Fuel
Fuel can be inserted into burner devices and burned to power them. Different fuels provide different amounts of energy, measured in megajoules (MJ).
Burnable fuel
The most common fuel type is burner fuel.
This is a list of all items usable as fuel in burner devices:
| Item | Fuel value | Fuel value per raw total | Fuel value per stack |
Vehicle acceleration |
Vehicle top speed |
Train max speed1 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 |
2 MJ | 2 MJ per wood | 200 MJ | 100% | 100% | 259.2 km/h (72 m/s) |
 |
4 MJ | 4 MJ per coal | 200 MJ | 100% | 100% | 259.2 km/h (72 m/s) |
 |
12 MJ | 0.96 MJ per unit of crude oil2, or 8.7 MJ per coal3 |
600 MJ | 120% | 105% | 272.2 km/h (~75.6 m/s) |
  |
2 MJ | 1 MJ per coal | 300 MJ | 100% | 100% | 259.2 km/h (72 m/s) |
 |
100 MJ | 0.8 MJ per unit of crude oil2 | 1 GJ | 180% | 115% | 298.1 km/h (83 m/s) |
 |
1.21 GJ | 9.68 MJ per unit of crude oil2, and 40.89 MJ per uranium ore4 |
1.21 GJ | 250% | 115% | 298.1 km/h (83 m/s) |
 |
4 MJ | 80 kJ per crop4 | 40 MJ | 100% | 100% | 259.2 km/h (72 m/s) |
 |
4 MJ | 80 kJ per crop4 | 40 MJ | 100% | 100% | 259.2 km/h (72 m/s) |
 |
100 kJ | 50 kJ per wood | 1 MJ | 100% | 100% | 259.2 km/h (72 m/s) |
 |
2 MJ | 2 MJ per crop | 100 MJ | 100% | 100% | 259.2 km/h (72 m/s) |
 |
10 MJ | 10 MJ per crop | 500 MJ | 100% | 100% | 259.2 km/h (72 m/s) |
 |
250 kJ | 250 kJ per crop5 | 50 MJ | 50% | 50% | 129.6 km/h (36 m/s) |
 |
1 MJ | 2 MJ per crop | 100 MJ | 100% | 100% | 259.2 km/h (72 m/s) |
 |
1 MJ | 4 MJ per crop | 100 MJ | 100% | 100% | 259.2 km/h (72 m/s) |
 |
6 MJ | 6 MJ per egg | 600 MJ | 100% | 100% | 259.2 km/h (72 m/s) |
 |
5 MJ | 5 MJ per egg | 500 MJ | 100% | 100% | 259.2 km/h (72 m/s) |
(1) For the purposes of in-game speed display, the game assumes 1 tile = 1 meter. I.e., a train on basic fuel travels at 72 tiles per second at full speed, and so on.
(2) This assumes all crude oil is processed completely into solid fuel using advanced oil processing and heavy oil cracking as intermediate steps, but not light oil cracking. More efficient methods are possible; in practice, the petroleum gas is more likely to be used for something other than solid fuel.
(3) Using coal liquefaction and heavy oil cracking, converting all light oil and petroleum gas into solid fuel. Does not include energy requirements of refining/mining.
(4) This assumes the "cost" is what you would have gained if you planted the seeds and harvested the grown plant, i.e. 50 yumako or jellynut.
(5) Fuel value per raw for spoilage varies a lot on the item spoiled and if they were made using the biochamber's 50% base productivity. 250 kJ assumes spoilage directly from yumako or jellynut crops. This is can go as high as about 2.43 MJ per crop using nutrients from bioflux (60 nutrients from 4.16 yumako and 1.66 jellynuts with 3.21 nutrients spent running biochambers).
Other fuel types
These fuels are consumed by specific entities and cannot be placed into standard burners.
| Item | Fuel type | Fuel value | Fuel value per stack |
Consumed by | Consumption rate (watts) |
Consumption rate (items) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 |
Nuclear fuel | 8 GJ1 | 400 GJ |  |
40 MW | 1 per 200s |
 |
Fluid2 | 50 kJ |  |
0.3 MW - 6.0 MW | 6/s - 120/s | |
 |
Fluid2 | 50 kJ | |
0.3 MW - 6.0 MW | 6/s - 120/s | |
 |
Nutrients | 2 MJ | 200 MJ |  |
500 kW | 1 per 4s |
 |
Food | 6 MJ | 600 MJ |  |
100 kW | 1 per 60s |
(1) This is 507 MJ per raw uranium ore assuming that all U-238 is enriched, all depleted uranium fuel cells are reprocessed, and there is no reactor neighbor bonus.
(2) Thruster fuel and oxidizer have a fuel value but technically do not have a fuel type. Since they can only be consumed by thrusters which require specific fluids, they are effectively their own fuel types.
Consumption
The following formula can be used to find how long a fuel will last in a device:
Burn time (s) = Fuel value (MJ) ÷ Energy consumption (MW)
Trivia
- Though the top speeds given by solid fuel, rocket fuel and nuclear fuel are presented as +5%, +15% and +15% respectively, this seems to only be true for trains. The top speeds for cars and tanks are instead approximately +9.5%, +34% and +58% respectively when these fuels are used.
History
- 0.15.0:
- Fuel type affects vehicle acceleration and top speed.
