OutPost on the
Endless Frontier*
EPRI e-News on Recent Key Developments Energy
Science and Technology: 1998-2000
A monthly series of informal reports and comments on developments in science
and technology with potential to impact the future course of global energy
development and use
"Opening
Act: Is It the Final Curtain Already?," No. 1, 16
June 1998.
[This was the inaugural
polemic of Outpost on the Endless Frontier, inspired by John
Horgan's article in the July 1996 issue of MIT's Technology
Review, wherein Horgan asserts "reductionist physics" has
ended. Perhaps below temperatures of a trillion
degrees or so (at these temperatures, the units don't
matter!), but above that there's a whole universe out
there.] |
"Faster,
F a r t h e r...Smaller: Toward "Street Smart
Electricity," No. 2, 2 July 1998.
[Implications of the further
miniaturization and increasing energy efficiency of emerging
computer semiconductor components on electric power
consumption...smaller is smarter...and tinier is on the
way.] |
"Unidentified
Superconducting Objects," No. 3, 9 July 1998.
[The discovery of high
temperature superconductivity evinced a frantic period of
trying to achieve room temperature superconductivity within
only a few months. I was appointed one of several
"special referees" for Physical Review Letters to filter the
wheat from the chaff...we called the chaff "unidentified
superconducting objects," or "USOs," a term we later learned
transliterated as a rather scatological word in Japanese.]
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"Journey
Down the Path of Least Resistance," No. 4, 17
July 1998.
[In the summer of 1998,
researchers at SUNY Buffalo reported "negative resistance"
in samples of fibrous graphite (perhaps carbon nanotubes or
graphene). Such an observation, if true, would have
constituted an egregious violation of the Second Law of
Thermodynamics. This column suggests an alternative,
and far less sensational, explanation, and how academics can
often stumble badly in the performance and interpretation of
rather straightforward experimental results.]
|
"Sun,
Sea and Sand: Solar Energy Stored in Hydrogen
Controlled by Silicon Semiconductors," No. 5, 3
September 1998.
[This article discusses the
Schatz Solar Hydrogen Project located at CSU Humboldt on the
northern California coast. I once visited the project,
and it partly inspired a commentary I later wrote for
Nature and also, in the form of solar roofs, became part
of the SuperGrid
vision. Although not realized on any significant scale
as yet, storage of solar-generated electricity in the form
of hydrogen chemical potential energy remains, in my
opinion, the practical implementation of this essentially
limitless energy source. |
"Squeeze
Play," No. 6, 25 September 1998.
[Application of pressure is a
universally employed tool by condensed matter physicists to
understand phenomena exhibited by all sorts of materials,
from semiconductors to superconductors. In the case of
superconductors, pressure often, and anomalously, increases
the superconducting transition temperature, e.g., at ambient
pressure, for Hg-1223, Tc is 134 K, whereas under 23 GPa
(234 thousand atmospheres), it increases to 166 K, the
current world record. This article is a general review of
how high pressure is used to probe the physics of
superconductivity.] |
"Return
to Death Valley Days," No. 7, 3 November 1998.
[There's a canard that goes,
"The future of energy is fusion...and always will be!"
One of the dark secrets of fusion-derived power is that no
radioactive waste is produced...not so for
deuterium-deuterium or deuterium-tritium reactions, whose
energetic neutrons must eventually be used to boil water,
thus turning any containment vessel "radioactively hot as
hell" requiring disposal every five years or so.
However, some fusion reactions, such as protons with
isotopic 11-boron, produce relatively harmless charged alpha
particles (helium nuclei) whose motion, in principle, can be
used to generate electricity directly. This OutPost
examines the promise of this reaction, concluding its
deployment is too inefficient to be practical.] |
"Why
Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend," No. 8, 5
March 1999.
[A quixotic issue, eh?
An extensive treatise on the physics of semiconductors, why
they work the way they do, and especially their present and
future application to electric power control, from the
present silicon hockey pucks underlying Flexible AC
Transmission, or "FACTs," technologies all the way to GaN
switches scaled up from emerging LED devices. A
necessary primer to understanding the hardware behind
tomorrow's so-called "Smart Grid."] |
"Dolly
and Deep Blue," No. 9, 2 July 1999.
[What do cloning sheep and
chess-playing supercomputers have in common? This
article explores the connection between genetic and
artificial intelligence, their most likely future
directions, and their mutual impact on the human energy
culture and society in the 21st century. This was the
most controversial OutPost I wrote and I was "asked" to make
several modifications, especially in the areas of climate
change and genetic engineering, by EPRI senior management,
before it was distributed to EPRI members. If you'd
like to see the "unexpurgated" version, click
here.] |
"Too
Good to Be True," No. 10, 25 August 1999.
