Development and Discussion

[mrvn]

You know, I was thinking the same thing with 2 H2 + O2 = 2 H2O. I'm playing Sea Block, too.

For ore production I have 32 electrolyzers running full time with 3 oxygen flare stacks and 4 hydrogen flare stacks. The hydrogen flare stacks basically burn all the time.

There really should be a hydrogen boiler that optionally can accept oxygen for more efficiency. Overall it should produce enough energy to nearly offset the electrolyzers but not more. I'm willing to create a mod for that, can't be that hard to create a modified chemical plant that produces steam from hydrogen and oxygen.

Now the big question is:

How much H2 or H2 and O2 does give how much steam? At what temperature? And how much energy does it take?

Note: Logically I'm assuming you need some energy to control the reaction and to pump stuff around. Practically the energy used would be a fudge factor to offset what you get back running the steam through a steam engine so we overall end up with a net negative.

The goal is to run with a slight energy loss in the most efficient setup possible. Is that simply the best electrolyer + H2 boiler + best steam engine / best turbine? Or are there better ways to create H2 (and O2)?

[BlakeMW]

One possibility for H2 and O2 would be H2+O2 -> H2O2 (hydrogen peroxide - it can be made to decompose directly to steam) - it could basically be a solid fuel recipe.

With the energy balance, the only way to make it work is to prohibit electrolytes from using efficiency modules. In my personal mod I actually have electrolyzers not allowed to use modules at all as I consider that the processes are too "intrinsic" to permit productivity or efficiency, while there are ways to make electrolysis more efficient (catalysts, high temperatures etc) for the most part it just needs gobs of electricity as a hard requirement. This also makes a nice distinction between machine types.

[luckyd11]

I'm happy to see I was not alone with these ideas about H2.

For the numbers, I don't really know. Just throwing ideas. I am not a mod maker, just a user (even though I 've been a C programmer 15 years ago).

Agreed, there should be no way to get more energy back from the H2 than its cost of production with the electrolysers.
I think the assigned energetic value of the H2 is the key here. We know 1 WoodPellet is worth 12MJ and 1 Coal is 8MJ.
I haven't done any calculation to set a value for H2.

So, possibly a special chemical plant (to be named) producing steam or hot water and exclusively used to burn H2.
Low efficiency at first. Upgradable through research. No modules, in any case.
Base cost (electric power) for running it. Cost increses a bit with upgrades
First version has no oxygen input, just atmospheric - lowest efficency say 50% of H2 energetic value.
Second version takes O2 as additional input as well - efficency improves to 60%.
Third version : improves efficency to 70%.
Fourth version (using titanium for heat exchanger) improves efficency to 80%.
Once again, the key element is to determine what the energy value of "x units of H2" should be.
At most, with the best equipment, the ultimate outcome of electricity production from H2 fuel should not provide more
than 80% of the electricity originally used (by the best of all electrolysers) to produce H2 at start.
The net energy outcome of an entire H2 loop must be negative.

All of this in the spirit of not throwing away all of that H2 energy. Some energy recycling!
Sounds good.

[mrvn]

Standard boilers have a 50% efficiency. Mk2 boilers have 60% and hotter steam. And so on. I would keep to those values.

But I wasn't thinking of making H2 a fuel that you just burn in a boiler. I was still thinking chemical plant where you have a dedicated recipe. X units of H2 + Y units of O2 give Z units of steam. In that case the question is: What is X and Z (and Y since the ratios are for pressure, not mol, but that should probably just mirror the pure water recipe) so that you have a energy loss even with the best loop.

But lets think about using H2 as fuel for boilers. It's a much simpler concept. It's a gas, it burns, lets heat water. This goes more into creating a generic boiler for fluids and gases. It would probably make sense to use a standard boiler but add another liquid input for fuel. So left to right water flows through, top has input for fuel, bottom output for steam. And then it's just about adding a fuel value for each liquid. Problem I think is that the game engines doesn't allow this. The devs would have to make a liquid/gas boiler template first.

So back to the recipe / chemical plant way of doing things: Thing is, when you burn H2 you do get H2O, very very hot steam. To be useful you would have to cool it down. So I would add a water connection and make it H2 + O2 + H2O (25°) = H2O (200°) or something. By spraying water mist into the flame you get cooler but more steam. If we ignore that burning hydrogen produces steam in itself and simply use it for energy we could use the same ratio of water to steam that normal boilers produce at the same speed and then just have to figure out the amount of H2/O2 to get the energy balanced to below the 50% efficiency of boilers.

[luckyd11]

Standard boilers have a 50% efficiency. Mk2 boilers have 60% and hotter steam. And so on. I would keep to those values.

But I wasn't thinking of making H2 a fuel that you just burn in a boiler. I was still thinking chemical plant where you have a dedicated recipe. X units of H2 + Y units of O2 give Z units of steam. In that case the question is: What is X and Z (and Y since the ratios are for pressure, not mol, but that should probably just mirror the pure water recipe) so that you have a energy loss even with the best loop.

