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NASA's Own X Prize?
Roger_Explosion writes "NASA has announced that its 2005 budget includes 20 million dollars allocated to what it calls 'Centennial Challenges.' These are described as 'a series of annual prizes for revolutionary, breakthrough accomplishments that advance exploration of the solar system and beyond and other NASA goals.' The article on the X Prize site seems to suggest that this was a collaborative effort between the X-Prize organisation and NASA. You can read the story on the X Prize site."
Although I am happy that funds like this are reviving the human desire to develop more space bound technology, this x prize is to jumpstart the space tourism industry.
I see in my mind's eye several hawaiian shirt and sunglasses wearing citizens doing limbo and playing shuffle board on a double decker space bus. It just feels tacky and it is far removed from my utopian Star Trek TNG tendencies of space exploration.
Is humankind so pathetic that the only reason we want to go into space is to expand the tourism industry?
Seems like a way for NASA to capatalize off of geeks with big ideas
If promoting space travel as a possible tourist activity can help develop the technology faster, I say do it.
Making the moon less necessary since 1998.
Finally NASA realizes that the best way to produce innovation fast is to put it into the private sector! I am looking foreward to more programs like this, though this one will probably have limited success because of the small amount being put in compared to NASA's total budget.
Faster, Better, Cheaper? Pick two and toss out one. We all know that low cost and space are desirable, the only problem is that low cost and government aint gonna happen. By its nature government views the spending as a positive. Hell, government will spend the saving on something else. Its all pointless. I say spend more for less is probably the best solution :)
Has it occurred to anyone that the reason the X Prize hasn't been won yet is becuase of the size of the prize? I mean, if I'm going to invest (and have others invest in ME) I think there needs to be a reasonable expectation of a return on that investment. 5, 10, 20 mil just doesn't seem to be enough to me.
The first men to arrive in Mars will earn $20 MILLION!!! It is a big deal!
2004 is already shaping up to be a banner year for space exploration. I can hardly wait to see what kinds of advancements come next. Competition is healthy, let's hope for a very competitive exploration of the cosmos.
www.lonseidman.com
X, what is it all about. Is it good or is it whack.
is right here in PDF www.nasa.gov/pdf/55407main_24%20Exploration.pdf format.
"sweet dreams are made of this..."
"Those 20 million should be spent on AIDS/Cancer research" replies!
...post an article about the "X-Prize" right after I read about porn/X-rated movies...
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Research prizes work so much better than many other methods of investment in progress that it's surprising you don't see more of them. On average, you'll see 16 dollars invested in progress for every 1 in the prize.
Here's a good article (plus links to other articles) on why research prizes are a great thing: http://www.longevitymeme.org/topics/research_prize s.cfm
Reason
Founder, Longevity Meme
Really, I never saw the X-Prize being a real big deal technology wise. The same goes for future prizes. Sure, the technology is great and all, but couldn't NASA do something similar on its own? Absolutely (though it would probably take more time and money). The point is the same as the aviation prizes a few decades back, while there might be a couple good "breakthroughs", they won't be revolutionary. The point is to get the "common man" excited about space travel. Remember the Simpson's when Homer goes up on the Shuttle? Same concept, different angle. People feel disconnected from the space program in the same way they feel disconnected from the military. That needs to be fixed. The Bush administration has made a wonderful decision to use the tools of the past (the prizes) to increase interest in space. Once the public is interested, NASA will have to get its act together better, and start making results, otherwise the public is going to demand the heads of the administrators. Also, we'll see more corporations entering the fray to profit off of this increased interest. And the end result is better and cheaper space travel and more R & D. Looks like everybody wins.
The X Prize isn't about putting another man on the moon, or even putting another one in orbit. It's just about building a rocket that can get people above the atmosphere repeatedly, quickly, safely, and cheaply. Such a rocket doesn't need much in the way of performance compared to a real launch vehicle.
For that goal (especially the "cheaply" part), increasing the amount of prize money could actually be detrimental. An expensive winning vehicle in 2000 (which could have been done, if the prize money was enough to lure a big aerospace company into the race) would have been much less of a "return on investment" than a cheap winning vehicle in 2005.
