Boiler Recipes for Water -> LP Steam or LP Steam -> HP Steam
Right now, the LP steam from arc furnaces and exhaust scrubbers is frustrating to use. There are precisely three consumers.
1) Turbines, which need a steady supply of LP steam to run efficiently.
2) Thermal desalinators, which are very inefficient relative to rainwater harvesters.
3) Cooling towers, which waste all the energy in LP steam.
Option 1 could be hugely improved with either direct LP steam generation or LP steam to HP steam. For the first recipe (water -> LP steam), a turbine could be set up with an LP steam-generating boiler as backup so it keeps spinning even when the arc furnace/scrubber steam is unavailable. For the second recipe (LP steam -> HP steam), this lets you plug the furnace/scrubber steam into existing HP steam pathways, again with a separate boiler as backup.
The latter option has one advantage (HP steam for hydrogen/silicon), and one disadvantage (endlessly looping HP steam -> turbine -> LP boiler -> same turbine).
Comments: 1
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25 Jun
SillySMSThis is now at least partially resolved with thermal storages; while it's only 80% efficient, it does let you buffer LP steam from periods of high production to tide one over through periods of low production.