burning liquefied coal in boiler is more efficient than coal?

[Mr.Hatty]

I did some calculations and I not sure if it lines up correctly.

But if you burn 10 coal you get 40 MJ of energy.

The input ingredients are 10 coal (40MJ) and 25 Heavy oil (14.5MJ).

sidenote: heavy oil has slightly more energy if you calculate it via converting HO to LO and then to solid fuel. You are increasing the energy by about 50 %.

If you do coal liquefaction process. Then you crack the HO to LO and produce solid fuel out of light oil and petrol. Petrol is only 5.4 % of total energy so you can drop it and don't convert. You get 111 MJ ????? The whole process takes 7 MJ of energy during crafting. I must have made a mistake somewhere or is this real? It feels pretty bonkers tbh.

The net energy that is created is around 48 MJ. Physics go out of a window I guess

Also placing down steam engine and turbine generates energy. Idk if this is unique to sandbox though. Placing down steam engine generates 15KJ and turbine generates 97KJ. If you were ever desperate for energy carry 10 turbines and an accumulator. Build 10 remove 10 build 10 ..... After placing 30 I got myself to 2.9 MJ lol.

[knighttemplar1960]

Nope. I calculated it a long time ago. You have it right. When you liquefy coal and turn it into solid fuel you magically get more energy out of it than went into it.

[Mr.Hatty]

Originally posted by knighttemplar1960:

Nope. I calculated it a long time ago. You have it right. When you liquefy coal and turn it into solid fuel you magically get more energy out of it than went into it.

lol

[The_Mell]

See it as useable energy instead of absolute energy and it might fit logic a bit better.

[Mr.Hatty]

Originally posted by The_Mell:

See it as useable energy instead of absolute energy and it might fit logic a bit better.

but it is coal changing state from solid to liquid back to solid. You can make it potentially more energy dense but you shouldn't be leaving with more energy than you started with it.

I would say that making coke from coal is likely energy negative as well.

I am also pretty sure that coal liquefaction is energy negative process in real world.

Think of it the other way around if it was energy positive no one would be burning brown coal in powerplants.

[Shurenai]

Originally posted by Mr.Hatty:

Originally posted by The_Mell:

See it as useable energy instead of absolute energy and it might fit logic a bit better.

but it is coal changing state from solid to liquid back to solid. You can make it potentially more energy dense but you shouldn't be leaving with more energy than you started with it.

I would say that making coke from coal is likely energy negative as well.

I am also pretty sure that coal liquefaction is energy negative process in real world.

Think of it the other way around if it was energy positive no one would be burning brown coal in powerplants.

You're not technically getting more energy than you started with. It's about efficiency.

I'm going to prolly explain this all poorly, but, We actually do exactly that same process in real life to get 'more' energy from the same material, but in reality, it's the 'same' energy, condensed down, purified, and re-made in a way that it burns more completely. And that product... Is charcoal.

We take wood, that burns very inefficiently (Yes, really), It leaves behind large chunks of itself, a lot of usable material floats away in the breeze, It may not all burn at an efficient level due to uneven heating or water content, it burns inefficiently because it's not able to burn hot enough, or burn too hot depending, or stay at temperature consistently, etc, etc, etc.

But if you pack it under some dirt and let it basically smolder in it's own choking ashes, the result you get is charcoal- The very same material, purified through a controlled burn, and resulting in a material that burns hotter, longer, more efficiently, more evenly. You use up more of the material creating energy than with wood, so even though it's literally the same material, You've increased the Harvestable energy from the process; This energy technically existed in the wood, but, due to other circumstances, functionally it went to waste.

Again; It's about efficiency. With Coal in game, You have a usable value of power, There's technically more power inside it but it doesn't burn efficiently since it's literally just raw unadulterated ore out of the ground, there's a lot of waste. Turn it into a slurry, filter and press it into solidified blocks of pure burnable material though, and you get fuller use of the stored energy.

Edit: To put it in other terms, It's like how we chop up animals or plants and cook them in different ways to use more of it. Alot of cuts of meat are damn near inedible or even completely unsafe to eat(ie, fugu) without additional preparation compared to the cuts everyone knows and loves; But that meat is still on the beast, That 'energy' is still there. Take a tough inedible cut like pork shoulder, Slow cook it for 10-16 hours and you've got delicious pulled pork that falls apart on your tongue and is a delight to eat.

