In high school physics one of the most common experiments was heating water from one temperature to another and seeing how much energy was required to do the necessary amount of labor. Typically this feat was accomplished with a bunsen burner and a beaker of distilled H2O, but what if instead we used our own body and a cup of ice water?
A Calorie is a kilo-calorie, and it takes 1 Calorie to raise the temperature of 1 kg of water by 1 degree Celsius. So, for example, if we eat a 500 Calorie sandwich from Subway for lunch we are actually taking in 500,000 calories. But alas, when we run on the treadmill at the gym and burn 250 Calories we are really burning 250,000 calories. Now, unless your pee comes out nearly frozen, something has to heat that ice water that goes into your system, and that requires energy aka Calories.
So how many Calories would we burn by drinking a 16-ounce glass of ice water?
- The temperature of ice water can be estimated at zero degrees Celsius.
- Body temperature can be estimated at 37 degrees Celsius (98.6 F).
- It takes 1 calorie to raise 1 gram of water 1 degree Celsius.
- There are 473.18 grams in 16 fluid ounces of water.
Thus, in drinking a 16-ounce glass of water, your body must raise the temperature of 473.18 grams of water by 37 degrees (0 to 37). This results in your body burning 17,508 calories, or 17.5 Calories as we know it. Burning 17.5 Calories doesn’t seem like a lot, but when you take into account that you’re doing nothing to burn them, it is free exercise. Furthermore, this is just one glass, if you drank 6 of these per day your body would be burning over 100 Calories. That’s over 3,000 Calories over the course of a typical month!