A big part of the reason why space exploration is stuck in a rut is that when we started it, we had a post-war technology (expendible artillery rockets) that could be used to "get people to space, and damn the cost". Well, we've been using those sorts of rockets ever since, and "DAMN, the COST!" Rocket fuel is cheap, but rockets and rocket engineers are expensive, and when we throw away the former and hire armies of the latter to supervise a few launches a year it gets really expensive. There are a lot of people (myself included) who think that the only way to change this is with reusable, rapid turnaround launch vehicles, and who speculate that the natural way to develop those vehicles is from technology developed flying suborbital prototypes. Our previous strategy of "start with a huge orbital rocket, and try to make it cost effective" (the Space Shuttle) turned out to be so expensive that when it failed we couldn't afford to try again. Hopefully the alternate strategy of "start with a cost effective rocket, and try to make it orbital" will be more successful, and even when it does have failures it's a lot easier to repeat a multimillion dollar experiment than a multibillion dollar one.
The reason these Centennial challenges (and the X Prize) are so exciting is that there's a problem with our alternate strategy: revenue. There's a commercial market for orbital rockets, but not much of a market (except for tourism, war, and the occasional science experiment) for suborbital rockets, and nobody wants to start a multi-decade research program if it's not going to bring in any money until the end. If NASA can provide funding for those projects in such a way that they can't be "cheated" into paying for failures (like they were with the X-33), it makes that long term strategy into a short term opportunity.
Hmm... I didn't intend that to be so long; I should shut up now, find a link for anyone who's actually still reading this, and go to sleep. There's a large relevant discussion at Jerry Pournelle's website; Pournelle's opinions on this subject don't differ much from mine, he's had most of them longer than I've been alive, and he's better at articulating them.
NASA needs to concentrate on missions to deep space exploration (beyond Earth). At this point and in light of W's cutting the X-33, I am in hopes that he creates a 1-2 billion X prize for the the first craft to lift X amount to LEO and repeat it again within a week with a maximum price. This would encourage the space industry to truely form.
NASA should also continue its own work on building a truely heavy lifter (non-reusable) that can takes us well beyond earth's orbit with large payloads (or simply lift extraordinarly large payloads).
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Isn't this like The Emmy's award for best award show? I am sure that prize would be great for some small group working under a tight budget but this is how I think its going to be: Nasa's X-prize goes to....Nasa for its continuing completion of goals in space travel. What im trying to say is how many people are actually gonna win this? Its like Microsoft having a prize for best microsoft product. I'm sure there are lots of other smaller companies who push the limits of transversing space but not as much as Nasa. If I am wrong please reply and tell me so.
Trix are for kids!
Are these funds really necessary? Aren't most companies that practice this kind of science already receiving government funding? There should definatly be a serious look taken at this option, as that's a LOT of money. Why should a company receive more funding than necessary, what, arne't plush pillows and cushioned chairs along with a multi million dollar house good enough for these... rocket scientists?
Pls No Negative Modding!
Today's medical research is conducted by companies, but also by education foundations like universities. Even though there aren't really grants for space research, perhaps the engineering developments for space travel should also be researched at universities. I'm sure there are lots of grants out there that are applicable to research in space technology, and this would get a lot of college students involved in the area for the future, when space travel becomes a more commonplace thing.
I'm the Devil the Windows users warned you about.
The Navy can make a ship that generates 40 megawatts (50,000 HP).
The Navy can make a ship that is completely self contained.
The Navy can make a ship that generates oxygen and scrubs the CO2 (and doesn't fail either).
The Navy can make a ship that can stay on self-sustained 6 month missions with a crew of hundreds.
NASA can't do more then seven crew for two weeks.
The Navy says "Can do!" and builds the Seawolf class submarine.
NASA says, "huh?"
(picture Conan O'Brien doing his Bush impression)
And if one is at all curious one should ask one's self this question: "When has a military power ever allowed a civilian agency to have more advanced technology than they do?"
Hmm?
I thought so.
Happiness is asking the right questions.
There is no energy crisis. Never has been, never will be.
First Law of Thermodynamics: Energy is neither created, nor destroyed.
First law of business: Make the consumer believe the product is scarce, then package and sell it in a format that can be controlled (ie. barrels of oil can be controlled, solar roofs can't).
The captured solar energy of a 150 mile by 150 mile square area of Nevada desert would provide the United States with all its energy needs: consumer, residential, transportation, commercial and industrial; oil, gas, coal, electric, etc. combined. Yes. It's a fact.
And we don't need any new technology to do it either. A simple coal, gas or oil fired plant can be retrofitted with a different heat source.
Do you know how many of these we could have built for the over $100 billion spent on securing middle east oil? 10? 100? No, _1000_. Yup! Ouch.
