Re: Space travel not war


You are not in charge,

I am in charge of me. That is enough.

nor are your personal actions making a
difference,

Yes they are.

so what's the difference?

My happiness.

All the good and wise intentions of honest folks don't seem to count,

You are troubled by a network of fixed ideas. Nothing in the external
world will allow you to rid yourself of these ideas. Oh, on occasion
you might think you will be rid of them some day, but the ideas are
fluid and they adapt and re-assemble into the same old fixed pattern
they've always had. You project all this onto the world - and blame
the world rather than addressing the problem where it exists. In your
head.

You won't get better on your own. I made a few suggestions to you
many months ago. You ignored it. GET HELP son, you'll feel better
for it.

especially when the few good-guys are being systematically topic/
author stalked and otherwise bashed and/or banished at most every
turn.

usenet is not the universe. lol.

There's no question we have more than enough solar derived energy to
spare,

The solar constant is 1,368 watts per sq meter. The Earth is 1
astronomical unit (AU) from the sun. That's 149,597,870.691 km. The
diameter of the Earth is 12,756 km. With this information we can see
how much power is available on Earth, and in the solar system.

The sphere of the Earth projects a shadow with a disk the same
diameter as the sphere. The area of the shadow times the power per
unit area gives the power available to the Earth's surface. So;

P = A*i = pi * (12,756,000)^2 / 4 * 1,368 =
174,825,588,922,703,731.5 watts
= 174,825.5 trillion watts.

Humanity uses energy at a 15 trillion watt rate. Principally by
burning 28.4 billion barrels of oil, 5.5 billion tons of coal and 1.1
billion tons of natural gas. Together they produce about 40 billion
tons of carbon dioxide.

So, by intercepting about 1 part in 11,655 of the solar energy falling
on Earth - that is by covering an area of 10,964 km - an area far less
that paved road area in most States - we can supply all our needs.

Of course there are practical difficulties. First, is that sunlight
isn't available all the time on Earth. The area of a sphere is 4x the
area of a disk the same diameter. Also, the atmosphere and clouds
interfere. At best this increases the area 5x for terrestrial
applications. So, we're at 55,000 sq km. Next nothing is 100%
efficient. At best again, 20% to 40% of the energy is available.
This increases the size to 274,200 sq km or 137,100 sq km - depending
on the efficiencies. These are not impossibly large areas. They're
less than the paved roads humanity uses, less than the rooftop areas
of all buildings.

The issue is the technology, and the cost of that technology, and the
cost of its maintenance, and the balance of system costs - needed to
be able to use energy when the sun is not shining.

If done cheaply enough the 28.4 billion barrels of oil, 5.5 billion
tons of coal, and 1.1 billion tons of natural gas are all replaced by
3.34 billion tons of hydrogen each year, eliminating all carbon
emissions, and providing the basis of continuous industrial growth.

We need not jump to this end point. I have worked in this area and
have developed low cost solar panels and balance of systems that tie
directly into our existing energy supply network.

Hydrogen and oxygen is produced from water and solar electricty when
the sun shines. The hydrogen and oxygen is piped to coal fired power
plants and used to partially oxidate the coal into carbon monoxide.
The carbon monoxide is hydrogenated to form methanol. Methanol is
dehydrated to form dimethyl ether. Dimethyl ether is dehydrated to
form butane. Butane is polymerized to form octane. In this way each
ton of coal is converted into 6 to 8 barrels of gasoline, with zero
emissions, while still getting the bulk of the value out of the heat
of combustion. Any shortfall is made up with hydrogen augmented
plants. Further the total hydrogen needed is cut by about 30% from
the all hydrogen energy economy. The beauty part is the future
production of gasoline is leveraged to pay for projects without giving
up control of the technology. Once the technology is well
established, any shortfall in growth of supply is made up by expanding
hydrogen production directly - leading eventually to a hydrogen
economy - without shortchanging any of the fossil fuel producers.

