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> What's the cost of importing 500,000 gallons of water to replace what evaporates? Freedom unit warning. 1 gal of water weights 8.33lbs. Andes are about 12,0
by Gibbon1 4y ago
> What's the cost of importing 500,000 gallons of water to replace what evaporates?
Freedom unit warning.
1 gal of water weights 8.33lbs. Andes are about 12,000 feet up. So 500,000 gallons would take about 50,000,000,000 ft-lbs.
2.655 million ft-lbs/kwh.
So about 18.8 kwh.
- kwhitefoot 4y agoSo why aren't you using Btu?
- midoridensha 4y agoHe's talking about using electricity to move water, and the US measures electricity in kW-h like everyplace in the world, as far as I know.
- cromulent 4y ago
- elihu 4y agoThat's actually not nearly as bad as I expected, though it assumes perfectly efficient energy use. 18.8 kwh to obtain enough lithium carbonate to make batteries for maybe a hundred cars? That seems like a pretty good deal, if the water itself is available at sea level. (If sea water is good enough and doesn't create additional environmental concerns, then it's basically free.) I can't help but think there must be a math error somewhere, since the result would imply that it should be approximately possible for a Nissan Leaf to pull a train of over a dozen fluid-containing cars from sea level to 12,000 feet on a single charge. That doesn't seem right, but I don't see anything wrong with the math so maybe my intuition is just wrong.