Lightning vs Hydrogen Fuel for Space Travel

[HawkI]

In space Hydrogen fuel is burned and propels the spaceship forward in the direction it's facing.

Newton's third law of motion states that for every reaction there is an equal and opposite reaction.

A lightning bolt makes around Five Billion Joules of energy.

I can't find specific numbers for Hydrogen fuel burning right now but I think it would be less.

Apart from the safety hazard to other rockets, satellites and earth, what do you think?

 

[rootone]

An static electrical discharge doesn't provide any significant directional thrust.
Ion drives though, are somewhat related to what you have in mind.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ion_thruster

 

[HawkI]

I would store the lightning bolt in a Graphene Tesla Coil. Not sure how I would sort out the Directional Thrust though?

 

[nasu]

It seems more like you are throwing buzz words around. How is Newton third law related to the lightning bolt?
And what do you want to compare? Burning enough hydrogen you can always get more energy than the one allegedly contained in a lighting bolt. Or in anything else.
You store the lighting bolt in a Tesla Coil?

 

[CWatters]

A lightning bolt makes around Five Billion Joules of energy.

Google suggests that the Saturn 5 engines delivered around 180 million horsepower = about 135 Billion Joules per second.

PS: If you want to make some sort of Electric powered Saturn 5 you will need a big "battery".

 

[rumborak]

You store the lighting bolt in a Tesla Coil?

That's where I checked out, yeah. Just the term "Tesla Coil" itself is usually a red flag. Plus graphene? And then storing something in it? Yeaaaahhhh...

 

[HawkI]

I may have figured out how to get some directional thrust going, you get a second Tesla Coil and cross the beams!

 

[CWatters]

Exactly what sort of "beam" do you think a Tesla coil makes?

 

[sophiecentaur]

Exactly what sort of "beam" do you think a Tesla coil makes?

Shades of Ghostbusters here. DO NOT CROSS THE BEAMS!

 

[berkeman]

Nonsense thread is closed.