If unlimited (portable) engery was found, what would change immediaitly and long term?

Ok for $899 you can go to home depot and buy a 6000 watt portable gen that "runs" for 5 years. I weights 100 pounds, has no exhaust and has a core charge deposit of $500 to encourage it to be recycled. For the sake of argument it cannot be weaponized anymore than a normal generator.

What would be the immediate implications and what would happen long term?
Geo political-manufacturing-socially-economically

Very short term there will be a severe shortage of the gen units, electricians and electrical fixtures to hook these babies up.

I could see the unwanted properties that were too far off the beaten path becoming very sought after.

Electric cars would be a real alternative and be at a short term premium. War over lithium for the batteries of these cars?

The oil industry would slowly, at first, start to decline-not go away. Money would flow out of this industry to other industries.

The economy?


Global stability?

a reply to: seasonal

Manufacturing and transport costs' would come down as energy cost is a major factor this would alter the balance of the economy potentially fueling a new consumer boom, the energy sector and power monopoly would collapse and as it is backed by major government's and conglomerates whom would then have had the rug effectively pulled from under there feet power balance in the world would shift unpredictably.
The technology would be discourages or prevented for this reason and maybe already has many time's over as after all the ultra wealthy don't want to have to do there own work now do they.

a reply to: seasonal

The question isn't what we would use the generators for.

The question is what the generators would be used for.

While I appreciate your question (it was very thought provoking and made my mind race) , and I hate to detail it, that's my answer.

Someone would weaponize it and rain on the parade.

a reply to: LABTECH767

I imagine over the years there has been game changing tech that was shelved.

Doesn't mean perpetual motion, just huge increases in efficiency.

a reply to: CriticalStinker
Are you saying using the gens as a weapon?

originally posted by: seasonal
Ok for $899 you can go to home depot and buy a 6000 watt portable gen that "runs" for 5 years. I weights 100 pounds, has no exhaust and has a core charge deposit of $500 to encourage it to be recycled. For the sake of argument it cannot be weaponized anymore than a normal generator.

What would be the immediate implications and what would happen long term?
Geo political-manufacturing-socially-economically

Very short term there will be a severe shortage of the gen units, electricians and electrical fixtures to hook these babies up.

I could see the unwanted properties that were too far off the beaten path becoming very sought after.

Electric cars would be a real alternative and be at a short term premium. War over lithium for the batteries of these cars?

The oil industry would slowly, at first, start to decline-not go away. Money would flow out of this industry to other industries.

The economy?


Global stability?

I don't think much would happen. Power delivery is already quite cheap. However, something like that would lower the cost of being able to move out into the boonies, in particular areas that are basically off grid. I could see that technology assisting in third world countries with poor electrical infrastructure.

The economy would collapse. Stocks would sink.
The economy relies on fossil fuels , decrease the demand for that , it all falls apart.

Why do you think it is so hard to renewable' s to gain a strong foothold?

a reply to: Groot

I would think this would be a partial collapse and a rebuild.

I would be concerned about the nuke plants, I could see a huge decrease in traditional line fed power.

This would also make fissionable material alot more costly.

Would people in 3rd world countries still starve their asses off. I'm afraid so.

a reply to: seasonal

Car, truck, farm and heavy equipment manufacturers, particularly U.S. based, would whine and complain about the cost of conversion. They would hold out looking for the Congress to give them subsidies, tax breaks and / or no cost loans to pay for conversion of their factories.

a reply to: Bramble Iceshimmer

Would they want to change?


I would imagine there would be some sweetheart deals that could be worked out with power companies. Lots of extra juice out there.

According to Joseph Newman they would never give you a patent for that said device. So then you would marry a 13 year old and become a broke recluse.

Electricity is the natural element that provides unlimited energy, it can be portable (your cellphone for instance), and never runs out.

Nikolas Tesla figured much of it out in a time that is now forgotten with our knowledge in such energies that lead to technology's rapid advances.

With the correct knowledge and mechanics, anyone can harness such energy as Tesla did over 70 years ago.

