They also decided that they didn't have the money to make the first stage design reusable so they tacked together a fuel tank with a couple of solid rocket boosters to do the same job. Then they gave the task of building the solid rocket boosters to ATK. The worst of both design choices. Why? So the pork could be spread to Utah as well. Then Challenger happened.
You can easily put an airlock in a capsule. Soyuz has one as does Shenzhou (orbital module). The manipulator could have been attached into the first space station core launched into orbit using a regular launch vehicle like a Delta IV Heavy. Delta IV Heavy has more payload than the Proton rocket which was used to launch the Mir modules and the Russian ISS segment. If, for whatever reason, you actually needed a mobile construction yard you could just launch a space tug into space and use that instead of wasting time and fuel getting it up and down all the time.
The Shuttle was a jack of all trades master of none vehicle. It is a pathological case of design by committee. NASA wanted an RLV, the DoD wanted the capability to launch and recover huge earth reconnaissance satellites, DoD wanted wide cross-range capability. These requirements don't mix well so the resulting vehicle was an abortion. Kind of like the JSF.
Apple has filed patents on its own flavor of wireless charging, a "near field" or resonant technology Resonant wireless electricity transmission was invented by Nikolas Tesla over 100 years ago.
A lot of people have been working on this on the past decade. It's probably been displayed on every IDF (Intel Developer Forum) since by so many companies that I can't even remember the names of them all. That and Peltier cooling.
"fossil fuel based fertilizers" is bunk. Nitrogen fertilizer is usually produced via an ammonia process (NH3) where nitrogen (N2) collected from air is mixed with hydrogen (H2) to produce ammonia. The hydrogen can be produced using a variety of methods. Currently the cheapest method uses steam reforming of natural gas but you could use a variety of other methods including a thermochemical hybrid sulfur process which uses water (H2O) as a feedstock and solar thermal energy or some other high temperature heat source (e.g. a Generation IV nuclear reactor).
Also someone in the 1960s or 1970s could claim that all future energy generation was going to be nuclear. In reality growth usually follows logistic curves. Just don't mention that to mdsolar.
There are all sorts of hidden costs in wind. Interconnect costs are one factor as you are connecting a wallop of low capacity generators. Then there is the cost of energy storage and backup generation when you have a high fraction of wind power. To cover wind power generation shortfalls you keep spooling natural gas fired power plants up and down, thereby losing generation efficiency, and increasing fuel burn. Also you need to install reversible pumps in dams to turn them into pumped storage. As a result of converting dams into basically giant batteries the cost of hydroelectric generated electricity goes up.
Like Google, Facebook designs its own servers and has them built by ODMs (original design manufacturers) in Taiwan and China, rather than OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) like HP or Dell. By rolling its own, Facebook eliminates what Frankovsky calls "gratuitous differentiation," hardware features that make servers unique but do not benefit Facebook.
"Most of our new gear is built by ODMs like Quanta," the company said in an e-mail response to one of our follow-up questions. "We do multi-source all our gear, and if an OEM can build to our standards and bring it in within 5 percent, then they are usually in those multi-source discussions."
Almost 50 percent of Quanta’s revenue comes from HP, data compiled by Bloomberg show. It’s also selling hardware directly to Google (GOOG) and Amazon.com (AMZN), which require massive collections of servers to keep their websites humming.
They "designed it" to a similar degree to what someone like HP or Dell does. Or Alienware. Or whatever. They ask the Taiwanese "build me this" and they built it.
I guess most of the work Google did was regarding the power supply, cooling architecture, etc.
Do you think Google or Facebook buy millions of server nodes from Dell or HP? No. They just order direct from the manufacturers in China and Taiwan (e.g. Foxconn, Pegatron, Compal, Quanta) that companies like Dell and HP use.
Actually if you look at what happened in both Germany and France nuclear is subsidizing green power. They're taxing nuclear generated electricity to give guaranteed profits on green electricity which is bought at a guaranteed price much higher than the price you can buy nuclear power.
The wind power construction drive is one of the big reasons why the EU is stuck in a quagmire of debt right now. The other was the housing construction binge.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah no kidding. The SLS is supposed to fly once every two years.
At least Soyuz is still around. And will be for the foreseeable future.
The same engine design is also be basis for the RD-191 rocket engine used in Angara.
For all we know the Russians could build their next space station together with the Chinese.
They also decided that they didn't have the money to make the first stage design reusable so they tacked together a fuel tank with a couple of solid rocket boosters to do the same job. Then they gave the task of building the solid rocket boosters to ATK. The worst of both design choices. Why? So the pork could be spread to Utah as well. Then Challenger happened.
You can easily put an airlock in a capsule. Soyuz has one as does Shenzhou (orbital module). The manipulator could have been attached into the first space station core launched into orbit using a regular launch vehicle like a Delta IV Heavy. Delta IV Heavy has more payload than the Proton rocket which was used to launch the Mir modules and the Russian ISS segment. If, for whatever reason, you actually needed a mobile construction yard you could just launch a space tug into space and use that instead of wasting time and fuel getting it up and down all the time.
