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by Denvercoder9 742 days ago
> There's enough energy in a Tesla battery to for the Tesla to reach escape velocity.

No, it's not even remotely close. A Model S weighs around 2000kg and has a battery of 100 kWh. That's √((100 kWh)/(1/2*2000kg)) = 600m/s of delta-v. Escape velocity for Earth is 11.2km/s, almost a factor 20 more.

1 comments

My math was off!

This nerd sniped me a LOT, I’m wondering if it’s possible for a chemical battery to reach orbital velocity (not escape).

An idealized Tesla would just be its battery (500kg) perfectly dumping energy to mechanical forward speed. Cutting 3/4 of the weight gets you closer to the delta-v you need, but youre still off by a factor of 5. Though orbital velocity, and leaving from the equator and gaining that speed, means you only need to get up to ~7.2 km/s. Still only a third of the way there.

Maybe you could split your battery into chunks, and expel them once they’re expended?