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Ask HN: Understanding KWh Intuitively

4 points by gnomodromo ↗ HN
Hi, I'm trying to understand the unit kWh intuitively. I came up with the following comparisons. But they feel surprisingly unintuitive. Did I make an error somewhere?

1 Joule: Energy to lift 1 apple of 100g up 1m (roughly).

1 Watt: Lift 1 apple 1m within 1s.

1 kW: Lift 1000 apples 1m within 1s.

1 kWh: Every second for 1h, lift 1000 apples for 1m in 1s.

Or: Lift 1 apple 3600km within 1h? This feels off.

Now if I compare it to a microwave that uses 1kWh, it means with the energy I spend running a microwave for 1h, I could lift an apple up 3600km?

1 comment

[ 2.4 ms ] story [ 8.6 ms ] thread
yorwba
Yes, it's also enough energy to accelerate your apple to 8.5 km/s or to heat 14 liters of water from 20 °C to 100 °C. Probably you don't have your microwave running at a constant power draw of 1 kW for an entire hour.