This needs a phantom power feature. How much does your phone charger consume when its it charging your phone but still pligged in.
Whats the cost of your TV when its "off?"
Does that use a lot of energy?
131–140 of 226 posts
Re: Does that use a lot of energy?
#132For reference it would be good to have per-passenger numbers for "sitting on a diesel bus", "sitting on an electric bus", "sitting on a tram", "sitting on a commuter train" as well.
Right, a lot of discussion about the energy economy of transportation would probably be better framed using units of people-miles or cargo-miles, per unit energy.
Re: Does that use a lot of energy?
#133Some more things I’d like to see:
- AI related values of course
- elevators, escalators
- traffic signals, street lights
Re: Does that use a lot of energy?
#134One thing missing but important to understand is the energy embodied in buying 'stuff'. At a very rough approximation, the cost of stuff, especially consumer goods manufactured cheaply, is quite a high percentage energy. When you look at people's energy usage, quite a lot of it ends up being the embodied energy in the stuff they buy. For quite a lot of people, it's probably the largest category of energy consumption.…
One may look at aluminum as a solid form of energy. In fact, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminium%E2%80%93air_battery
One gram of finished 3nm packaged semiconductor is roughly equivalent to half a kilogram of refined aluminum in terms of energy cost. If you want to spend a lot of energy for not much mass, photolithography is fantastic.
Re: Does that use a lot of energy?
#135Earlier quoted context omitted.
Energy security is national security. Cheap electricity means you can do things that made "no sense" with expensive electricity. (e.g. smelt aluminum) Cheap electricity means you can underbid regions that have expensive electricity... As Technology Connections said, "Panels that cover your electrical needs for the next 25+ years? In the Midwest, we call that a good deal!"
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To note, we are almost at installing 1TW of solar PV every year globally.
Re: Does that use a lot of energy?
#136Earlier quoted context omitted.
Energy security is national security. Cheap electricity means you can do things that made "no sense" with expensive electricity. (e.g. smelt aluminum) Cheap electricity means you can underbid regions that have expensive electricity... As Technology Connections said, "Panels that cover your electrical needs for the next 25+ years? In the Midwest, we call that a good deal!"
Most of those technologies also need uninterrupted power supplies. Something wind, solar and batteries for the next 50 years aren't.
Ember Energy: Solar electricity every hour of every day is here and it changes everything - https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/solar-electricity-e... - June 21st, 2025
> Batteries are now cheap enough to unleash solar’s full potential, getting as close as 97% of the way to delivering constant electricity supply 24 hours across 365 days cost-effectively in the sunniest places.
What does this mean? It means we are most of the way there with solar and batteries alone, even if we need a bit of carbon based generation to bridge the gap while solar and battery deployments scale globally. Solar and batteries will only continue to get less expensive and better.
Our World In Data: Installed solar energy capacity - https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/installed-solar-pv-capaci...
Solar PV go brrr.
Re: Does that use a lot of energy?
#137Earlier quoted context omitted.
Energy security is national security. Cheap electricity means you can do things that made "no sense" with expensive electricity. (e.g. smelt aluminum) Cheap electricity means you can underbid regions that have expensive electricity... As Technology Connections said, "Panels that cover your electrical needs for the next 25+ years? In the Midwest, we call that a good deal!"
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is that a sustained 20TW? Absolutely crazy that we're generating 60kwh per person daily. Where does it all go?
Re: Does that use a lot of energy?
#138Re: Does that use a lot of energy?
#139Earlier quoted context omitted.
Energy security is national security. Cheap electricity means you can do things that made "no sense" with expensive electricity. (e.g. smelt aluminum) Cheap electricity means you can underbid regions that have expensive electricity... As Technology Connections said, "Panels that cover your electrical needs for the next 25+ years? In the Midwest, we call that a good deal!"
Most of those technologies also need uninterrupted power supplies. Something wind, solar and batteries for the next 50 years aren't.
Pumped hydro is one solution. You bank the excess wind/solar using gravitational potential energy and then draw on that whenever you need to.
Re: Does that use a lot of energy?
#140> Gas heating (Single room) (1 hour of use) -- 2700Wh.
Wow dude, your room is very-very poorly insulated. Having a 2700W heater turned on constantly just for one room is a lot. If it's 0C outside and 20C inside, a typical room should not lose more than 500W, but better be in 200--400W range .