But lets think about using H2 as fuel for boilers. It's a much simpler concept. It's a gas, it burns, lets heat water. This goes more into creating a generic boiler for fluids and gases. It would probably make sense to use a standard boiler but add another liquid input for fuel. So left to right water flows through, top has input for fuel, bottom output for steam. And then it's just about adding a fuel value for each liquid. Problem I think is that the game engines doesn't allow this. The devs would have to make a liquid/gas boiler template first.

So back to the recipe / chemical plant way of doing things: Thing is, when you burn H2 you do get H2O, very very hot steam. To be useful you would have to cool it down. So I would add a water connection and make it H2 + O2 + H2O (25°) = H2O (200°) or something. By spraying water mist into the flame you get cooler but more steam. If we ignore that burning hydrogen produces steam in itself add simply use it for energy we could use the same ratio of water to steam that normal boilers produce at the same speed and then just have to figure out the amount of H2/O2 to get the energy balanced to below the 50% efficiency of boilers.

I agree with your argument. It should have similar efficency as all standard boilers.

It's true that liquids and gases are not usable fuels in the base game. It would be a good addition, though, not necessary a simple one. Gas chemistry with pressure concepts? No! A simplified layer only.

But, without that, I like your idea of a H2 burning plant that produces hot water steam as per : H2 + (opt O2) + H2O (25 C) = H2O (200 C)
It's simple and effective; fits with current game mechanics; and it gets the job done. I'd be happy to see that in Angels Mods or aside of it in a compatible mod.

Anticipation ...

[septemberWaves]

It's true that liquids and gases are not usable fuels in the base game.

I know this isn't quite on-topic with the discussion about producing power from hydrogen and oxygen, but it is relevant to using liquid fuels. I like to use the mod KS Power with Angel's mods, because it integrates very well to provide (among other things) diesel generators that run on a liquid diesel fuel made from light fuel and methane. Which is a nice use for light fuel, as well as being a pretty decent power production method in general.

[mrvn]

It's true that liquids and gases are not usable fuels in the base game.

I know this isn't quite on-topic with the discussion about producing power from hydrogen and oxygen, but it is relevant to using liquid fuels. I like to use the mod KS Power with Angel's mods, because it integrates very well to provide (among other things) diesel generators that run on a liquid diesel fuel made from light fuel and methane. Which is a nice use for light fuel, as well as being a pretty decent power production method in general.

How do they do that? Is it a recipe in an assembler like building where you pick the recipe or a boiler thing where diesel goes into the fuel slot?

[septemberWaves]

How do they do that? Is it a recipe in an assembler like building where you pick the recipe or a boiler thing where diesel goes into the fuel slot?

There's a new diesel generator machine which you pipe the diesel into (the diesel itself is made in a chemical reactor with light fuel and methane, if I'm not mistaken). There's also a cheaper oil boiler, although I'm not sure what it burns when Angel's mods are installed (possibly crude oil).

[BlakeMW]

Diesel Generators are a hacked steam engine that consume a very small amount of fuel each second at extremely high efficiency (like +4000% or whatever), the script sets the fuel in the fluidbox to the appropriate temperature.

The Oil Burner is simply an assembler which has some recipes like Crude Oil + Water -> Steam, it does not involve any scripting.

[wzzl]

Trying to use advanced smelting for the first time.. shouldn't you be able to barrel used coolant?

[luckyd11]

Trying to use advanced smelting for the first time.. shouldn't you be able to barrel used coolant?

Very hot fluids (300 C) are hardly barrelable, used coolant needs to be cooled;

[mrvn]

Trying to use advanced smelting for the first time.. shouldn't you be able to barrel used coolant?

Very hot fluids (300 C) are hardly barrelable, used coolant needs to be cooled;

But I can barrel 500°C hot steam? That's inconsistent.

[luckyd11]

Trying to use advanced smelting for the first time.. shouldn't you be able to barrel used coolant?

Very hot fluids (300 C) are hardly barrelable, used coolant needs to be cooled;

But I can barrel 500°C hot steam? That's inconsistent.

I agree; it's inconsistent. Steam shouldn't be barrelable either.
But, hey! Let's call that a design feature ...
Just like the free water pumping from the basic water pump (energy-wise) or the energy-free conveyor belts (of any speed)

[Nindydar]

Trying to use advanced smelting for the first time.. shouldn't you be able to barrel used coolant?

Very hot fluids (300 C) are hardly barrelable, used coolant needs to be cooled;

But I can barrel 500°C hot steam? That's inconsistent.

I agree; it's inconsistent. Steam shouldn't be barrelable either.
But, hey! Let's call that a design feature ...
Just like the free water pumping from the basic water pump (energy-wise) or the energy-free conveyor belts (of any speed)

Can you actually barrel steam? I assumed you couldn't but honestly I've never tried. I don't see how the temperature would be tracked if you barreled it as it is no longer a fluid once its in a barrel and i doubt the game keeps up with the individual average temp of every single barrel you have. I assume that it would all unbarrel at some standard temp which seems like it could be abused pretty easily. The few times i needed to move steam i use tankers as they keep track of fluid temp.

