So, I am currently using a geothermal-based energy system, and have increased geothermal energy to double its normal value so that 1 lava cell gives 50k EU at 50 EU/t. I am looking, however, at a steam-based system that uses railcraft steam engines and steam turbines powered by boilers. Lava gives 1k heat, NEI says, compared to the 50k EU. If I was to switch to fuel-burning steam boilers (fuel gives 96k heat, 96 TIMES more powerful that lava!) which would be more efficient? And is nuclear still the best of them all? I am not really worried about transfering energy as te Electrical Engine allows me to use EUs as MJ, and the boiler will give me access to both steam engines and turbines, for MJ and Eu respectively. But I do need help choosing!
Comparison of different energies
- Thread starter Dragonchampion
- Start date
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Please try the steam boiler in single player first so you get an idea of just how hard it is to keep it warm. My advice early on is to dig under your base and pray you find a big lava pool to pump up for magmatic engines into an redstone energy cell. That's what I use 
I'm actually pumping lava from the nether. Fuel is no issue. I'm trying to figure out which is more efficient... the buffed Geothermals or Steam Boilers?
If you're going to just change the configs any way that suits you, why not just change the geothermals to output a few million EU instead?
You don't need to be rude.
In reality, Geothermal energy is considered a clean source of energy that is akin to nuclear, while giving substantially less. I did balance it and make sure that the amount of energy produced is still easily overtaken by nuclear and other modes. I wanted to make sure people used things other than the much-overused Solar Energy, which gives something for nothing. I essentially switched the two's config settings, halved solar's while doubled geothermal.
So I did find out a bit more, and discovered that Electric Engines uses 6 EU/t to give off 2 MJ/t, and a steam boiler with 36 blocks will give off enough to run a Steam Turbine (100 eu/t , DOUBLE than my buffed geothermals) while still having 40 steam left over, enough to run an Industrial Steam Engine (8 MJ/t).
But something I cannot figure out, is, for a max size 36 unit steam boiler, how long does 96k heat (1 fuel bucket) last? Will I run out quickly if I have found a 30 block high oil geyser?
In reality, Geothermal energy is considered a clean source of energy that is akin to nuclear, while giving substantially less. I did balance it and make sure that the amount of energy produced is still easily overtaken by nuclear and other modes. I wanted to make sure people used things other than the much-overused Solar Energy, which gives something for nothing. I essentially switched the two's config settings, halved solar's while doubled geothermal.
So I did find out a bit more, and discovered that Electric Engines uses 6 EU/t to give off 2 MJ/t, and a steam boiler with 36 blocks will give off enough to run a Steam Turbine (100 eu/t , DOUBLE than my buffed geothermals) while still having 40 steam left over, enough to run an Industrial Steam Engine (8 MJ/t).
But something I cannot figure out, is, for a max size 36 unit steam boiler, how long does 96k heat (1 fuel bucket) last? Will I run out quickly if I have found a 30 block high oil geyser?
Funnily enough, I have already worked out this problem in this thread here:
http://forum.feed-the-beast.com/thr...bc-fuel-bucket-worth-in-a-steam-boiler.10841/
Oh! Thanks! I also posted a new question dealing with lava, too. 1 lava cell = 1k heat. So would 1k heat produce more or less than 50k EU?
Well, if one fuel bucket = 96000 heat and produces ~1.3 million EU, then that means 1 heat is ~14.2 EU (at 100% boiler heat). Therefore your 1k heat lava cell would put out a measly 14.2045 * 1000 = 14,204.5 EU. You are better off burning it in a geothermal if EU is your goal.
Ahh, I see. So for long term sustainable, my buffed geothermals are good. But for heavy duty stuff and higher power required objects, like quarries, my best bet is to make fuel and use them in boilers.
Is there a config file anywhere that you can edit heat values? only 1k for lava seems a little... weak.
Is there a config file anywhere that you can edit heat values? only 1k for lava seems a little... weak.
When I want to make BC Power, I generally use Blulectric engines for the following reasons:
- They are generally easy to make if you have a diamond drawplate available
- They can output 32MJ/t
- I can power the blulectric engines with windmills which are 20 times more powerful than RP solar panels.
- I don't need to feed coal or other fuel into the power source to get the engine running.
- Just 2 of them can power a quarry at full power given that you are supplying full power to the blulectric engine
- Windmills can run day and night
- Windmills and Blulectric Engines also look cool.
