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I read this question (Flame temperature for cooking food) and came up with the following questions:

  • Could companies color their flames so that products would heat quicker?
  • How would they do this?
  • Could you use this to make an infrared or ultraviolet flame? If you could, how hot would they be?
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Unfortunately not, I'm afraid.

I think you might have gotten cause and effect mixed up here. Blue flames are hotter than yellow flames not because of their color, but because hotter flames generate blue light and cooler ones generate yellow/red light.

To take an example of this kind of problem, I know that very red tomatoes tend to be tastier than very pale tomatoes. Does this mean that we could make tastier tomatoes by injecting food coloring into them? Well, probably not, because it's not the color that causes the flavor. Rather, tomatoes that generate more color tend to also generate more things like sugar and flavors, and so flavorful tomatoes tend to have more color.

With flames, it's even more black-and-white because while its possible to have a pale tomato that happens to taste good, the color of the flame is set by the universe: unless you add colors yourself, it is impossible to have a blue flame that is the same color as a yellow one. The color of the flame is determined by something called "blackbody radiation," and if you're curious about why flames are colored the way they are, it's definitely something to take a look at.

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The flame has different color because it has different temperature. If you add something to change flames color (like source of metal ions) it will not affect temperature of the flame. So in short: they can not.

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When we talk about the color of flame we should consider its source, too. If you are burning a transition element then you will see a colored flame. Each element may give different color so the energy caused by this element will also be different. And the heat is also related to this energy.

On the page you have linked, you can see the relationships for these energies. However, if you need further informations you can study related concepts e.g. electronic spectra and quantum mechanics. Since this issue can be explained with more details.

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The temperature of the flame depends (mostly) on the material being burned. Natural gas burns with a hot blue flame, while wood burns with a cooler yellow flame.

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