4 ms·

Is that so? I would have thought if you heated boiling water you’d turn the excess heat energy into steam pressure or something.

• p1mrx 3y ago
  A steam turbine is (to some approximation) an inverse heat pump. You can use the temperature delta from an electric heat pump to run a turbine and generate electricity, but the laws of thermodynamics guarantee that the power output of the (heat pump + turbine) system will be less than its power input. The best you can hope for is to approach 100% efficiency.
  • hyperhello 3y ago
    But the unconverted energy is still in the form of heat, right? Sorry if I’m missing the point. I realize you can’t get 100 of the input, but the unused energy should still be there.
    • Gibbon1 3y ago
      The key thing to understand is an energy source includes both an amount and a quality. For heat energy the quality is related to temperature. And is basically the percentage of it that can be converted to 'work'. For electricity the quality is near 100%. So a heat pump moves low quality heat energy inside you house say at 65 degrees and dumps outside where it's say 90 degrees. The energy you move needs to increase in the amount of quality. The increase in energy comes from the electricity used to drive the pump.
    • phanimahesh 3y ago
      Yes, the unused energy is still there, but not "usable" since it is not possible to go from heat to any other energy form at 100% effeciency.