- You also have some blutricity stored if you make RedPower machines
- They can't directly power Lasers or Redstone Energy Cells due to a bug, but you can use Redstone Energy Conduits and it will fix that issue
- Windmills need to be above ground so you will need to feed that blutricity down.
- You will need quite a bit of battery boxes if you want to keep some energy stored to make the engine run at full capacity.
- Windmills take a while to get started at full speed
Solar panels are overused and, as such, I hate them. I believe they stifle creativity. As I said before, solar panels were really heavily nerfed for my server. As for Redpower energy, I haven't thought about that. But the major thing about it is, as you said, Batteries. I'd prefer to have only a few battery boxes rather than 50 million, ahaha.
That is just lame. We should stop using compact/advanced solars on servers just so that it is a PITA to get a decent solar farm.Just for the record: On the last map on my server (1.2.5) nuclear reactors were buffed by a factor of 10 (an ice casuc produced a whopping 20k EU/t!) and guess what.... most people still used solars
Just for the record: On the last map on my server (1.2.5) nuclear reactors were buffed by a factor of 10 (an ice casuc produced a whopping 20k EU/t!) and guess what.... most people still used solars
That is so lame. Pulse reactors are so flippin' awesome when gregtech is there. I've only seen it once and I nearly passed out it was so cool.
And making free and inlimited lava from the Nether worth 50k doesn't stifle creativity?
Just for the record: On the last map on my server (1.2.5) nuclear reactors were buffed by a factor of 10 (an ice casuc produced a whopping 20k EU/t!) and guess what.... most people still used solars
It really is a shame that so many players just always go for the path of the least resistance. I wish the IC2 devs would fix the issue with normal solars so that the compact versions can be removed. You see that on our server too: even to power quarries people just build a bunch of compact solars and some electrical engines.
They also should take a good look at balancing power outputs and needs so that for the higher tiers just building a bunch of geothermals or solars would not cut it.
Just for the record: On the last map on my server (1.2.5) nuclear reactors were buffed by a factor of 10 (an ice casuc produced a whopping 20k EU/t!) and guess what.... most people still used solars
The problem is that you don't need that much energy very often - so you should instead nerf Solar's by a factor of 10 - that would make keeping even a limited maschine set-up running with Solar's alone would be a hazzle
Or simply remove IC2 solars completly
Well the problem is, even completely removing those would not change anything. There are dozens of completely safe reactor designs, biofuel production setups, blaze farms, and so on easily found on the internet. You can't realistically stop all of them while still maintaining some resemblance of a complete mod. You can't force creativity on people - at least not without completely redesigning MC itself. By its very nature, every resource can be found everywhere (to a large degree), and transport of huge amounts of resources is trivial even by vanilla means (you can fit 1,900 blocks of anything in your inventory and just walk in the worst case). Therefore any setup can always be perfectly replicated by anybody, given a detailed enough guide. There is never a need to adapt to different environmental conditions, or different resource availability, as in the real world.
I think the only reasonable solution is to gather all the people who want to inovate together and start a server using as wide selection of items and machines as possible - relying on good faith that people will try and go further than the same "meh" setups.
(I still fondly remember the 90's, when looking up guides and walkthroughs was considered practically equivalent to cheat codes...
)It's all the kids who are so used to instant gratification. If something takes you more than 5 minutes to set up it's considered 'booooring'
You can't really prevent most people going for similar setups. But atleast my cane > biomass > fuel > boiler setup is complex enough to automate that it actually took me hours to all set up properly.
I think the main issue is that different people have different opinions on what's 'cheesy' or 'cheating'. With all the people using actual cheats in online games (aimbots, x-ray vision, etc.) I am not surprised that a discussion on solars and the balance implications is pretty much impossible.
I don't mind people looking up reactor designs on the net though, stuff like that is kinda harsh if you get it wrong. I just don't like setup that take you 5 minutes and then provide you all the power you'll ever need. Where's the fun in that?
You can't really prevent most people going for similar setups. But atleast my cane > biomass > fuel > boiler setup is complex enough to automate that it actually took me hours to all set up properly.
I think the main issue is that different people have different opinions on what's 'cheesy' or 'cheating'. With all the people using actual cheats in online games (aimbots, x-ray vision, etc.) I am not surprised that a discussion on solars and the balance implications is pretty much impossible.
I don't mind people looking up reactor designs on the net though, stuff like that is kinda harsh if you get it wrong. I just don't like setup that take you 5 minutes and then provide you all the power you'll ever need. Where's the fun in that?