Edit 2: I think the issue here is that the game simply doesn't tell the player something like "Coal: 20MJ energy(4mj usable in current state)" or "Coal: 4MJ usable(20MJ if refined), So when you look at coal, you see 4MJ, you do all the math, you come out with 'more' energy than you put in, and it seems like an infinite energy glitch.

[The_Mell]

Originally posted by Mr.Hatty:

Originally posted by The_Mell:

See it as useable energy instead of absolute energy and it might fit logic a bit better.

but it is coal changing state from solid to liquid back to solid. You can make it potentially more energy dense but you shouldn't be leaving with more energy than you started with it.

I would say that making coke from coal is likely energy negative as well.

I am also pretty sure that coal liquefaction is energy negative process in real world.

Think of it the other way around if it was energy positive no one would be burning brown coal in powerplants.

Yeah, and some of this power produced is directly used by the conveyor belts feeding the plant in the real world while Factorio features magical belts that just work.
Real world is an interesting but problematic background for games because they are always limited simulations and usually feature design decisions to make them a good game.
From a game designer perspective it makes sense to have a positive gain when players put 'work' into something because that is motivating.

[Fel]

Originally posted by Mr.Hatty:

Originally posted by The_Mell:

See it as useable energy instead of absolute energy and it might fit logic a bit better.

but it is coal changing state from solid to liquid back to solid. You can make it potentially more energy dense but you shouldn't be leaving with more energy than you started with it.

I would say that making coke from coal is likely energy negative as well.

I am also pretty sure that coal liquefaction is energy negative process in real world.

Think of it the other way around if it was energy positive no one would be burning brown coal in powerplants.

If you have some basic understanding of the history of handling metals, you probably heard about refining wood into charcoal, a significantly better fuel made from burning wood (in a special way where it doesn't really "burn" of course).
There is a similar process for coal, turning it into coke, found much later and usually roughly associated with the start of mass-production of steel.

When making energy from burning, it is how efficiently you are creating heat that matters as the first step and refined fuels tend to be able to burn a lot better, partly thanks to not having as much in terms of impurities and having a molecular structure that releases more energy when broken down to carbon and converted in CO2.

TL;DR: The process in the game is slightly weird but the core idea is not as wild as you might think.

[knighttemplar1960]

Originally posted by Shurenai:

Originally posted by Mr.Hatty:

but it is coal changing state from solid to liquid back to solid. You can make it potentially more energy dense but you shouldn't be leaving with more energy than you started with it.

I would say that making coke from coal is likely energy negative as well.

I am also pretty sure that coal liquefaction is energy negative process in real world.

Think of it the other way around if it was energy positive no one would be burning brown coal in powerplants.

You're not technically getting more energy than you started with. It's about efficiency.

I'm going to prolly explain this all poorly, but, We actually do exactly that same process in real life to get 'more' energy from the same material, but in reality, it's the 'same' energy, condensed down, purified, and re-made in a way that it burns more completely. And that product... Is charcoal.

We take wood, that burns very inefficiently (Yes, really), It leaves behind large chunks of itself, a lot of usable material floats away in the breeze, It may not all burn at an efficient level due to uneven heating or water content, it burns inefficiently because it's not able to burn hot enough, or burn too hot depending, or stay at temperature consistently, etc, etc, etc.

But if you pack it under some dirt and let it basically smolder in it's own choking ashes, the result you get is charcoal- The very same material, purified through a controlled burn, and resulting in a material that burns hotter, longer, more efficiently, more evenly. You use up more of the material creating energy than with wood, so even though it's literally the same material, You've increased the Harvestable energy from the process; This energy technically existed in the wood, but, due to other circumstances, functionally it went to waste.

Again; It's about efficiency. With Coal in game, You have a usable value of power, There's technically more power inside it but it doesn't burn efficiently since it's literally just raw unadulterated ore out of the ground, there's a lot of waste. Turn it into a slurry, filter and press it into solidified blocks of pure burnable material though, and you get fuller use of the stored energy.