In this way the 5.5 billion tons of coal each year is converted to an
average 38.5 billion barrels of liquid fuels, more than the 28.4
billion barrels currently consumed. A total of 66.9 billion barrels,a
year and 235.5% more fuel than currently consumed. With a 7% growth
rate world wide, this is achieved in 12.7 years. Additional
electrical power is provided by hydrogen, growth beyond this is
provided by hydrogen. A 30% increase in the 38.5 billion barrel total
- using an area of panels equal to that computed above, constitutes
50.05 billion barrels of synthetic fuel from coal, a 78.45 billion
barrel total, which is 276.2% above today's consmption - which occurs
after 15 years of 7% per annum growth in demand.

After that, hydrogen dominates.

I am sponsoring 8 projects that total 300 sq km as my initial projects.
150,000 sq km total divided by 300 sq km is a growth of 500 times
growth. Taking the 15th root of that obtains 51.3% annualized rate of
growth - to meet the shortfall with my technology - while maintaining
a global growth rate of 7%.

We can also collect solar energy off-world. There's sunlight in the
space beyond the Earth. Using low cost photovoltaics to power low
cost free electron lasers that beam bandgap matched energy to solar
collectors, converting them to power satellite receivers, is one way
to go. This all has to be done a very low cost in order to be
competitive. Given that, the amount of energy is tremendous. The
energy is beamed to the then existing solar power systems and
increases their output about 30 times without any problems. Beyond
that, we beam energy directly to end users at different wavelengths,
and move beyond the Earth with our industry.

How much power is available if we do that?

Well, a sphere 149,597,870.691 km in radius has a surface area of;

A = 4 * pi * r^2 = 281,229,379,125,966,859.9 sq km.

With 1,368 watts/meter2 or 1,368 megawatts per km2 across that sphere
we have

384,721,790,644,322,664,384.7 megawatts

of solar power available to us in space. This is
25,648,119,376,288.18 times the energy humanity uses today. So,
efficiently tapping into the power output of the ENTIRE sun, allows
each human to use 4,000 times the amount of energy the entire race
uses today, and still have power to spare!

So, we're not energy poor by any means.

We merely lack the cleverness to tap into the energy reserves
available off-world, at a cost that allows economic use.

I am changing that.

At 7% annual growth rate in energy use, how long would it take before
we NEEDED the sun's entire output? Oh, about 456.3 years. So, we
have the time, if we start now.

Of course what happens after?

Well, WE change due to our success. That's an important point. When
humans are raised in luxury, and not frustrated throughout their
lives, they become in a way - domesticated. Very much like the silver
foxes of Siberia. They become friendlier, and nicer. There is an
actual genetic change that occurs in one generation. Also,
reproductive rates fall below replacement levels when living standards
rise to US 1950 levels and above.

These two changes explain the generation gap and the labor patterns in
places like Europe, the United States, Saudi Arabia, and Japan.
Applied generally to humanity, it is not likely that humanity will
consume more than 100 times the energy it uses today per person, in
less than 70 years - or have more than 10 billion humans alive ever.
Our success limits growth as well as our failure. We shouldn't fear
this. We should embrace it. How would rather see human numbers
moderated? Everyone living in a burned out basement in Beruit
avoiding the killer robot mines? or Everyone living like billionaires
served by robots?

Add in space travel and things become more interesting.

In fact, the most sophisticated human population models show human
population peaking at about 8.5 billion, and falling off gradually
after that, even with increased longevity and high living standards.
Add in interplanetary and interstellar travel, and human density drops
even faster. We very quickly become what we were before cities -
bands of high tech long-lived nomads spanning the galaxy. If
technology well beyond the bernal sphere based starship is possible,
that is if time travel, or any other far out possibility becomes real
- then human density will fall to the vanishing point - which may
explain where all the alien species are - they hit the same wall.

The universe is a big place, and by spanning big sections of it, we
grow richer, but at some point our density falls.

Within the next 32 years we'll hit the technological singularity, and
between then and now, if we survive to then, we'll achieve nearly
everything we can achieve in this world - so, looking at these limits
is an important activity.

What is not useful is taking everything personally and blaming this or
that individual for this or that failing. We need to take a grander
view and demand more of ourselves in working toward the future we
want.









not to mention upon a good many other green and/or fully
renewable alternatives for producing and conserving energy without
further trashing our environment or that of our bank accounts.
. - Brad Guth

.

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