[ExI] " Space-Based Solar Power - SBSP" sent you a message...

Stefano Vaj stefano.vaj at gmail.com
Sun Dec 6 22:34:32 UTC 2009


I have just received that, and thought might be of interest to some of us...

<<From John Strickland:

NEW STRONG BUT INDIRECT SUPPORT FOR SSP

A Utah physicist Tim Garrett has just published a paper which gives
strong indirect support to SSP.  His paper is based on physics more
than economics, and indicates that energy conservation has little
effect in the long run, and that the globe needs to replace and add
about 300 Gigawatts-equivalent of new non-carbon energy sources a day
in order to stabilize current greenhouse gas levels.  He sees little
prospect of this in the short run.  Several Journals refused to
publish his paper, in seeming confirmation of the Climate-gate
scandal.  (Some of the Climate-gate documents are surely innocent, and
others surely not).

If we (the global community) currently need 300 Gigawatts equivalent /
year of new, clean energy (for fuel and power), Nuclear can only cover
part of it since there is not an unlimited amount of uranium.  If we
had C.A.T.S., SSP would be able to provide such an unlimited amount of
energy, since there is no fuel to deplete.  Trying to do it through
ground solar and wind means the globe would have to add 1200 Gigawatts
per year of solar and wind capacity, (assuming a capacity factor of
25%, yielding an annual average of 300 Gigawatts) along with either
the power storage needed to make it available as electricity when
needed, or the equipment to create non-carbon fuels out of the
majority of it.  Assuming that the capital cost of building the ground
wind and solar equipment is about $10 Billion per Gigawatt, and that
the storage and conversion equipment would be about the same, the
annual global cost to meet this “red queen’s race” would be about 24
Trillion dollars a year, of which the annual US share would be at
least $5 Trillion/yr.  If nuclear reactor parts could be mass-produced
and the reactor construction standardized like France does to keep the
capital cost a $2 billion / Gigawatt, the global annual cost would be
2.4 Trillion and the US share would be about 500 Billion/yr.  Building
the system of re-usable rockets and a system to build SSP would
probably cost much less than what the US would spend during a single
year.  In addition, SSP represents the only source of power which we
can keep adding to at this rate without causing any environmental
degradation or massive use and depletion of physical resources to
build ground solar and wind equipment.

The link to a free, downloadable copy of the original article
(Published 11-21-09) in the journal “Climatic Change” is at:
http://www.facebook.com/l/09c43;www.springerlink.com/content/9476j57g1t07vhn2/fulltext.pdf

The Article name is “Are there basic physical constraints on future
anthropogenic emissions of carbon dioxide?”

The link to ScienceDaily’s article Is Global Warming Unstoppable? on
the issue is at:
 http://www.facebook.com/l/09c43;www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/11/091123083704.htm

I suggest that everyone carefully check this new point of view out to
see how we can effectively use it.
If any physicists in the group can help translate the physics language
in to plain English, that would help.
If anyone finds sites where this is being discussed, let us know.
This should be starting to happen today.

John>>




-- 
Stefano Vaj



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