4 ms·
I still don't understand why we don't really have a reliable and good way to convert chemical bond/radioactive energy into electrical energy directly? Why do w
by fsniper 4y ago
I still don't understand why we don't really have a reliable and good way to convert chemical bond/radioactive energy into electrical energy directly? Why do we still require 2 conversions of Chemical -> Heat -> Electrical ?
Is that something that is impossible or not cracked yet?
- tullianus 4y agoSome examples exist for directly converting alpha, beta, and gamma particles into electricity, but I didn't find anything for neutrons in my brief search. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_battery#Radiovoltaic_conversion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_battery#Radiovoltaic_co... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betavoltaic_device https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betavoltaic_device
- lambdatronics 4y agoFuel cells convert chemical -> electrical directly, batteries go both ways. For nuclear fusion, the only practical reaction releases 80% of the energy as uncharged particles (neutrons), for which the only way to harness their energy is to convert it to heat. The 20% of the energy that is emitted as charged particles could in principle be converted with high efficiency, but the other 80% dominates. For fission, more of the energy is emitted as charged particles, but it's not clear how one would harvest it directly in bulk. (It can be done on small scales, but not efficiently.)