Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by bodyfour 4228 days ago
Think about how little cooling is needed on a big electric motor. Even motors made 100 years ago are very efficient.

By contrast anything that qualifies as a "heat engine" (including internal combustion) is limited by Carnot's law to be low-efficiency. If it weren't for the extraordinary energy density of combustible fuels they wouldn't be competitive.

1 comments

Yes, the theoretical efficiency limit on electric engines and generators is 100%.