But we _are_ running out of oil. And we're running out of it much faster than anybody cares to inform you.
How much did you spend on heat this winter? On hot water? On AC last summer? On $2/gal gas for your Camry and SUV? It's time we had Open Source Energy, don't you think?
Your friendly neighborhood,
JSMS III
p.s.
For every four barrels of oil we burn, we're only finding one new one.
Again, for every four barrels of oil we burn, we find only one new one.
And again, for each new barrel of oil discovered, we're burning four from the old fields.
Who was the greatest exporter of oil to the United States last year (2003)?
Saudi Arabia? No. Venezuela? Nope. Iraq? uh-uh.
Who was it you ask? Canada! How 'bout that, eh?
Now ask yourself, why? How's that? What the heck is going on?
Oh yes, Donald Duck is going to have a SCREAMING ORGASM whe we launch him into orbit.
Listen in on Donald Duck!
look what it did for the internet! better than space tourism i think
Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony.
My opinion of The New NASA(TM) remains unchanged. Until they have actually awarded prize monies in a fair and open competition ($20M in prizes is pocket change for what should be the _bulk_ of NASA's budget) I'm convinced this is just a way to inhibit politically embarrassing events, such as the private prize awards that actually opening up the space frontier in the place of NASA. No one in power really wants this to happen lest they lose control of the pioneering (and therefore unmanageably independent) American populations they have so recently destroyed with their economic and technology policies.
Seastead this.
but not a joke
A few years ago, the big thing at Nasa was micro-satellites and micro-explorers. Send up several dozen cheap, small explorers that were mostlly made from stuff already on the private market. NASA could send up dozens, knowing half or more would be destroyed or wouldn't work, but the end result would be a lot more exploration for a lot less money. With any kind of manned spaceflight--tourism or not--the multiple redundancies and zero (?) accepted risk, the costs grow astronomically and the actual science down drops. But former NASA administrator Dan Goldin--back during the mid-90s budget crisis at NASA--decided the only way to get Congress and US taxpayers excited was through manned travel--the Right Stuff stuff. The press doesn't get as excited about 40 football-sized explorers out there, most of which don't work. This is a shame. Forget the rich tourists, forget lunar colonies. Let's go back to small, cheap, expendable which also means a lot of good science.
NASA is yet another arm of the United States' military. Look it up in their charter.
FOR SHAME, slashdot, FOR SHAME. Who cares what sort of military build up occurs as long as we have cool space toys, right?
How many of you have heard of the Air Force Space Command (AFSPC)?
Is this program about extending humanity's reach into space, or advancing our collective human knowledge? Neither. It's about bigger, better killing machines for the United States military.
Shame on you, slashdot, for supporting the advancement of technology at any cost.
I am a geek, but you all make me fucking SICK.
[Music:Hail to the Chief]
[Bush descends from Airforce One on a runway in Geneva]
Bush: Hello!
[pause]
Bush: Hello!
Frenchman: Allo! Who is eet?
Bush: It is George W. Bush, and these are my presidential aides. Whom am I addressing?
Frenchman: A representative of the European Space Agency.
Bush: Go and tell your superior that we have been charged by God with a sacred quest. If he will give us food and shelter for the night, he can join us in our quest to land a man on Mars.
Frenchman: Well, I'll ask him, but I don't think he'll be very keen. Uh, we've already been there, you see.
Bush: What?
Bush aide: He says they've already been there!
Bush: Are you sure you've been there?
Frenchman: Oh, yes. It's very nice-a. (I told him we've already been there.)
Frenchmen: [chuckling]
Bush: Well, u-- um, can we come and have a look?
Frenchman: Of course not! You are American types-a!
Bush: Well, what are you, then?
Frenchman: I'm French! Why do think I have this outrageous accent, you silly president-a?!
Bush aide: What were you doing on Mars?
Frenchman: Mind your own business!
Bush: If you will not show us how you got there and back, we shall take your country by force!
Frenchman: You don't frighten us, American pig-dogs! Go and boil your bottom, sons of a silly person. I blow my nose at you, so-called Bush President, you and all your silly NASA Astro-nnnnnnauts. Thpppppt! Thppt! Thppt!
Bush aide: What a strange person.
Bush: Now look here, my good man--
Frenchman: I don't wanna talk to you no more, you empty headed animal food trough wiper! I fart in your general direction! Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries!
