[Greenbuilding] energy and power terms

[Jason Holstine]

I second and resemble the remark.

It¹s analogous and confounded by the confusion over BRIGHTNESS ‹ everyone
wants to compare lightbulbs by the watt and nobody knows what a lumen is.
Now there you have nasty apples and oranges.


On 11/21/11 11:44 AM, "David Bergman" <bergman at cyberg.com> wrote:

> Completely agree. It's also why the term kilowatt-hours is so confusing to
> most folks (many of who think it is kilowatt per hour).
> 
> David
> 
> At 10:04 AM 11/21/2011, Alan Abrams wrote:
>> methinks that what is problematical is semantical.  if it is gallons of milk
>> that are important to a mother, and gallons of milk per hour that are
>> important to a milkmaid, and if these terms are logical and intuitive--then
>> watts should logically be the term for the volume of electricity consumed,
>> and watts per hours should be the term for the rate.
>> 
>> but it's not.  hence the confusion.
>> 
>> On Mon, Nov 21, 2011 at 7:06 AM, nick pine <nick at early.com> wrote:
>> David Bergman writes:
>> 
>> The article also says, btw, that watts are comparable to horsepower. But I do
>> find their explanation before that rather confusing: "A laborer working
>> through the day will put out 75 watts of power. A medium-sized car might
>> consume 100,000 watts." Those sound like energy totals, not flows.,
>> 
>> 
>> Perhaps the intent was to say that the laborer can generate 75 watts for a
>> long time, vs 300 watts for a shorter time. And accelerating a 4000 pound car
>> from 0 to 60 mph takes about 1/2mV^2 = 1/2x4000x0.454lb/kg(60x0.447)^2 = 653K
>> joules. If that happens in 6 seconds, it might require a constant 653K/6 =
>> 109K joules per second, ie 109 kW for 6 seconds, or perhaps more power and
>> smoke at the beginning and less at the end, at a non-constant rate.
>> 
>> Nick Pyner wrote:
>> 
>> ... If you must use automotive terms, I submit it might be better to use the
>> fuel gauge than the speedo.
>> 
>> 
>> The rate of change of the fuel gauge is closer to power than the speedo.
>> 
>> 
>> Or how about the engine? A watt is exactly like a horsepower, just 3/4 the
>> size, and most of the world uses just that.
>> 
>> 
>> One horsepower is about 3/4 of a kilowatt, like 10 75-watt people.
>> 
>> Nick 
>> 
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> 
> David Bergman  RA   LEED AP
> DAVID BERGMAN ARCHITECT / FIRE & WATER LIGHTING + FURNITURE
> architecture . interiors . ecodesign . lighting . furniture
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