Quote:
Originally Posted by Piwoslaw
I heard somewhere that the opposite is true, but that may depend on quite a few parameters. But if what we want is more heat than power then a "less efficient" engine would be just the thing, right?
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Well, possibly so, but consider that electricity is considered a 'higher quality' energy than heat, since it is easy to get nearly 100% efficiency when converting from electricity to heat, but it is very difficult to get much past 85% to 90% efficiency when converting from heat to electricity, 15% to 30% being common.
But you are right in that the 'wasted' heat energy would mostly be utilized.
However, if the inefficiency is due to fuel that is not totally combusted, it's a different matter.
-AC_Hacker