Bush aide: Is there someone else we could talk to?
Frenchman: No. Now, go away, or I shall taunt you a second time-a! [sniff]
Bush: Now, this is your last chance. I've been more than reasonable.
Frenchman: (Fetchez la vache.)
Other frenchman: Quoi?
Frenchman: (Fetchez la vache!)
[mooo]
Bush: If you do not agree to my commands, then I shall--
[twong]
[mooooooo]
Jesus Christ!
Aides: Christ!
[thud]
Ah! Ohh!...
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
It sounds to me like an easy way for NASA to contract/outsource. Hobbiest come up with solutions for the problems, then NASA buys the IP from them for the set prize amount. Depending on your point of view, this is good or bad. Good in that it spurs innovation in the private sector, gives NASA some nice PR, gives someone a sizeable check for their work, and lowers some costs at NASA. Bad in that the same schmuck that sold his IP probably sold his rights to patent and market his/her design. I realize that this is /. and it seems that all patents are bad, but when used properly, they can be more beneficial than destructive. Software patents, IMO, are an entirely different story for some other thread.
Amigori
"The quality of life is determined by its activites."--Aristotle
Hey! They should be offering a prize to the best low-cost, low-risk tech to save Hubble.
Um, that's nice. Wake me when we have 100% efficient solar cells, so that we can actually have total "captured solar energy". Oh, and when it's possible to manufacture 22,500 square miles of solar panels without utilizing massive quantities of some very nasty materials. Oh, and when the things will install and maintain themselves. Oh, also, and when we cease to have power loss in transmission. Oh, and when we have retrofitted our entire economy to use one power source (alternating electric current), instead of the variety we currently use.
But we _are_ running out of oil.
No kidding. Like they told me in grade school, we'll be bone dry by 1985! Time to hit the panic button.
It's time we had Open Source Energy, don't you think?
Energy which is distributed so that its source code can be freely examined and modified by the end user?
Who was it you ask? Canada! How 'bout that, eh? Now ask yourself, why?
Because they're closer than everybody else?
All employees must wash hands before seeking equitable relief.
>The captured solar energy of a 150 mile by 150 mile square area of Nevada desert would provide the United States with all its energy needs: consumer, residential, transportation, commercial and industrial; oil, gas, coal, electric, etc. combined. Yes. It's a fact.
Interesting theory. Theory, though. Certainly not a fact, considering it doesn't even make mention of the most obvious problem:
What do we do at night?
But then again, I never expect someone who hasn't even taken a business course to notice a simple MISSING FACT like that.
>But we _are_ running out of oil. And we're running out of it much faster [google.com] than anybody cares to inform [peakoil.net] you.
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.
Did you ever take a business course, ever? Even once? Hell, have you even filled out a tax return?
In conclusion, if markets are allowed to function freely the supply of oil will never run out. Changes in consumer patterns and the emergence of new technology driven by increases in the price of oil will prevent this from happening. While predicting doomsday scenarios may be a good way to get people to know your name, they are a very poor predictor of what is likely to happen in the future. -- Mike Moffatt, PhD
But we _are_ running out of oil. And we're running out of it much faster than anybody cares to inform you.
You are thicker than tar pitch, aren't you?
Nobody cares to inform you because you are deluded and your doomsday fantasies are only shared between a select few clinically insane individuals.
How much did you spend on heat this winter? On hot water? On AC last summer? On $2/gal gas for your Camry and SUV? It's time we had Open Source Energy, don't you think?
We will if you keep your hands out of the economy. It's working perfectly fine and if you keep trying to screw with it, you may just succeed at breaking it. At that point you *WILL* have your doomsday scenario, and if you think running out of oil or coughing in smog sucks, imagine the depression, but 10 times worse. Rent Mad Max someday to get a feel for what life without a stable economy would be like.
Now ask yourself, why? How's that? What the heck is going on?
Oil is heavy (duh!). Greenpeace makes it costly to transport. Nobody wants to handle it (grose, smelly, dangerous stuff). So they don't without adequate compensation. Which makes it cost effective to buy it from Canada. That along with the good relations that comes with trading with neighbours and the mutual benefits NAFTA provides mean the US is an intelligent country that knows a good deal when it sees it.
That WHAAAAAMBULANCE sure struck a deep pothole, didn't it?
For every four barrels of oil we burn, we're only finding one new one.
So you admit we're daily finding new oil?
You're shooting holes in your own argument!
