11 cents per kilowatt hour

I know there must be a point in there somewhere.

kilowatt of electricity, all day and all night. Their bikes are stationary and they drive electrical generators in a gymnasium. How many bikes are nee ded? How much can we pay the people who generate at the ordinary market val ue of $0.11 per kilowatt hour?

generate electricity at the market rate. Or pay them four hundred times mor e to burn coal.

There will be some pointy bits on the bike sprocket.

George H.

Might be an excerpt from a secret Occupy Wall Street proposal. ;)

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

lowatt of electricity, all day and all night. Their bikes are stationary an d they drive electrical generators in a gymnasium. How many bikes are neede d? How much can we pay the people who generate at the ordinary market value of $0.11 per kilowatt hour?

nerate electricity at the market rate. Or pay them four hundred times more to burn coal.

The reality is, people *pay* for gym memberships.

:)

Michael

That seems pretty low. Athletes expend ~500W sustained (long-distance events taking over an hour) and >1kW for events taking a minute or so.

Base metabolism is ~100W.

But if you were serious about using muscle power, animals would seem to be a better bet (you only have to pay for the food, no wage on top of that).

But if you use people, they'll pay you for the chance to lose those unwanted pounds

Michael

Base metabolism 100 watts, before doing the job for 8 hours a day. 100 watts to surf the internet pushing buttons and not generating yet.

E = 24 hour/day 3600 seconds/hr 100 joules

E = 9 Megajoules Joules/day

E = 2000 kilocalories = 2000 Calories

The point is that electricity is inexpensive enough that manual labor is worth less than 5 cents per hour in some tasks. That is for an athlete who generates for 8 hours delivering ten times the power that I would provide. Like that song, Big Bad John.

Basic electronics is easy. Power equals energy per second.

Yes, a much needed idea !

Jamie

I don't think you could pedal a stationary bike at 25W for several hours. (I'm thinking of a museum exhibit, the bike was kinda, tired and worn.) The amount you expend, and your output power, are two different numbers. ~10% efficiency is a good guess, Athletics can do

George H.

Look at this:

w.

cant't buy much food at that rate. animals aren't a good way to turn biomass into mechanical energy.

Dear Helmut, I looked at the bicycle generator video. The work gang makes u p to 121 watts per person in the video. That is like lifting 90 pounds up o ne foot per second. My estimate of 75 watts is not for a power surge, it is for 8 hour shifts. The maintenance costs on bicycles will exceed the value added by selling kilowatts for 11 cents each. Burning coal is much more ef ficient and cost effective, in the short haul.