Update: I am actually searching for really simple, intuitive ways to explain it. I have a background in engineering, but am struggling to explain why we “pay for kwh”, and not kw (on our electricity bill) to someone who doesn’t. I have tried in many ways but maybe I’m not giving the right examples or making the right comparisons. I am really searchig for a way to ELI5.
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I’d compare it to water usage.
You pay for water by the amount you’ve used, not the flow rate. And that in essence is the kWh vs the kW.
edit: I’ll expand this answer out…
If I want to fill a (small) swimming pool with a hose pipe, I can turn on the tap by any amount I want to up to the max. I could drip water in, or I could just fully open the tap. The end result will be the same though – I end up with a full swimming pool. It’s just if I drip water in it will take much, much longer. BUT if I know the amount of time it’s taken to fill the swimming pool and the flow rate of water, I can work out the total water usage.
So, in this case, I have the water flow rate (cubic meters per second) multiplied by time (hours). There is a mix of time units (seconds and hours) which don’t easily cancel out.
Electricity is the same. Note first that a Watt is defined as **Joules per second**. So I have a flow rate (kW). I also have the amount of time I’m using that flow rate for (hours). So if I want to know the total usage I multiply the two together: kWh.
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