Again, for every four barrels of oil we burn, we find only one new one.
Then you repeat that fact. Yeesh, why did I even bother to write this?
And again, for each new barrel of oil discovered, we're burning four from the old fields.
For crying out loud. Am I the only one reading this? That we are finding new oil even now?
Do you know how many of these we could have built for the over $100 billion spent on securing middle east oil?
??? Can you give even the slightest shred of evidence of that? Any? At all? Even an iota? Even a nudge in the right direction?
First law of business: Make the consumer believe the product is scarce, then package and sell it in a format that can be controlled (ie. barrels of oil can be controlled, solar roofs can't
Heh heh, I don't know why you decided to make me your enemy, but your post was dead on. :)
Um, that's nice. Wake me when we have 100% efficient solar cells, so that we can actually have total "captured solar energy". Oh, and when it's possible to manufacture 22,500 square miles of solar panels without utilizing massive quantities of some very nasty materials. Oh, and when the things will install and maintain themselves. Oh, also, and when we cease to have power loss in transmission. Oh, and when we have retrofitted our entire economy to use one power source (alternating electric current), instead of the variety we currently use.
I've actually been thinking about this, and I really don't have any idea how solar cells work, but I was thinking that a small greenhouse-like structure insulated with that fancy aerogel stuff would do an excellent job collecting heat. Right? So now we just have to convert that heat to electricity. Three ways I know of off the top of my head.
No kidding. Like they told me in grade school, we'll be bone dry by 1985! Time to hit the panic button.
I tend to think that we're running out of oil in the same sense that as soon as you're born you're dying. We *will* run out of oil eventually, so it is a problem that should be addressed sooner rather than later. Personally, I don't trust either the oil companies or the freaks like you responded to when they give us estimates for how long the oil we have will last, but I'd really like to see something renewable first (like alcohol) and non-polluting second.
Energy which is distributed so that its source code can be freely examined and modified by the end user?
Isn't that how energy is already distributed? If you want to examine your electricity directly, just stick a hanger in an electrical outlet! :)
Who was it you ask? Canada! How 'bout that, eh? Now ask yourself, why?
Because they're closer than everybody else?
No, see, Canada sends us "Ol", not "Oil". See, Canadians think that the war in Iraq is 'aboot ol'. :)
Like what I said? You might like my music
I see in my mind's eye several hawaiian shirt and sunglasses wearing citizens ... Is humankind so pathetic that the only reason we want to go into space is to expand the tourism industry?
Thanks for your application to the Celestial Fashion Police. Indeed, the Galaxy needs hand-picked uniformed police like you to turn away millions of ugly space tourists at the airlock.
We've heard reports that some of these unsightly revelers have been sneaking aboard shuttles under false credentials as space adventure travelers. As you know, this term is reserved for Buzz Aldrin, Captain Picard, and a handful of other hand-picked people who look good on TV.
As you know, everyone was born in the same big universe, and born curious about it. Yes, even the teeming masses of People with Too Much Hair Who Still Think Black Doc Martins Are Rad. Better that the cosmos should remain sterile and lifeless than populated with uncool people who overstay their welcome, and invent all sorts of unsanctioned space arts, sports and societies.
So Welcome, Sherrif. Welcome to the Celestial Fashion Constabulary. Say, is that an M-star in your badge? You know, with your eyes, you could probably get away with an O or B star, and those are soooo popular these days...
Science with small, cheap and expendable unmanned probes and orbital labs is useful because it will help us to prepare for the manned flights which, to my mind, are absolutely essential for the future of the human race.
The owls are not what they seem
Is humankind so pathetic that the only reason we want to go into space is to expand the tourism industry?
Yes.
RTFM; please, I beg you.
Tourism is what comes before migration. To be able to migrate into space we have to first build up experience with short trips, short trips to space are simply most likely to be marketable as tourism.
Sindri Traustason.
As safity goes, two or three reactors crashed to the ocean within a decade should not make any big difference with what we already have there. And I think nuclear reactor based engines should be much safer as there is no risk of self-ignition based explosion like we have on a regular basis with Shuttle boosters and similar ones. You cannot stop ignition in modern engine once it's started. If anything goes wrong the reactor can be stopped immidiately (as well as the water or waterver liquid vaporation process) and the whole thing can land safily on a parashute.
Did I say that nuclear engines will be multiple times usable? Ok, Now I've said that. And that's a big plus to make the whole orbital business cheaper.
