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why, it's genius! and no girls even need to sleep with them... bravo john, bravo!

though... i was hoping to make girlfriends a form of currency. oh well, i guess early 1900's mormons would be willing...since they were all about polygamy.
 
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The closest thing we have to free energy is nucleor and look where thats going. The problem with solar pannels is that they only have 20% efficiency. 80% of the suns power is not soaked up.

Magnets do stuff with no energy input they still can move something so why isnt there some kinda magnet turbine where each spoke has the opposite feild on it so when it passes by it is pushed away creating energy..,actually that sounds really amazing on the spot does anybody see an apparent flaw in my idea?
 
JohnDoe said:
Would reach equilibrium and stop moving. One step further, let's talk about something actually used - electric motors. They reverse the polarity to make it move another half turn but this requires more energy than what is produced by the half turn, same flaw in every perpetual energy idea.
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What he said. :P


Also, I think that we should research nuclear energy. When used right, it creates lots of energy with from little mass, and there is a lot of supply. Furthermore, it's clean. The only problem is safety. Well, it is relatively safe, but when something goes wrong, it could go very wrong. So... fix that, I guess?

Anyway, we should also look into higher efficiency from harnessing sun energy. There has to be some way to get more than 20% out of regular light. We should help science find it.

Thirdly, there is the Tokamak. A massive machine that does not work with splitting atoms, but fusing them. It's the same process that takes place on the sun. Though, we don't have the same pressure as on the sun, so we 'just' multiply its temperature by about ten times. Still, this is still under research, and the efficiency is negative. But apparently, we can eventually get a lot of energy from it, if all goes well. So let's hope for the best.

Finally, we still have water and air. It's energy that just appears in nature. We should use it.
 
Wave energy is certainly interesting. I mean there are a lot of, uh, waves.
Piezoelectric tiles are also very interesting. I mean, generating electricy each step you take?
 
^I heard of that it would be awesome. But then the local govt would send you letters everymonth saying your a fatass and you dont contribute to society. Get off your ass and go make us some energy.

If the problem is perpetual energy then we need to harness our ideas onto something ridiculously abundant like seawater.

Cold fusion is the future. The reason it wasnt thought possible was because every container would have the most minute amount of heat so it would never reach absolute zero. Scientists realized they could achieve it in a magnetic field vaccuum. That way the magnetic field was the container itself. It is crowned a success but the mini sun only survives a few seconds before the field weakens and the vaccuum is destroyed.

...So we have the unlimited power of the sun but we dont have the power to contain it yet...

This is the age old goal of alchemy turning lead into gold getting something for nothing. It will never be achieved energy cannot be created nor destroyed BUT it can be transmutted into matter and vice versa.
One atom is worth an extreme amount of energy just as an extreme amount of energy is needed to make one atom. So nucleor is the way to go its just we need to find a better way of harnessing it.
 
cheezMcNASTY said:
basically what Tsuyu said, but far less technical.

Nature is a greedy bitch, she taxes everything.

now how about this for an idea?

Basically, harnessing the power of WoW nerds (who, lets face it, need excersize)
we rig a workout gym to generate energy to both a powerplant and my washing machine.
the result? free energy, exercise for WoW players, and a lower electric bill for me.
it sounds great, i know, but no doubt you're wondering how we can make all the WoW players leave the safety of their hot pockets and computer chairs? simple. we pay them in girlfriends. with that, not only will they be willing to work out, but also the fact that they don't have a choice in their "employment" will never legally be brought into question. everyone wins!
View attachment 257
Click to expand...

That diagram wouldn't make sense without the sock.
 
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Tsuyu said:
Nuclear energy is slowly poisoning our planet. It can't be allowed to be the way of the future. The used nuclear fuel remains hazardous for such an immensely long time.
Click to expand...

Nuclear energy is one of the best ways we have to make enery, and one of the cleanest we have now. Sure, there have been catastrophe's related to nuclear power in the past (Chernobyl and Fukushima), but they were isolated cases. They've taught us valuable lessons, and they're pretty safe now. Nuclear waste can be easily and safely stored, and have only ever been compromised in the event of a major disaster (such as the Japanese earthquakes).

In Australia at least, they're probably the best way to power our country going into the future. We have to get off of coal, and with no seismic faults anywhere near our coastline, and quite a large desert full of uranium, it seems pretty daft to me that we're ignoring it because of some scare campaign.

But, I do think that there are more attractive options for the far future. Fusion will definitely be the best method of energy production. Once we figure out how to do it properly, that is.
 
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