Can someone please explain to me how water can be 350 degrees?

[ElFenix]

This. Pressurized water has a higher boiling point. It's how nuclear reactors work. Water in PWRs can be liquid up to 700+ degrees because the pressure is 150+ atm.

Boiling point is also affected by substances that are dissolved in the water and also by the external vapor pressure (i.e. altitude where your are boiling the water).

i just find it amazing that we use nuclear fuel to boil water. even nuclear fusion would just... boil water.

i did read about the super soaker guy who has spent his super soaker fortune to build a heat engine whose only moving parts are electrons and protons, no water boiling, no quadruple expansion steam engine, no emissions at all because it's sealed. use the electrons to directly create electricity. it's the intersection of heat engines and fuel cells.

 

[LTC8K6]

Don't all modern cars run a (usually) high pressure cooling system?

IIRC, NASCAR cars run about double the pressure of a typical street car.

 

[DT4K]

You could repeat that experiment 1000 times and odds are, it wouldn't happen again. However, if you heated the water once in the microwave, allowed it to cool, then heated it again, the odds significantly increase of that happening.

Maybe not with the same severity, but it's actually fairly easy to superheat liquids. There is a reason that you often use boiling stones or some other foreign object in the beaker in chemistry lab.

 

[rcpratt]

i just find it amazing that we use nuclear fuel to boil water. even nuclear fusion would just... boil water.

i did read about the super soaker guy who has spent his super soaker fortune to build a heat engine whose only moving parts are electrons and protons, no water boiling, no quadruple expansion steam engine, no emissions at all because it's sealed. use the electrons to directly create electricity. it's the intersection of heat engines and fuel cells.

What are you saying, that you can't believe we've mastered nuclear fission but still use the inefficient steam cycle for generation?

 

[a123456]

What are you saying, that you can't believe we've mastered nuclear fission but still use the inefficient steam cycle for generation?

Yeah, I think so. We haven't really invented anything better but still safe. I think liquid sodium is supposed to be "better" but sodium is too explosive if it gets out in the open.

I doubt we'll be able to manipulate individual electrons however we want for a really long time. That seems a bit too futuristic for a civilization that's really just started to get going.

 

[rcpratt]

Yeah, I think so. We haven't really invented anything better but still safe. I think liquid sodium is supposed to be "better" but sodium is too explosive if it gets out in the open.

I doubt we'll be able to manipulate individual electrons however we want for a really long time. That seems a bit too futuristic for a civilization that's really just started to get going.

Liquid metal reactors still use the steam cycle in the secondary loop, similar to how current PWRs work.

 

[a123456]

Liquid metal reactors still use the steam cycle in the secondary loop, similar to how current PWRs work.

Sure. Just that any type of loops are going to suffer from heat loss and be quite inefficient.

How are those spaceships in Star Trek (or whatever sci-fi series) supposed to be powered off antimatter drives supposed to work anyway? It doesn't seem like they would use a steam cycle over there.

 

[ElFenix]

What are you saying, that you can't believe we've mastered nuclear fission but still use the inefficient steam cycle for generation?

'mr president, we've discovered a fantastic new power source! it promises almost unlimited power for nearly no cost!'

'how's it work?'

'well, we take these green rocks, split the atoms within, and then...'

'harness the power of the atom!?! then what do we do?'

'boil water!'

it's very anticlimactic.

 

[BurnItDwn]

The coolest is that water boils at even lower temperatures in a Vacuum.... like ... -60 or -70 out in space.... crazyness!