Less is more !
And frankly science is the wrong reason to expand space exploration. It must be profitable, that means tourism, land ownership, mineral rights etc etc.
Government of the people, by corporate executives, for corporate profits.
Here's to the pilots in the Mojave Desert, the Israelis, Romanians, Italians, and Canadians for stepping up.
If you don't agree with what they are saying why don't you come up with some intelligent counter-arguements? There are some trolls who need to be modded down and ignored, but I don't think this is one of them.
Assets = Liabilities + Equity
Seems reasonable. But we should include the goal of business which is to maximize the risk-adjusted income from your assets. Fooling the customer into believing that a good is scarcer than it is and selling it in a controlled format achieves this goal.
The engineering side of it should be closed completely leaving just an administrative arm for regulating space travel.
The the bilions of dollars of budget saved should be split into prizes like the X prize for specific achievements.
Does the FAA design, engineer, build and fly military, passenger and cargo aircraft? Do they bollocks.
Government of the people, by corporate executives, for corporate profits.
There would be a risk of space travel getting a sleazy image, but that could be avoided by clever marketing.
Not so much anymore, but about ten years ago when Russia and the United Space were regularly sending people up into space for research, or bragging rights, or whatever they did it for, it was shown that the Russian system was a lot more efficient, and cheaper.
Actually, the Russian system for sending non-people up into space is more efficient and cheaper, too, despite the fact that even the USA is using expendibles for that.
But I'm not arguing with your main point. It's cheaper to design expendible rockets than reusable rockets because the requirements aren't as strict, and it's much easier to design expendible rockets well because you can fly prototypes rather than being economically forced to depend on your first multibillion dollar white elephant. There is no appropriate comparison between the Space Shuttle, our first partially reusable rocket, and the mature expendable boosters of the time; the Space Shuttle is more analogous to the earliest prototype expendibles, and it's stuck in that state because we weren't willing to call the first design a "sunk cost" and start improving it. We've been able to redesign expendables again and again, whereas with the Space Shuttle we've mainly fixed the SRB O-rings and started using new alloys in the external tank.
Does this mean the solution to cheap space flight is to stick with the mature expendables? I doubt it. In the long term, R&D budgets get swamped by operating budgets. Tweaking expendable rocket technology is a low-risk route for commercial companies, so that's what they've all done, and so they've pushed the limits of cost savings about as far as they'll go for expendables... and it doesn't look like they'll ever go much farther than $1000/kg prices to orbit.
What the commercial companies aren't willing to risk (and so what government funding should risk in their place, if we have aspirations beyond tiny satellites and probes or if we're going to get serious about this "people on the Moon and Mars" stuff) is applying that same type of development (repeated design improvements with modern materials, flying the designs over and over again to learn how they can be improved) to reusable rockets as well.
This sounds horribly expensive, but it doesn't have to be. Even when it failed with the X-33, they didn't waste 10% of the Shuttle's regular operating budget. Private companies trying to do things similarly have failed for lack of funding, because they couldn't get investors to raise half of what they needed, which amounts to about 5% of what NASA spends each year operating a decades old prototype.
The problem is that (as the X33 showed) large private industry can't do it either - too much government supervision leads to designs like VentureStar that try to pack half a dozen bleeding edge technologies into one package, and too little government supervision leads to companies like Lockheed coming hat in hand for more money when one of those technologies fails. If you try to strike a happy medium, then you just end up losing on both counts. Back when the X-33 proposals were made, we should have funded all four of them, flipped Lockheed the bird when their project screwed up, and then awarded the big full scale contract to any of the groups which succeeded. Private industry only works better when there's competition for your dollar; otherwise it's just like a government project but with profits skimmed off the top. Unfortunately we've seen mergers down to two big aerospace companies, neither of which has much of an incentive to lower launch costs, and so we probably couldn't get much competition out of them today.
It sounds like the conclusion is that we're probably screwed and I'm just ranting about it for no reason, but this "prize money" mode of funding might be an exception to that. Unlike traditional R&D projects, prize offerings are zero risk for the government - if someone attempting to earn your prize fails, they do so on their own dollar. Unlike traditional R&D projects, prize of
Ok, you are correct in that there isn't an energy crisis in the thermodynamic sense. However, there is a scarcity (not a crisis) of work in the thermodynamic sense.
The captured solar energy of a 150 mile by 150 mile square area of Nevada desert would provide the United States with all its energy needs: consumer, residential, transportation, commercial and industrial; oil, gas, coal, electric, etc. combined. Yes. It's a fact.
