My car charger can boil water really fast [video]

I'm sure there was a period where one couldn't find a 3kW kettle in the UK on power efficiency grounds, one was supposed to run a 2kW one instead to save the planet. But now when I search I find 3kW models again. So either that was a nightmare of some sort or sanity has prevailed.

Chatgpt thinks this was threatened in 2010 then postponed in 2016 then cancelled, which vaguely aligns with my timeline of interest in tea.

But the more powerful kettle should be slightly more efficient[0] because there is less time for heat to escape from the kettle while the water is being heated.

[0] Energy efficiency at boiling the water. A kettle is always 100% effective at making heat.

UK power grid has the Eastenders effect. Where the ending credits of the Eastenders soap signals a large increase in power draw from the grid as people will put on the tea kettle at the end of the show. The grid operators have to dispatch enough power to cover for this.

While the amount of energy used to boil water at 2kW is not significantly different from 3kW (2kW has a tiny amount of more atmospheric losses I think), there is a difference for the impact on the grid. Same energy but more power generating and transmission line capacity needed.

I highly doubt that. Electric kettles are just about 100% efficient, and the only difference between a 3kW kettle and a 2kW one is how long it'll take to boil. The total energy consumed will be more-or-less the same.

Are you perhaps conflating it with the EU regulations on vacuum cleaners going in around 2017? As with all EU regulations, this of course resulted in a decent bunch of EU-bashing in UK media by the usual suspects - despite less-power-hungry vacuum cleaners being just as effective as the more power-hungry ones, and power consumption being inflated by manufacturers to market their vacuums, as plenty of people believed that "bigger number = more suck = more better".

You could use vacuum like in a vacuum flask. In fact to my surprise the product seems to already exists although its selling point is how long it holds water hot after boiling and not its efficiency.

A larger heating element is very slightly more efficient due to less heat escaping as the liquid is heated more quickly. Resistive electric heating is always 100% efficient no matter the size of the heating element.

Keep in mind that heat is constantly being transferred between things that are different temperatures, the faster something reaches the set point temperature, the less time there is to lose heat.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_equation

Here's a video showing an engineer at the national grid bringing hydro-electric plants online at the closing credits of a popular soap opera in anticipation of the millions of kettle that are about to be switched on!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slDAvewWfrA

There was no such thing in the UK. ChatGPT is trained to produce text that fulfills the user's expectations. If you put a prejudiced prompt in, expect a corresponding result.

People are downvoting you because your story seems crazy, but you’re right (and wrong).

In the early 2010s there were reports that the EU was set to ban 3kW kettles in the anti-EU tabloid press.

The ‘plans’ were discussions, were general (about ‘high energy appliances’, not specifically kettles), and never got beyond the initial discussion stage - according to the same press because of fears they would drive Britons to vote for Brexit, although I’m not sure I believe that. As other commenters say, unlike other appliances that could be made more efficient, kettles are almost 100% efficient already, so the power draw doesn’t really matter. I still have some faith the authorities looking into home appliance energy efficiency would know that.

https://hoaxes.org/weblog/comments/eu_not_banning_kettles

https://www.the-independent.com/news/uk/politics/eu-pauses-p...

If we really cared about efficiency of these devices, they'd be insulated.