• Blue_Morpho@lemmy.world
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    26 days ago

    Uranium generates that energy by fission. The hydrogen in sugar could generate huge amounts of energy if fused.

    • TheTechnician27@lemmy.world
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      26 days ago

      And this boulder could generate huge amounts of energy if I pushed it up to the top of Mt. Kilimanjaro and let it roll down.

      44 upvotes and 0 downvotes for a comment that doesn’t understand that energy density measurements like this tend to measure the useful energy of a system.

      • WhiskyTangoFoxtrot@lemmy.world
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        26 days ago

        It figured out photosynthesis instead. Why do your own fusion when you can just take advantage of the fusion that’s already happening?

    • suoko@feddit.it
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      26 days ago

      For comparison:

      • Chemical combustion of uranium: ~4.7 MJ/kg
      • Nuclear fission of uranium-235: ~83.14 TJ/kg (or $ 83.14 \times 10^6 , \text{MJ/kg} $)
      • davidgro@lemmy.world
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        26 days ago

        Serious answer: A huge negative amount. Anything above iron requires energy to fuse (which is why it produces energy from fission.) and I’m pretty sure nothing with 184 protons could be stable enough to count as being produced - the nuclei would be more smashed apart than merging at that point.

      • Blue_Morpho@lemmy.world
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        26 days ago

        Using the rule of thumb, anything heavier than iron requires energy input to fuse. So you lose energy fusing uranium.