For others, I calculate that to be roughly 58 billion square meters. At roughly a KwH per meter of sunlight, you get a maximum solar input of 58 terawatts. But perhaps 30% of that can be converted (using really good solar panels) to electricity. That still should in the neighborhood of what the US consumes.
I believe others have indicated this, but even if we build this enormous structure, we have two problems. First, we need to transport the power to where it is needed. This isn't a solved problem, but we can assume that the surface area of the panels is distributed over the US rather than being concentrated in Nevada. Locating all power production in Nevada would result in vast power losses to the East coast. I'm not sure how much the 500 kilovolt lines (think they are best copper-based lines) lose, but it's probably more than 75% loss (wild guess) over thousands of kilometers.
Even if that is fixed, you have the problem of storage. This is a far more difficult problem. A large scale cost effective system that could return 50% of the power it consumed would be a vast step up for most regions of the world. Pumped water storage (pump water up into a reservior and drain it to produce electricity) seems to work where it can be placed.
Make it a hotel.
I vote that all $20 mil go to the guy who invented the beer hat!
./weed | bong
Actually, that should be within the confines of 1960's technology, which says far musch more about our current state now, than the "state of the art" then...
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
The moron to whom you commented is not interested in thinking about the problem, nor even of taking a quick peek at the lings the original author posted, it's awfully big of you to treat him with such civility.
So, in that same spirit, here are a few more comments.
You're totally on the right track. The key is _heat_. Burning Coal/gas/oil to boil water to create steam to turn a turbine to generate AC to distribute to homes to pour into a giant resistor to create heat (stove/water heater/baseboard heaters) is one of the most inefficent things we do with our current energy system.
The link to the Boeing Solar Power clearly explains how it works, it's efficiency, how it stores energy at night and its cost. All the original commentor had to do was spend a few minutes reading, but he prefers to remain in his super-right wing ignorance.
It doesn't use solar panels.
It uses direct concentrated solar heat so it is much more efficient (~70%) than the most efficient solar cells (~30%).
Heat is stored in a molten salt reservoir so electricity continues to be generated after the sun goes down.
Electricity isn't the only way to distribute power.
Hydrogen is also an energy transport, so the plant can sell electricity directly and also convert it to hydrogen and sell that.
The lack of understanding on Slashdot of something so fundamental, and the lack of imagination in using our current technologies to solve problems is astounding.
Kudos to you for being open minded and really thinking about it.
Regards,
JSMS III
You're ad hominem attacks are a sign of weakness, you should restrain yourself.
Now I'll attempt to address your questions and remove some of your ignorance.
If you had clicked on the link to the Boeing Solar Power Tower and read for even a couple of minutes it would have answered most of your questions.
1. It doesn't use solar panels, it uses concentrated solar heat at roughly 70% efficiency
2. It stores the heat in a reservoir of molten salt so it can continue to generate electricity under cloudy conditions and at night.
3. The basic infrastructure is exactly the same as a coal or gas fired plant. The cost today of a coal or gas plant is about $1/watt. The pilots of the power towers are running about $1.5/watt and are easily reduced to $1/watt under greater economies of scale.
Yes, I have taken business courses, and electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, and software engineering.
Let me explain it to you a little more slowly. If you're only discovering 1 of something while comsuming 4 of something that would be a clear indication that you're rapidly heading towards a resource crunch wouldn't it? I've done my research on this, have you?
Either oil is a finite resource or it's not. If it is, and we claim to know what are global reserves are, then knowing our current burn and growth rates combined with well understood economic models of what happens once you pass the half way point, we have a very good idea of what is going to happen in the next ten to twenty years.
Also, let's not forget:
To pump the water for our highly industrialized agriculture your need quite a bit of energy
You need petrochemicals to create the fertilizers
You need lots and lots of diesel for the massive combines, other equipment and transportation to market
It's not a question of running out completely or getting down to 1/3 of reserves left. It's a question of getting to 1/2 of reserves left (where we are today) and what effect that has on the price (as you are fond of pointing out).
Many economists of the '80s and '90s (and still today) argue that for the United States to have a robust economy the price of a barrel of oil must stay at or below US$25. Well, how long has it been at $28, $30, $35? How long has this recession been going on? This is a cake-walk compared to what's coming.
I don't know what black helicopters have to do with this discussion.
