this post was submitted on 09 Jan 2025
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I'd not that it's criticized, it's just kinda funny that everything comes back to steam engines
Oh for sure. It’s like a desire path or evolution’s crab in that way. I think I just misunderstood people’s criticisms as belittlement of the process without them understanding why it’s still the standard.
Fair enough, I'm sure people DO criticize it but it's mostly a joke.
On a side note, are there any theoretical energy sources that DON'T involve steam? I'm not well-versed
Solar (photovoltaics), wind turbines, and hydroelectric are a few non-steam energy sources in use.
As for theoretical sources, some of the pulsed-power fusion concepts use the electromagnetic pulse from fusion to directly induce electrical power. But none of these have been demonstrated yet.
I would throw all turbines into one group, steam or otherwise. Your spinning a thing in a magnetic field to create electricity. PV is particularly cool because it doesn't do that. It's a totally separate technology.
There's also natural gas turbines
Excluding things that still involve moving fluid through a turbine or piston engine mechanically driving a dynamo or alternator while simply swapping out the steam for another fluid (too obvious), here's all the ones I could find:
Also not well versed, but last time I saw this topic come up, someone mentioned towers that wiggle in the wind and generate energy via the wiggles, apparently interacting with liquid at no point.
edit: Also maybe this YouTuber's creation? https://youtu.be/BSxK5VagSb8
Yup. There are reed-like wind capture devices that generate piezoelectricity from compression. The same technology is being implemented in some nations to capture pressure energy on roadways and paths.
Ah yes, the next solar frickin' roadways. No this isn't implemented on any scale and it's right next to perpetuum mobile's in terms of magical thinking needed.
Dave is that you? 😏
The one from eevblog? Unfortunately not. But I did watch a few thunderf00t videos before he dove right into the "anti-sjw" scene 12(?) years ago
Same, this is such a common tale. "I used to watch TF, until he radicalized himself." Man, he made some good content back then and completely crashed it when he dove head first into Gamergate BS.
His favoured enemy now is Elon Musk btw., the new content might be worth watching. I'm just a little apprehensive this might drive the algorithm to present me with anti-sjw videos I don't want to watch.
That makes sense.
Besides that, does solar power use steam? I would assume not, at least not directly.
Photovoltaics do not. But here are solar powered steam generators
https://pubs.aip.org/physicstoday/article/69/11/17/415388/Solar-steam-generator-needs-no-lenses-or-mirrorsA
On the nuclear side there are also alpha voltaics, beta voltaics and gamma voltaics that take radiation and generate electricity. Alpha rely on alpha particles ionizing usually a gas, Beta voltaics rely on beta particles which are electron or positron emissions and gamma voltaics take photons in the gamma region and use them to excite electrons to generate electricity.
Overall though heating water is significantly easier to do, more efficient, and more robust
Thermo-electrochemical cycles.
The idea is simple: the favorability of a chemical reaction is a function of temperature, some reactions are more favorable at high temperatures, some at lower. For electrochemical reactions (e.g. batteries) this means a change in voltage at different temperatures. Some reactions have higher voltages, some lower. By choosing a pair of redox reactions such that the direction of charge transfer can be reversed within a specified temperature envelope, one can create a thermal engine that directly converts heat to electrical energy without requiring a turbine.
There's lots of research on this, sometimes called the 'omnivorous' flow battery.
Oh, there are many. I was referring specifically to finding a more efficient way to convert the heat from irradiated rods to electrical energy.
Steam engines are the crabs of power generation.