The Shuttle was a jack of all trades master of none vehicle. It is a pathological case of design by committee. NASA wanted an RLV, the DoD wanted the capability to launch and recover huge earth reconnaissance satellites, DoD wanted wide cross-range capability. These requirements don't mix well so the resulting vehicle was an abortion. Kind of like the JSF.
At the moment Dragon's only intended purpose is ferrying crews to the ISS
Google "DragonLab".
That is only happening because the printed dollars aren't filtering down the market. If they did you would get inflation.
It's not an ICBM like Proton. Angara was designed to launch satellites. Nothing more.
Proton uses toxic hypergolic fuel. Energia was too expensive. That's why they made Angara. It's a cost-effective replacement for Proton.
That's lame. I guess you can still get satellite TV though.
If it was bad then it is worse now. You had TV Series. A lot was sitcoms sure but you had sci-fi, action, etc as well.
Today you have reality shows and news you've read on the Internet two days before.
Apple has filed patents on its own flavor of wireless charging, a "near field" or resonant technology
Resonant wireless electricity transmission was invented by Nikolas Tesla over 100 years ago.
but no products have as yet come to market
That part is just like Nikolas Teslas work too.
A lot of people have been working on this on the past decade. It's probably been displayed on every IDF (Intel Developer Forum) since by so many companies that I can't even remember the names of them all. That and Peltier cooling.
Regarding fishing stocks:
http://www.nature.com/news/201...
http://www.planetexperts.com/t...
As for deforestation it would be a LOT worse if we didn't use chemical fertilizer to increase crop yields.
There's some talk on TED about overgrazing and soil erosion.
"fossil fuel based fertilizers" is bunk. Nitrogen fertilizer is usually produced via an ammonia process (NH3) where nitrogen (N2) collected from air is mixed with hydrogen (H2) to produce ammonia. The hydrogen can be produced using a variety of methods. Currently the cheapest method uses steam reforming of natural gas but you could use a variety of other methods including a thermochemical hybrid sulfur process which uses water (H2O) as a feedstock and solar thermal energy or some other high temperature heat source (e.g. a Generation IV nuclear reactor).
A bankrupt wind farm falls into disrepair and may lose significant capacity due to lack of maintenance before it gets sold off to someone else.
Also someone in the 1960s or 1970s could claim that all future energy generation was going to be nuclear. In reality growth usually follows logistic curves. Just don't mention that to mdsolar.
There are all sorts of hidden costs in wind. Interconnect costs are one factor as you are connecting a wallop of low capacity generators. Then there is the cost of energy storage and backup generation when you have a high fraction of wind power. To cover wind power generation shortfalls you keep spooling natural gas fired power plants up and down, thereby losing generation efficiency, and increasing fuel burn. Also you need to install reversible pumps in dams to turn them into pumped storage. As a result of converting dams into basically giant batteries the cost of hydroelectric generated electricity goes up.
As for Facebook:
http://arstechnica.com/informa...
Like Google, Facebook designs its own servers and has them built by ODMs (original design manufacturers) in Taiwan and China, rather than OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) like HP or Dell. By rolling its own, Facebook eliminates what Frankovsky calls "gratuitous differentiation," hardware features that make servers unique but do not benefit Facebook.
"Most of our new gear is built by ODMs like Quanta," the company said in an e-mail response to one of our follow-up questions. "We do multi-source all our gear, and if an OEM can build to our standards and bring it in within 5 percent, then they are usually in those multi-source discussions."
http://www.bloomberg.com/bw/ar...
Almost 50 percent of Quanta’s revenue comes from HP, data compiled by Bloomberg show. It’s also selling hardware directly to Google (GOOG) and Amazon.com (AMZN), which require massive collections of servers to keep their websites humming.
So you were saying?
They "designed it" to a similar degree to what someone like HP or Dell does. Or Alienware. Or whatever. They ask the Taiwanese "build me this" and they built it.
I guess most of the work Google did was regarding the power supply, cooling architecture, etc.
I know you are joking but there are more efficient methods of heating than resistive heating. Namely heat pumps.
Do you think Google or Facebook buy millions of server nodes from Dell or HP? No. They just order direct from the manufacturers in China and Taiwan (e.g. Foxconn, Pegatron, Compal, Quanta) that companies like Dell and HP use.
So much for it being a reliable store of data. That's the unreliable bit.
They want you to put all your data in the cloud but then don't guarantee it will be stored properly.
Actually if you look at what happened in both Germany and France nuclear is subsidizing green power. They're taxing nuclear generated electricity to give guaranteed profits on green electricity which is bought at a guaranteed price much higher than the price you can buy nuclear power.
The wind power construction drive is one of the big reasons why the EU is stuck in a quagmire of debt right now. The other was the housing construction binge.