Shh. We don't like to use the word conspiracy, we prefer to call it business-as-usual.
No cover up is necessary, the credulity and ignorance of the populace is enough.
I apologize but the rest of your so called arguments don't warrant any comment.
regards,
jsms iii
The link to the Boeing Solar Power Tower explains more of what you are looking for, but here's a quick bullet list:
;-)
1. It doesn't use solar panels, it uses concentrated solar heat at roughly 70% efficiency
2. It stores the heat in a reservoir of molten salt so it can continue to generate electricity under cloudy conditions and at night.
3. The basic infrastructure is exactly the same as a coal or gas fired plant. The cost today of a coal or gas plant is about $1/watt. The pilots of the power towers are running about $1.5/watt and are easily reduced to $1/watt under greater economies of scale.
4. The energy doesn't have to be distributed solely as electricity. Much of it could be converted to hyrdrogen and shipped or piped around the country.
5. Boeing is looking to sell these as peak-hour booster add-ons to existing gas, oil and coal plants. This will help buffer them against peak demand both in terms of energy demand and spot price so it helps them save money.
6. Of course it also helps to bridge the "valley of tears" between our current oil based economy and whatever we decide to replace it with.
Either oil is a finite resource or it's not. If it is, and we claim to know what are global reserves are, then knowing our current burn and growth rates combined with well understood economic models of what happens once you pass the half way point, we have a very good idea of what is going to happen in the next ten to twenty years.
Also, let's not forget:
To pump the water for our highly industrialized agriculture your nee quite a bit of energy
You need petrochemicals to create the fertiliers
You need lots and lots of diesel for the massive combines.
It's not a question of running out completely or getting down to 1/3 of reserves left. It's a question of getting to 1/2 of reserves left (where we are today) and what effect that has on the price (as you are fond of pointing out).
Many economists of the '80s and '90s (and still today) argue that for the United States to have a robust economy the price of a barrel of oil must stay at or below US$25. Well, how long has it been at $28, $30, $35? How long has this recession been going on? This is a cake-walk compared to what's coming.
Remember the thing spoken and agreed to in the privacy of the boardroom isn't a conspiracy, it's simply good business.
And as everyone knows, a coverup is not necessary, the credulity, ignorance and attention span of the American populace is enough.
One of the greatest things George W. Bush has done for us as a country and society is to have removed much of that credulity. Now all we have to do is solve the ignorance and attention problems.
"But I know if we don't find more product (oil) we're going to have a problem. "
George W. Bush
regards,
jsms iii
thought i'd ping you to check out some of the new comments in this thread.
jsms iii
Free energy as in speech, not free as in beer.
Free energy in terms of being decentralized, and under the consumers' choice and control.
I have next to zero control over where the oil comes from, under what conditions it is "extracted" from the host country, or how much I'm going to have to pay for it tomorrow.
However, some evacuated tube solar collectors for heat and hot water and some standard solar panels for electricity is totally under my control.
And in California -- and some other states -- I can sell the excess electricity back into the grid.
This is something Bush and his gang to not want to see catch on in a big way. As soon as oil heads north of $35/barrel alternative energy becomes more and more viable. You can't control a million solar roofs but you can control barrels of oil.
Free energy as in speech already exists, if you know where to look for it. :)
Generator Joe has quite a few.
Bowers Power has some as well.
Google knows all
Propane generators can usually be powered by natural gas as well. They have lower emissions than gas or diesel generators, are generally quieter, and can also be a lot cheaper in operating costs. I don't know if that makes your TCO lower than just hooking into the power grid, but free energy as in speech is here and now. But it's not free as in beer, and the cost to set it up is much higher than just getting an account with your utility guys.
Now for ways to reduce your costs. Most homes already have natural gas powered heaters, so we'll ignore heating this time.
These guys sell propane-powered replacement for appliances that are typically electric these days. Replace your fridge, dryer, and washer, and that knocks out 90% of your electric bill (except for air conditioning).
For air conditioning, I didn't find anything outside just replacing the source of electricity to the air conditioner.
Of course, if you live in a dry climate, swamp coolers are pretty nice.
Like what I said? You might like my music
Thanks. Will do that.
Excellent rebuttal. I'm surprised actually that this variant of solar power is so cheap compared to coal and oil. If the numbers are true, then it's on the threshold of being built. The land area and sunlight requirements will cause trouble (eg, transport losses), but that still leaves a lot of potential area.