Question

If all of the energy from decay of the 14C in your body could be captured and converted into electrical energy, how many

Answer 1

1. What energy is released in each ¹⁴C decay.
2. How many decays per second occur for each person.

For part 1, the energy released in beta decay is the Q value of the reaction which can be determined from the mass defects: 3.0199 MeV - 2.8634 MeV = 0.1565 MeV per ¹⁴C decay. You can then convert that number into Joules.

For the second question, you need to make some assumptions. The ones I made were that each person weighs 75 kg, of which 18% of that weight was due to carbon. I also assumed that the ¹²C:¹⁴C ratio in the human body is the same as it is in the atmosphere or around 10¹²:1. Based off of that information you can determine the number of ¹⁴C atoms in a human body. Once you know how many ¹⁴C atoms the body contains, you can determine the activity thanks to the relationship: Activity = Number of ¹⁴C atoms * ln(2)/Half-life. You should get something around 2.597E+3 decays per second.

This allow you to determine how much energy a human gives off due to ¹⁴C decay each second. Take the 100 Watts and divide it by the Joules/second from a human and you will be able to figure out how many humans you need in order to power a 100 Watt light-bulb.