4 ms·
Yeah the units cancel, that's the issue. The phrasing implies that after half a day it's received 85k terawatts which doesn't make any sense. Power (kg m^2 /
by treyd 2y ago
Yeah the units cancel, that's the issue. The phrasing implies that after half a day it's received 85k terawatts which doesn't make any sense.
Power (kg m^2 / s^3) * Time (s) = Energy (kg m^2 / s^2)
Now from context it's obvious that what was meant is that Earth continually receives 170 terawatts from the sun. The phrasing is technically inaccurate, but it's a turn of phrase that works fine.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- jessekv 2y agoso... close... petawatts ;)
- spacedcowboy 2y agoSo, not knowing any better, I read it as meaning 170k TW/day, so 85k TW/12 hours made sense to me, but you’re right… [1]. The earth receives 14.9 ZettaWatts of solar radiation per day… [1]: https://gosolarquotes.com.au/amount-of-solar-energy-hitting-earth/ https://gosolarquotes.com.au/amount-of-solar-energy-hitting-...