How many SPSes for $87 billion ?

--- In ssi_list@... "Paul D. Fernhout"

You've raised many interesting points and I hope that people more
knowledgable on SPS will jump in to correct some of your
misconceptions.

I'd just like to briefly address some of your points.

> 1. Putting a nation's energy supply in orbit just puts the nation
at
> risk of space habitat originated cartels and embargoes instead of
> earthly oil producer cartels and embargoes (perhaps not completely
a bad
> thing if you plan to be living on the habitats? :-) The lesson
learned
> should instead be -- produce your energy locally and use it more
> efficiently so you need less for core services.

Are you the victim of a TV set cartel? There are no domestic
manufacturers yet we seem to be able to purchase sets more cheaply
than in the past. SPS is an asset in the same manner. Oil, OTOH is a
consumable quantity that is subject to market forces on a daily
basis.
>
> 2. Economically speaking, energy efficiency is a much better
economic
> investment than energy production. This site has lots on this
topic:
> http://www.rmi.org
> http://www.rmi.org/sitepages/pid17.php

This argument originates back in the late 70s. It is true but the
largest gains are found at the most inefficient margins. The gains
diminish from there, until squeezing out energy efficiency becomes a
very formidible task. You'll get a lot of juice from an orange on
the first squeeze, almost none on the tenth, at which point you
should get another orange.

>
> One study in the 1980s suggested that the cost of a year or two of
> military expenditures spent on the Persian Gulf Deployment force
spent
> on home insulation would make the US energy independent right now.
See
> for example the 1980s book Brittle Power, available online at:
> http://www.rmi.org/sitepages/art7095.php

Here is my anecdotal rebuttal. Back in the late 70s, early 80s, I
was a partner in a home insulation business. When we started, things
were going gangbusters, but after a few years, our telephone
solicters increasingly ran into more and more people who had already
had their homes insulated. IOW, our retrofit market was finite and
the more successul we were the faster we eroded the marketplace. I
learned a very important lesson from that venture and it did help
finance grad school.

The claim of insulation leading to energy independence is clearly
overstated.

>
> Repeat, the energy crisis is purely a political, not a
> technical, problem. Off the shelf solutions solve it now. REPEAT --
off
> the shelf solutions are available right now to build a sustainable
> society.

You leave out economic considerations, convenience and the market
preferences of the consumers.

For that matter, we could all use wood burning stoves and forget
about oil heating our houses. It's only an environmental-air
pollution problem, not a technical one. Think of all those forests
that we can harvest - they're renewable - if only we could see
through the smog to be able to cut down the trees.

> It makes no economic or security sense to build SPS systems when
we
> would be just wasting the energy being beamed down by poorly
insulated
> homes, poorly insulated refrigerators, and inefficient motors and
> industrial processes (the US typically has used twice or more the
energy
> per unit of industrial output than in Europe).

For a PARTIAL explanation of this look to the addendum I attached to
my previous post that addressed the larger distances between US
metropolitan centers comapred to European centers. There are other
factors at work as well, but that shouldn't completely diminish your
point that there are inefficiencies in the US infrastructure.

Economically and
> practically it makes sense to stop wasting energy before producing
more
> of it.

I disagree. Philosophically you raise a point of view. Economically,
the markets decide, and the markets are choosing the route of cheap
consumables over asset intensive mitagation.

And once less energy is used, many on Earth renewable solutions
> are viable to produce minimal energy needs using local resources
(sun,
> wind, hydro, tidal, biomass, geothermal, etc.).

The sources you mention above are insufficient in scale or
robustness to offset the current infrastructure.

> But economically, habitats aren't going to be built for reasons of
> beaming power down to earth using SPSs. It's a dead idea,
economically.

I disagree. If not for SPS, I see no rationale for Habitat
construction.

> And as much as I admire Gerry O'Neill's vision and
accomplishments, he
> got that part of the economics wrong, compared to someone who
> specializes in energy and security issues like Amory Lovins at
RMI. SSI
> has been (partially) stuck in that mud of promoting SPS ever
since. SSI
> needs to move on from that outdated economic rationale. Repeat --
SSI
> needs to move on from SPS and beamed power -- the SPS issue may be
> technically sweet, but is economically and practically and
socially
> uninteresting compared to ready alternatives.

You can repeat your assertions as many times as you like, but absent
supportinig argument, which you neglect to provide, your assertions
are opinion, and IMHO, uninformed opinion.

You tout this vision of solar cell independence and premise this
vision of country estates all having the land available to deploy
the infrastructure. You neglect to factor in the energy costs
requried to manufacture the PV cells (which is extensive - where
will that energy come from? - oil? coal?) - with SPS all the energy
used is derived away from Earth's biosphere.

You also neglect to advance how dense cities can deploy sufficient
PV arrays to power tall buildings.

Further, how about industrial operations?

How about cloudy days? All those batteries, which have a finite
chemical lifecycle are going to wreak havoc with the environment.

> Frankly, I feel habitats will be built for theses sorts of reasons:
> * as an act of charity by a philanthropist (not investment as
> investments are meaningless once there is abundance for all),

You'd probably have a more likely outcome of winning the lotto 5
times in a row rather than counting on this outcome. First off you'd
have to have someone accumulate a fortune that is a multiple of what
Bill Gates has accumulated, and then be willing to bankrupt himself.

> * or as a collaborative effort by open source / free content
hobbyists
> (similar to GNU/Linux or model railroad enthusiasts),

OK, let's be generous, and assume that you have a million
enthusiasts who can offer their valuable skills. If each of these
people volunteered $100,000 of their time, you'd still be at only a
Hundred Billion dollars. How is the actual infrastructure going to
be paid for?

In short, I don't see this model being applicable.

> * or through huge government investment as a public works project
(or as
> a justification for continuing a social security pyramid scheme
> predicated on a growing population),

If the politicians can't make a case for an economic program like
SPS, then it strectches credulity to believe that they'll fund a
Habitat which has no economic rationale.

> * and/or by some kid or rogue AI with spare time and a nanotech
> replicator (in a few decades).

Might as well say god will make one appear in orbit as salvation for
those deserving souls.

TangoMan