How come induction stove is more energy-friendly than gas stove (with gas cylinder), while induction stove is using electricity and gas stove is not ?
In: Technology
A gas stove work with fire that heats up air the area around it, which then heats up the pot, some of that heat escapes form the sides of the burners
An induction stove instead works by using coils of wires and electricity to directly heat the pot, without having to heat up anything else, so it is more efficient by letting less heat escape
Induction is far more efficient.
A gas stove burns fuel for energy. Energy is lost as light from the flame, heat escaping around the sides of the pot, heating up the stovetop itself, as unburnt gases escaping, etc.
An induction stove works by utilizing a magnetic field to excite the material of the pan itself. No pan present to get heated, very little energy is used. Can’t have heat escape around the pan because the pan itself is what is getting hot, not the stovetop. Every watt of power that it takes in, aside from a tiny amount for control boards, is converted into heat that is used for cooking.
In a gas stove, chemical energy is converted into heat. This process is very efficient, with only a little bit of energy lost as light (visible flame) or sound (hissing). However the heat from the gas stove leaks out around the pot, so not all the heat energy is going into your food.
An induction stove doesn’t actually heat up, it causes the pots and pans placed on it to get hot. This means almost all the heat generated by the stove is going into your food, making the induction stove very efficient.
But there is another thing to consider; generating electricity has an efficiency cost. So the true efficiency of the induction stove has to account not only for the efficiency of the stove heating the food, but also of the power plant turning oil, coal, or natural gas into electricity and sending it to your house. Once you consider this cost, an induction stove may be less efficient than a gas stove.
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