[A personal primer on the
Scientific Method drawing from my own lifetime pursuit and
application of its methodology. How to tell fact from
fiction, from the discovery of high temperature
superconductivity to the reports of cold fusion, are the
lessons taught us by the Greats, from Galileo to Semmelweiss
to Feynman. This is a must read for those journalists
wanting to avoid the pitfalls dug by those who promise to
have in their possession the energy salvation of mankind.] |
"Mr.
Watson, Come Here, I Want You!," No. 11, 2
September 1999.
[The hardware backbone of
internet communication is comprised of principally four
technologies: twisted copper pair, coaxial cable,
fiber optics and satellite. However, it is in
principle possible to use electric power lines for this
purpose as well. The main barrier has been the overall
low bandwidth. In 1999, a company called Media Fusion
came out of the woodwork with claims to have overcome this
obstacle accompanied by considerable fanfare, including
backing by an important member of Congress. OutPost
investigates. Today (2009), Media Fusion's original
website seems
to have disappeared and the name is now associated with
Media
Fusion, Inc., a quality multimedia service firm.] |
"Retro
Chautauqua," No. 12, 24 October 1999.
[“Do
you want free electricity?” shouts Dennis Lee. “Yes!”
rejoins his audience of true believers, an assembly that
sort of reminds you of the worst of the turn of the century
pseudo-science, semi-revivalist traveling roadshows. In the
fall of 1999, the New Tesla Electric Company put on a 20-odd
city tour demonstrating the coming era of free energy for
all. This column narrates my own impressions gained from
attendance at one of Mr. Lee's "Chautauqua" performances.] |
"Nearer,
My God, to Thee," No. 13, 31 December 1999.
[The
story of Fermilab and the CERN Large Hadron Collider and the
quest to understand our physical origins and the relevance
of their technology to the overall energy enterprise.
Writing this column gave me the seminal inspiration for what
later became the
SuperGrid vision ((BTW, Bill Foster, formerly of
Fermilab and originator of the "pipa-a-tron" concept, is now
a Member of Congress).] |
"The
Gathering of the Clan," No. 14, (Unfinished &
Unpublished) 2000.
[The
story of the March, 1999, meeting in Atlanta celebrating the
100th Anniversary of the founding of the American Physical
Society, now considered not only the premier American
professional physics body, but internationally as well with
as many, and perhaps even more, foreign members as American.
Although unfinished, please read the section on the rebirth
of nuclear fission power.] |
Postscript
In early 2000, primarily due to the fallout
from the deregulation of electricity generation, EPRI
underwent extensive organizational changes and restructuring
of its charter and program. Although, as far as I
could tell from feedback, OutPost on the Endless Frontier
had been immensely popular with the membership, it was
mutually decided I had "better things to do" and hence it
was discontinued, No. 13 the last to be distributed.
Nonetheless, I had a number of ideas "in the oven" whose
topics I list below. If any in the media happen to
stumble across this page and want to encourage me to follow
up with them, just send an e-mail to
w2agz@w2agz.com.
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"Cold Fevers and Cold Sores: A Comparative Tale of
"High Temperature" Superconductivity and "Cold" Fusion in
the 1980s."
[As a
participant in the discovery period of both phenomena, I'm
unusually situated to comment on these events. In
2008-09, I was a resource to CBS News 60 Minutes for its
20th anniversary segment on cold fusion and was interviewed
on camera by Scott Pelley...more on that story later.]
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"Revenge of the Nukes."
[Parody
of the Lemon-Fonda 1979 movie "The China Syndrome" in which
nuclear fission power drives China, India and Africa to
economic domination of the United States and Europe.]
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"Five Easy Pieces."
[Richard
Feynman's "piano theme" combined with Irving Langmuir's
prescription for the identification of pathological
science.]
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"From the Mouths of Babes."
[Once
while demonstrating superconducting levitation defeating
gravity to a 7th grade science class, I was asked, "Dr.
Grant, why is there gravity?" You'll have to contact
paul@w2agz.com for the
answer.]
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"Hydrinos: Hydrogen Visits Flatland."
[In the
mid-1990s, Randall Mills, MD (Harvard) purported discovered
a fractional quantum ground state below the universally
accepted Rydberg level to which, under certain unclear
circumstances, would decay to that state releasing "free
energy." Mills went on to found
Blacklight Power
which to date has received some $60 M in venture capital
funding (visit the Wikipedia
BLP
site for more info). For comments I made to the press,
I, and several other physicists, including two Nobelists,
received "cease and desist" letters from BLP's attorney
threatening lawsuits should we continue with our comments.
It cost EPRI $50 K to hire a Palo Alto "fast gun" to write a
"back off" letter, which included an offer to invite Mills
to deliver a seminar at the Institute for Theoretical
Physics at UC Santa Barbara as well as an hour-long (twice
the usual time allotted) at the General Meeting of the
American Physical Society...so far (2009), no response.]