Edit: To put it in other terms, It's like how we chop up animals or plants and cook them in different ways to use more of it. Alot of cuts of meat are damn near inedible or even completely unsafe to eat(ie, fugu) without additional preparation compared to the cuts everyone knows and loves; But that meat is still on the beast, That 'energy' is still there. Take a tough inedible cut like pork shoulder, Slow cook it for 10-16 hours and you've got delicious pulled pork that falls apart on your tongue and is a delight to eat.

Edit 2: I think the issue here is that the game simply doesn't tell the player something like "Coal: 20MJ energy(4mj usable in current state)" or "Coal: 4MJ usable(20MJ if refined), So when you look at coal, you see 4MJ, you do all the math, you come out with 'more' energy than you put in, and it seems like an infinite energy glitch.

Turning wood into charcoal makes it more energy dense but reduces the mass by a corresponding amount. Some of the energy in the wood is used (wasted) removing water. Some of the energy it can provide from other voletiles that are burned off in the reduction process is also lost. The end result is a product that is higher in carbon that burns hotter and cleaner (and faster) than the wood. Turning wood into charcoal is still a net energy loss process.

In game 10 coal (40mj potential) is liquefied into (90)65 heavy oil (25 is used for the next cycle, 20 light, and 10 petroleum gas oil. If you crack the heavy oil into light oil and convert every thing to solid fuel you get 6.9 solid fuel which, when burned in game, provides 82.8 mj of energy.

Processing the coal into the oils takes 2.1 mj. Converting the heavy oil into light oil takes 0.7 mj. Converting all of the oils into solid fuel takes 2.89 mj. If you subtract the entire energy cost of the conversion out of the end total you converted 40 mj worth of coal into 77.11 mj of solid fuel. (81.66 mj if you used efficiency modules).

If you are calling some of the energy used in the process adding an oxidizer by some type of reformation process I'll give you that for making solid fuel into rocket fuel but on planet where oxygen is free its an unneeded step. IRL it would cost you something deu to process inefficiencies but in Factorio machines are 100% efficient except for those few that have a drain.

Even without efficiency modules you are magically adding 37.11 mj to the total end product (hand waving the pittance of energy to produce the 50 steam required) while reducing its mass and volume. The total carbon you started with is the total carbon you end with.

It's the same magic that allows mining productivity research to create extra free ore/coal/stone/oil from nothing.

[Mr.Hatty]

Originally posted by Fel:

Originally posted by Mr.Hatty:

but it is coal changing state from solid to liquid back to solid. You can make it potentially more energy dense but you shouldn't be leaving with more energy than you started with it.

I would say that making coke from coal is likely energy negative as well.

I am also pretty sure that coal liquefaction is energy negative process in real world.

Think of it the other way around if it was energy positive no one would be burning brown coal in powerplants.

If you have some basic understanding of the history of handling metals, you probably heard about refining wood into charcoal, a significantly better fuel made from burning wood (in a special way where it doesn't really "burn" of course).
There is a similar process for coal, turning it into coke, found much later and usually roughly associated with the start of mass-production of steel.

When making energy from burning, it is how efficiently you are creating heat that matters as the first step and refined fuels tend to be able to burn a lot better, partly thanks to not having as much in terms of impurities and having a molecular structure that releases more energy when broken down to carbon and converted in CO2.

TL;DR: The process in the game is slightly weird but the core idea is not as wild as you might think.

Metallurgy and heat production for sake of making for example electricity are different topics.

Do you have a source that says that burning let's say wood makes less total heat than burning charcoal? That if I were to take 1 t of wood and burn it. I would end up with less heat than if I would refine it to 250 kg of charcoal and burn it instead.

The reasons for use of refined fuels in metallurgy is completely different to power generation. If I was using the solid fuel block to make steel I wouldn't be complaining. But we are just throwing it into oven to heat up steam to 165 degrees celsius. You are correct that coke and charcoal burn hotter as they are more way more dense. If you want to make iron you need to heat it up to 1500 degrees celsius and there wood isn't sufficient. Other argument I think is impurities. Iron is made with coke which is made from already very pure coal. But I am not convinced that running power plant on coke would be producing more energy compared to shoving the coal to furnaces right away.

Like even ships and especially warships during 1900s didn't use coke as fuel as far as I know. And they could actually benefit from increased energy density.