[mrvn]

Trying to use advanced smelting for the first time.. shouldn't you be able to barrel used coolant?

Very hot fluids (300 C) are hardly barrelable, used coolant needs to be cooled;

But I can barrel 500°C hot steam? That's inconsistent.

I agree; it's inconsistent. Steam shouldn't be barrelable either.
But, hey! Let's call that a design feature ...
Just like the free water pumping from the basic water pump (energy-wise) or the energy-free conveyor belts (of any speed)

Can you actually barrel steam? I assumed you couldn't but honestly I've never tried. I don't see how the temperature would be tracked if you barreled it as it is no longer a fluid once its in a barrel and i doubt the game keeps up with the individual average temp of every single barrel you have. I assume that it would all unbarrel at some standard temp which seems like it could be abused pretty easily. The few times i needed to move steam i use tankers as they keep track of fluid temp.

Hmm, I just assumed. Never tried it.

[mexmer]

hmm, barreling steam, that would be hot

[luckyd11]

Consistency is safe and happy. Barreling hot steam or used (hot) coolant is NOT possible.

However, barreling oxygen gas is possible (and possibly other gases too) @!? Erh?? :/( ... I'll accept that as a "feature".
From a realistic point of view, barrels should only contain cold liquids (15-25C). No gas !
For gas, there should be dedicated containers for compressed liquified form of the gas (ultra cold).
And if there are already such "compressed gas tanks", then bravo !
Truth is that I have not dug enough yet in the mod to find that.
Either it's there and I have not seen it, or it's not there at all.

[Ashprinny]

Actually; that's exactly how gasses are transported in RL too. I know Bob's (at some point in time) had 3 different methods of transporting gasses and/or fluids: By barrel (for "true" liquids like water, Sulferic Acid, oil etc), Canisters (for gasses like Hydrogen, air, Oxygen), and a sort of plastic jerrycans (for emulsion and/or composite fluids like Lubricant, Ferric Acid etc.)

When I played earlier versions I know these recipes could still be used crossmod but eventually bob scaled it back to the jerrycans and barrels first; probably because the gas canisters were basically the same entity as the barrel, recipe and all (2 steel for 1 canister holding 100u of material) and eventually the jerrycans were abandoned for the barrel (probably for convenience sake)

In the end; though the realism is a nice touch it often ended in a logistical nightmare (even more than it already was) with you having to track 3 different entities that all, basically, did the same thing and it eventually would lead to a lot of extra logistical planning or 1 of either 3 entities would clog up the network.

Likewise I discovered this problem again when I started to work with the sheetmetal. Having no method to transport the used coolant basically took away the reason why I wanted to produce sheetmetal in the first place with sheetmetal fabrication plants becoming as big as simple nugget smelting but at least the nugget smelting let me augment it by "droning" in catalyst ingots whereas sheetmetal had no such functionality. I searched the modforums for a recipe mod that let me cool Used Coolant so I could realistically transport it OR (what I finally ended up using) a recipe that allowed me to barrel "hot" Used coolant. With that I had back WHY I wanted to produce sheet metal in the first place: A compact way to transport "condensed" plates for modular usage elsewhere in my megabase.

[crysanja]

I recently finished my bob/angel/spaceX game, which required lots of rocket launches(250+).

It was alot of fun, thank you!

My biggest issues were with fluid piping. I would wish for better fluid propagation.
Fluids which stood out with bad propagation were steam, purified water and natural gas.

The production of steam is realy proplematic, because boilers dont have production numbers and cant be effected with modules.

The useage of ammonia is extreamly high lategame, which is causing issues with transporting it. Maybe reduce all ammonia numbers to aid fluid tranpsortation.(not cheaper products)
Ammonia production via bio-processing is a good startout, however it will never work out when producing rocket fuel.
One reason for the "bad" bio-processing of ammonia is the very inefficient production of CO2. Maybe CO2 production should be enhanced, using a mk5 belt of coal is alot.
The CO2 issue is componded with the carbon production, which is one of the most used items.

Air seperation as well as compressing air is very inefficient. Maybe make this alot more efficent, but change the parts to 20% O2 80% N2. The air intake is the main issue, its propably the worst production building.

High production of H2(via oil) results in an high over production of methane/ethane/butane. Methane can be turned into fuel blocks, however ethane and butane are more or less plastics only, which is not enough to cover the production. Cracking of methane/ethane and butane would help alot.

Manganese production seems kind of fine, however the washing planets have low production numbers as well as high fluid intakes. They require more pumps then pipes.Oo
The fluid access of the washing plant is not helping either.
The side production of mud is extreamly high too, turning it into landfill is just reducing the permanent storage.

The useage of gems is very low in total, however the production of geodes is kind of high, i guess i should have used them for something else then gems, but it feels like a waste. Maybe reduce the numbers of geodes produced?

[cpy]

Maybe I should just make some special seablock pump that just suck up bottom slag from sea. I also love mod that makes offshore pump use power