Also magnetic energy is free, ulimited and exists in nature like electricity.

Solar.

Wind.

Hydro.

Thermo.

Kinetic.

Man did not create these energies, nature did, they have always been in existence, waiting to be harnessed for its power and fuel, for purpose.

When you bring artificial/manufactured currency into the question regarding obtaining such energies.. you limit yourself to said currency.

But i feel that somewhere in the cosmos, a species that cares not for artificial currency, has adapted and developed these energies beyond our knowledge and understanding, simply for their greater good and advancement.

And your talking about a little generator

Currency holds us back from amazing potential by limiting our minds to its own limits.

Construction sites would change drastically especially road side and new industrial build outs would change. Contractors would buy them up and put them to the test... The mobile rig welding industry/ electro arc welding would change too.

a reply to: seasonal

For a start, more people would vanish off the grid.

More people would deny utility companies the opportunity to make money from the sale of fuel and energy to their homes. More people would build homes in places which are hard for the government to find, leave alone tax or track. More people would take up nomadic existences, and fewer would be located in places where it is possible to police or monitor them in anything like real time, without expending unworkable amounts of resources.

I think you would also see major changes in the way government operates, after about three to six years. Their traditional backers would evaporate, because their oil and gas, their energy supply money would be drying up like mad, the cheaper and more effective, not to mention more convenient power sources you have hypothesised would take over nearly entirely, and their sale alone would not keep those big companies floating.

Government therefore would be backed by different money, different peddlers of despair and woe, perhaps newspaper and media organisations and entities.

In any case, it would not be business as usual.

a reply to: TrueBrit

I think you are right, there would be some newly made rich people who own way out scrub brush acres that is now for sale.

I also think we would see a war in the middle East, and not a stop at the boarder war this would be a war of consolidation of countries under one banner. And the EU would have their hands full.

If you have enough money to buy the unit and a livable house with a fresh water well. You are literally all set.

I was talking to a group of fellow mechanics and we were discussing winning the $200,000,000 lottery. One guy made the best statement.
He said he would buy a 400 acre plot in the UP of Michigan, there is natural gas wells up there and he said he would be all set if he had that energy source. Just run a natural gas gen and it could power everything.

a reply to: seasonal

It would increase the near term viability of manned space flight to other bodies in our system and their colonization.

Part of the problem is energy and fueling that energy. The weight is enormous. You either need to figure out how to generate your energy once you get there or find some other viable system.

a reply to: ketsuko

True, outer space is something I did not think about.

If they can land the rovers on mars, why not 15 of these things? The astronauts could have viable power on the planet waiting for them, if this existed.

I think it is already happening!

That is why there is a glut of oil out there. That is why the Rockefellers divested all their oil holdings (read that again! Happened in 2014 which is the same year Lockheed said they can make a nuclear fusion reactor). ATS thread - Lockheed reactor.

The rich would make a grab for any thing labeled green (check! Look at Shell, Chevron, and Exxon). Link

The IMF would drive up debt on poor countries and threaten "hell and high water" on anybody going against their plans. (Check! Look at Iceland). ATS: Iceland Was Right, We Were Wrong: The IMF.

Iceland did one better! They not only got off the IMF train, they got off the Big Oil train too. They are using geothermal to break the chains. We need to follow their example! They were called a "rouge nation" and it was said, "they will never recover on their own currency" but after five years of decline they are back where they were AND WAY BETTER OFF (imo).

Not only oil but GMO crops too. We need those big banks, big companies (especially Monsanto or whatever they call themselves now)... they all need fail! Then we can become human beings like we are meant to be.

Got to run and feed my unicorn parking meter!

ETA: The date "2030" seems to be the big date for fusion

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

Thing with Iceland and its geothermal is that they are basically sitting at the rare above-ground extrusion of a mid-ocean rift. Their country is getting every so slowly torn apart, but in the meantime, it provides them with a ready source of geothermal that most other countries cannot hope to match because it's right there very close to the surface.