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The reason isn't to make steam into power but to use the steam in the coal liquification process without having to burn any of the coal. This would increase productivity + I do a better job at getting electricity than in getting burnable fuel.(Mostly because almost all of my power plants are solar power plants).

Currently, there is a limitation on how you can generate steam in space. As fusion generators don't make heat, and instead use plasma, nuclear power is the only option for generating steam.

This limits space platforms that want to use steam for purposes other than power generation, namely the coal synthesis to coal liquefaction combo to generate oil products in space.

This makes using the best power option not a viable option to upgrade to for production platforms. (An example is a production platform that generates rocket part components while parked in orbit and sends them down to the planet for use)

With an electric boiler (that uses more power than it generates in steam to make it not broken) this problem goes away. It also makes for a backup surge power option for fusion power by storing excess power as steam if your accumulators drain out for some reason.

Since steam generation in space is already a thing, I don't see any real issues adding it as an option.

An alternative would be to allow the heat exchanger to have a mode to run off of electricity at a power loss, or an electric heating tower option that works in space.

Vulteran wrote: Thu Oct 31, 2024 7:09 am Currently, there is a limitation on how you can generate steam in space. As fusion generators don't make heat, and instead use plasma, nuclear power is the only option for generating steam.

This limits space platforms that want to use steam for purposes other than power generation, namely the coal synthesis to coal liquefaction combo to generate oil products in space.

I like the suggestion for an electric boiler, but i think you may have missed some way to make steam that do not involve heat.

Namely i could use a coal liquefaction on space, from the carbon asteroid, you could get coal, and burn a few a in a regular boiler with water you get from ice melting ( in chem plant) for the early steam. Later you do not burn coal or carbon but rocket fuel that you can make from the coal liquefaction process. ( depending on which tech are available to you, there also exist the "simple coal liquefaction" that can be used to get the early heavy oil, instead of sending barrels to orbit ).

mmmPI wrote: Thu Oct 31, 2024 8:11 am I like the suggestion for an electric boiler, but i think you may have missed some way to make steam that do not involve heat.

Namely i could use a coal liquefaction on space, from the carbon asteroid, you could get coal, and burn a few a in a regular boiler with water you get from ice melting ( in chem plant) for the early steam. Later you do not burn coal or carbon but rocket fuel that you can make from the coal liquefaction process. ( depending on which tech are available to you, there also exist the "simple coal liquefaction" that can be used to get the early heavy oil, instead of sending barrels to orbit ).

Burners, including boilers, don’t work in space, that’s why the suggestion is being made. But I completely agree with you, steam in space is not needed to begin with, because the simple liquefaction recipe doesn’t use steam. Complete oil processing is entirely possible in space without any additions. If you want to increase efficiency, then you can choose to use nuclear for steam, but you don’t need to.

Yeah simple coal liquefaction is the way, and electric boiler would be a nice on change on this .

CyberCider wrote: Thu Oct 31, 2024 9:49 am Burners, including boilers, don’t work in space, that’s why the suggestion is being made.

They DO work in space, but you can't place them unless you are using editor for your test and don't realize it doesn't apply to the real game x)
My bad

oh my, for some reason my brain just thought the simple recipe was only craftable on vulcanus, that does solve the problem of oil production in space, thanks

Vulteran wrote: Thu Oct 31, 2024 2:20 pm oh my, for some reason my brain just thought the simple recipe was only craftable on vulcanus, that does solve the problem of oil production in space, thanks

Another recipe that comes from the same tech (steam from acid) is in fact Vulcanus exclusive, so you must have confused those two

It might sound stupid to use electricity to boil water... to drive a steam turbine, right?
But if you instead of seeing it as a generator, look at it as a battery... You can store steam in "liquid" silos...

Currently we can only generate electricity in 3 ways:
* Coal + boiler + steam engine
* Solar panels
* Nuclear reactor + steam boiler + steam engine.

But there is only ONE way to store excess energy:
* Accumulators
That's boring.

But if Electric Boilers was added, it would finally be possible to store energy in another way: Steam, for later use.
(apparently they have developed some AMAZING insulation in the future...)

I found this mod that adds Electric Boilers:
https://mods.factorio.com/mod/electricb ... om=updated
But, I do NOT want to use that, because mods disable achievements, that's why this should either be in the base game, or there should be some way to preserve achievement generation, from "non cheating" mods.
This is "non cheating" because you still have to generate all the same energy, but now you can just store it in another way.

Thoughts?

It would be a pretty big balance change for ships, given how many accumulators can be replaced with a single fluid storage tank. I don't remember how many that is, but I think it was a lot. There is the water consumption to consider, though, so it could be an interesting trade-off. I'm not experienced enough with this part of the game to have an educated opinion, just tossing the idea out.

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=118756

+1 here too

This would likely make accumulators useless, given how cheap fluid tanks are and how much steam they can contain.

Uhh... am I missing something?

You can already store energy in the form of steam, in liquid tanks. In fact I thought that was the canonical way to store the massive power outptut from fission reactors, so you don't waste nuclear rods.

Panzerknacker wrote: Wed Nov 06, 2024 5:42 am This would likely make accumulators useless, given how cheap fluid tanks are and how much steam they can contain.

No it's not because you have electricity that you also have water to spend there. Fulgora is a good example.
Besides , that would left a "simpler" option : accumulators, and a more crafty one, with the electric boiler and steam engine/turbine / steam tanks, with the later being justifiably more rewarding.

myridium wrote: Wed Nov 06, 2024 5:48 am Uhh... am I missing something?

The purpose of the suggestion which is to add another way that wouldn't involve nuclear, in case you missed uranium is the only non-infinite ressource in this game. ( there's another thread linked with the same proposition for yet another bunch of reasons)

myridium wrote: Wed Nov 06, 2024 5:48 am Uhh... am I missing something?

You can already store energy in the form of steam, in liquid tanks. In fact I thought that was the canonical way to store the massive power outptut from fission reactors, so you don't waste nuclear rods.

There are no current ways to generate steam without consuming something (burned fuel, nuclear fuel, acid/calcite). This would allow any source of electricity, particularly solar, to be stored as steam, which outside of Fulgora is the main use case for accumulators. In what situation would you use accumulators if you could store electricity directly into steam tanks? Only for tiny amounts of energy would accumulator storage require less space than steam. You'd have to use accumulators if water was unavailable, but are there any situations like that?

Tinyboss wrote: Wed Nov 06, 2024 5:03 pm

myridium wrote: Wed Nov 06, 2024 5:48 am Uhh... am I missing something?

You can already store energy in the form of steam, in liquid tanks. In fact I thought that was the canonical way to store the massive power outptut from fission reactors, so you don't waste nuclear rods.

There are no current ways to generate steam without consuming something (burned fuel, nuclear fuel, acid/calcite). This would allow any source of electricity, particularly solar, to be stored as steam, which outside of Fulgora is the main use case for accumulators. In what situation would you use accumulators if you could store electricity directly into steam tanks? Only for tiny amounts of energy would accumulator storage require less space than steam. You'd have to use accumulators if water was unavailable, but are there any situations like that?

I don't know how the energy density compares between legendary accumulators and tanks. At least with accumulators you don't require the water and turbine infrastructure. They are more convenient at least, and that's often reason enough to use something.

+1 to this. Electric heater of any kind, honestly. Would help greatly on Aquilo. Also, electric heat makes sense.