Amazing video by Technology Connections. It’s a long one, but don’t miss his 30 minute angry rant at the end.

  • spacesatan@leminal.space
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    3 days ago

    No. Why would anybody have an intuitive frame of reference for what a joule is.

    This appliance uses 1 kilowatt, running it for an hour is a kilowatt hour. Easy.

    *And I can’t even find anything suggesting any countries meter electrical bills by the joule so ???

    • merc@sh.itjust.works
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      3 days ago

      This appliance uses 1 kilowatt. Running it for 1 second uses 1 kJ. Easy.

      Are you billed by the hour, or by the month?

      • spacesatan@leminal.space
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        3 days ago

        By the kilowatt hour per month.

        If you’re talking about systems that generate and consume power measured in watts. Why would you then convert to joules so that you can say ‘this generates ___ joules per hour’ when you could just infer kwh from the nameplate wattage. It’s an extra conversion for no reason.

        • merc@sh.itjust.works
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          3 days ago

          Why would I care about “Joules per hour”? What matters is power (Watts), and total energy used (Joules). “Kilowatt hour per month” is just an awkward way of saying “Joules per month”

          • Tuuktuuk@piefed.europe.pub
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            6 hours ago

            Because total energy used is not what matters. What matters for most people is how much they have to pay. And they have to pay according to how many hours they were powering their devices with how many kilowatts.

            People are – sadly – very uninterested in thinking about energy being indeed energy.

            • merc@sh.itjust.works
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              6 hours ago

              they have to pay according to how many hours they were powering their devices with how many kilowatts

              Let’s see, power multiplied by time is… energy. So they’re paying for the total energy used. If they use 2 kW for their hair dryer and it doesn’t even come close to an hour of usage, they have to pay for that too.