Joules (J) are the official unit of energy. 1W=1J/s. That means 1Wh=3600J or that 1J is kinda like “1 Watt second”. You’re right that Wh is easier since everything is rated in Watts and it would be insane to measure energy consumption by seconds. Imagine getting your electric bill and it says you’ve used 3,157,200,000J.
I guess it wouldn’t make sense to measure energy used by gas-powered appliances in Wh since they’re not rated in Watts. Still, measuring volume and then converting to energy seems unnecessarily complicated.
At least in the US, the electric company charges in kWh, computer parts are advertised in terms of watts, and batteries tend to be in amp hours, which is easy to convert to watt hours.
I did a physics degree and am comfortable with Joules, but in the context of electricity bills, kWh makes more sense.
All appliances are advertised in terms of their Watt power draw, so estimating their daily impact on my bill is as simple as multiplying their kW draw by the number of hours in a day I expect to run the thing (multiplied by the cost per kWh by the utility company of course).
I pay my electric bill by the kWh too, and I don’t live in the US. When it comes to household and EV energy consumption, kWh is the unit of choice.
1J is 3600Wh.
No, if you’re going to lecture people on this, at least be right about facts. 1W is 1J/s. So multiply by an hour and you get 1Wh = 3600J
That’s literraly the same thing,
It’s not literally the same thing. The two units are linearly proportional to each other, but they’re not the same. If they were the same, then this discussion would be rather silly.
but the name is less confusing because people tend to confuse W and Wh
Finally, something I can agree with. But that’s only because physics is so undervalued in most educational systems.
Do you regularly divide/multiply by 3600? That’s not something I typically do in my head, and there’s no reason to do it when everything is denominated in watts. What exactly is the benefit?
I was really confused by that and that the decided units weren’t just in W (0.1 kW is pretty weird even)
Wh shouldn’t even exist tbh, we should use Joules, less confusing
Watt hours makes sense to me. A watt hour is just a watt draw that runs for an hour, it’s right in the name.
Maybe you’ve just whooooshed me or something, I’ve never looked into Joules or why they’re better/worse.
Joules (J) are the official unit of energy. 1W=1J/s. That means 1Wh=3600J or that 1J is kinda like “1 Watt second”. You’re right that Wh is easier since everything is rated in Watts and it would be insane to measure energy consumption by seconds. Imagine getting your electric bill and it says you’ve used 3,157,200,000J.
Or just 3.1572GJ.
Which apparently is how this Canadian natural gas company bills its customers: https://www.fortisbc.com/about-us/facilities-operations-and-energy-information/how-gas-is-measured
I guess it wouldn’t make sense to measure energy used by gas-powered appliances in Wh since they’re not rated in Watts. Still, measuring volume and then converting to energy seems unnecessarily complicated.
Thanks for the explainer, that makes a lot of sense.
https://lemmy.world/comment/14146864
At least in the US, the electric company charges in kWh, computer parts are advertised in terms of watts, and batteries tend to be in amp hours, which is easy to convert to watt hours.
Joules just overcomplicates things.
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I did a physics degree and am comfortable with Joules, but in the context of electricity bills, kWh makes more sense.
All appliances are advertised in terms of their Watt power draw, so estimating their daily impact on my bill is as simple as multiplying their kW draw by the number of hours in a day I expect to run the thing (multiplied by the cost per kWh by the utility company of course).
I pay my electric bill by the kWh too, and I don’t live in the US. When it comes to household and EV energy consumption, kWh is the unit of choice.
No, if you’re going to lecture people on this, at least be right about facts. 1W is 1J/s. So multiply by an hour and you get 1Wh = 3600J
It’s not literally the same thing. The two units are linearly proportional to each other, but they’re not the same. If they were the same, then this discussion would be rather silly.
Finally, something I can agree with. But that’s only because physics is so undervalued in most educational systems.
Do you regularly divide/multiply by 3600? That’s not something I typically do in my head, and there’s no reason to do it when everything is denominated in watts. What exactly is the benefit?