How efficient would humans be as an “engine” or power generation as opposed to modern sources?

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Ignoring the blatant ethical issues associated with this question, I’m genuinely curious from a scientific standpoint how efficient the human body is at generating energy. I’m a chemical engineering major and after learning about combustion engines and steam generation, there’s a great deal of inefficiency. After taking an intro to biochemistry course it seems like the human body is incredibly efficient at energy efficiency, using food as the fuel. I was also made curious by that one black mirror episode where people rode those standing bikes as their job, I think it was for power generation but I can’t really remember. Would it actually be a good substitute in terms of equivalent power and clean energy? Again, a horrible hypothetical given the history and current use of people in such dehumanizing ways, and if this really isn’t something to be discussed, I apologize.

In: Engineering

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Anonymous 0 Comments

Horrible. Remember that, before machines and tools, humans *were* the only power generation available to us, but the second we could offload that onto beasts of burden and machines, we did so, because they are so much better.

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