It’s been more than 200 years since the widespread implementation of the steam engine.
Why is this still the most prevalent means of producing electricity? With things like fusion reactors, why is it so hard to convert the thermal energy into electrical energy?
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water is a VERY EFFICIENT compound for expansion and contraction, and those actions when harnessed for rotational purposes are the best way we know to make alternating current with magnets. This means that even nuclear power is harnessed to heat water past the boiling point, to make a directed force much the same as a steam engine, BUT! the important thing there is that the heat is not produced through combustion, and does not release hydrocarbons. A nuclear plant today, in both the 20th and 21st centuries is a very advanced steam turbine… A nuclear plant in the far future may potentially be concentrated solar panels, directly absorbing the radiated power as electrons into the wires, without the water turning thermal energy into expansive thermal energy as an intermediate step.
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