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"Maybe Edison Had It Right After All."
[The
great protocol battle between Edison and Tesla tested the
commercial emergence of "electricity for the people"
regarding which technology would win. Tesla
won...maybe. The great advantage of ac was its easy
transformation to high voltage and low current for delivery
to the end user made possible by Tesla's transformer.
But lately, the advent of silicon thyristor power
electronics may change the equation, allowing the
transmission much more efficiently of direct current, more
amenable to today's IP technology. See my
review of Phil Schewe's book. There's a lot more
to report and comment on regarding this issue today in
2009.]
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"Mix 'n' Match."
[When my
colleague, Fritz Will, joined EPRI in 1994 shortly after me,
Fritz, a world-renowned electrochemist, remarked over lunch
one day, "I don't understand why there is not more
enthusiasm within the utility industry for grid-connected
hybrid vehicles." I agree. The situation is
gradually changing, but not that fast. In 2000, I had
planned an in-depth analysis of the "household requirements"
to charge your new GM (Government Motors) "TesEd" car (get
it?).]
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"No Free Lunch."
[A
planned polemic on the Zero(th), First and Second Laws of
Thermodynamics...actually about 1/3 written! These are
real laws, not like those passed by Congress...or even the
House of Commons. For decades in the 19th Century,
there empirical formalism was mysterious and magical...until
Boltzman, Maxwell and Gibbs...and Planck...arrived on the
scene. A real great story.]
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"The Genesis Effect: Live Long and Prosper."
[Remember that particular Star Trek saga where an organic
chemist, female, gazes down from the Starship Enterprise
fondly watching the rapid spread of vegetation and animal
life she had just seeded on an otherwise dead, moonlike
planet, and murmurs softly, “Can I cook? Or can I cook!”
What will be the bottom line of genetic engineering?
Or selection, as depicted in the film Gataca?"]
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"The Republic of Science."
[One can
safely claim Galileo founded modern experimental science,
especially as applied to physics. Essentially, if I tell you
how to do an experiment, you should be able to repeat and
get the same result. An essential corollary holds that
even if you don't disclose how you did a given experiment,
if it falls within accepted laws of physics, it's very
likely someone will figure out how to get the same result
independently. That's just how the Soviet Union was
able to fabricate without benefit of espionage their own
hydrogen bomb...the laws of nuclear physics said it was
possible. So, physicists, and in general all
practitioners of science, form a "Republic," where its
citizens can participate equally as long as the follow the
Galilean Constitution. The Republic of Science is
inherent in the rationalistic philosophy of Karl Popper and
Niels Bohr, and articulated as such by the chemist Michael
Polanyi. A great recent example of the utility of
these republican principles was their success in exposing
the
Bell Labs fraud in 2002. I had planned a similar
application to the Cold Fusion imbroglio.]
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"Whiskey is For Drinking."
[It is
attributed to Mark Twain that he once observed, "Whiskey is
for drinking; water is for fighting over." While not
yet verified, the remark certainly illustrates the
importance of water over whiskey in local politics and
policy in Twain's 19th century American Wild West.
Today the importance of water still dominates the economics
and well-being of many places on the planet, and energy is
an important component of its acquisition, purification and
distribution. The role of energy in water issues will
increase as the world warms and adaptation technologies
requiring more electricity emerge.]
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"You're a Smart Guy, Tom."
[It's
the first cabinet meeting at the White House (only it wasn't
at the White House 'cause it didn't exist yet, it was held
on Wall Street in NYC), and just before adjournment, it was
noticed that no one in the new administration had been given
responsibility to oversee the review of patents as mandated
by the Constitution. Washington looked around
the table...Adams, Jefferson, Hamilton, Knox and
Randolph...and said, "Hey, Tom, you're a smart guy and like
to tinker with things. Why don't you take this on?"
This is my imaginary scenario that resulted in Jefferson
becoming the Republic's first patent commissioner. One of
Jefferson's first, if not principal, requirement for
issuance of a patent was that it be "useful." Today
this standard still differentiates US patent law from that
of other countries, and helps stifle claims that egregiously
violate the laws of physics. I had planned an OutPost
addressing how this aspect of our patent law effectively
guards against those who would promise free energy and free
elelctricity.]
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| *The above articles
were written during the years 1998 - 2000 while I was an
employee of EPRI and with the encouragement of my director
during this period, Dr. Gail Kendall, who felt I needed an
outlet for my "wise guy" temperament. The opinions
contained therein are completely my own and in no way
represent those of the Electric Power Research Institute or
its membership. Although these articles are
copyrighted, I hereby grant universal "free use" for
research and public educational, including media, purposes.
However, I would appreciate being notified if and when they
are quoted, downloaded or referenced by e-mailing me at
w2agz@w2agz.com.
For general guidelines on material contained within this
website, see the About
This Site page. |
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