Advanced Energy Initiative is but a walking shadow . . .

In his State of the Union Address President Bush admitted out loud that America is addicted to oil and announced a bold new Advanced Energy Initiative. I recently editorialized about an Apollo Energy Program inspired by JFK's moon program that cost $135 billion over ten years. I just got through researching Bush's funding for his Energy Initiative.

For all aspects of the program; nuclear, coal, wind, solar and the rest funding is $942 million. Boy, that's one heII of a commitment isn't it! Oh, and that's not all, 16% of that will come from cutting other energy programs already producing savings. Programs like the Industrial Technologies Program that produced technology for lightweight cars and trucks resulting in a $9 billion oil savings in 2004 alone. This little agency produces a savings of $7 for every $1 invested, but the Bush budget will cut its funding by 30%. The cuts run across all DOE conservation projects.

The Republicans say we have to be fiscally responsible, right? Any new program has to be paid for with cuts in others. It's the ONLY way to keep the budget under control, right?

I disagree. We could roll back the $15 billion in tax cuts for the oil industry from last year's Energy Bill. In 2005 the Oil Industry raked in over $100 billion in profits. That is a world record for profits in a single year. Without the tax cuts the $85 billion would still be a world record. No, the Republicans won't be doing that. In fact they defeated a $5 billion roll back on tax cuts as a "windfall" tax. Mind you it wasn't a new tax, it was a roll back of existing cuts passed last year, cuts to an industry that rewarded one CEO with a $400 million retirement package. The oil industry could fund Bush's entire Energy Initiative with just three retirement packages!

So there you have it. Smoke and mirrors. Make promises and cut funding. Grandiose speeches full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11126665/ (expenditures for Advanced Energy Initiative)

http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0531/p02s01-uspo.html (cuts to energy programs)

There are three companies pursuing hydrogen-boron plasma toroid fusion, Paul Koloc, Prometheus II, Eric Lerner, Focus Fusion and EPS. A NYT Thomas Friedman column wished this would become a Manhattan Project for Clean Energy.

There is an interesting chat on this topic by Clint Seward of Electron Power Systems http://www.electronpowersystems.com with Rodney T. Cox of http://www.powerchips.gi / chat on EPS with Eric Lerner comments at:
http://www.scienceforums.net/forums/showthread.php?t=6965

Per review for the Office of the Secretary of Defense:

"MIT considers these plasmas a revolutionary breakthrough, with Delphi's
chief scientist and senior manager for advanced technology both agreeing
that EST/SPT physics are repeatable and theoretically explainable. MIT and
EPS have jointly authored numerous professional papers describing their
work. (Delphi is a $33B company, the spun off Delco Division of General
Motors - but undergoing bankrupcy reorg.).

Revolutionary Impact: High - reliable generation and acceleration of these
plasmas using compact mobile machinery could provide US forces with a unique
generic defense against ballistic and cruise missiles, manned and unmanned
aircraft, and kinetic-energy projectiles of all sizes, velocities and
compositions."

Details:

Technology Review of Electron Power Systems (by an independent consulting
group) for Office Of The Secretary Of Defense July 2004

Technology Title: Electron spiral toroids (EST) as kinetic-energy weapons
(KEWs)

Development Organization: Electron Power Systems, Inc., Acton, Mass.

Description: EPS teamed with MIT's Plasma Science and Fusion Center under an
STTR grant to develop a theoretical framework and laboratory methods for
reliably creating small (0.5-1.0 cm diameter) self-organized plasmas, called
"electron spiral toroids" (ESTs) or "spiral plasma toroids" (SPTs). EST
electrons travel in parallel orbits around a torus in densities sufficient
to create a stable, self-sustaining internal magnetic field. These novel
laboratory-level plasmas, whose physics resembles that of ball lightning,
are unusual in that they remain stable in partial atmospheres without
requiring external magnetic fields for their containment, yet can also be
accelerated in a directed fashion to potentially very high velocities (e.g.,
600 km/sec) and kinetic energies. Parallel work on formation and magnetic
acceleration of "compact toroids" is also underway at DoE's Livermore lab
and at Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) at Kirtland AFB, NM, although
these plasmas - which can only exist in vacuum - require large (multi-meter
long) machinery that uses magnetic field pressures associated with "Tokamak"
fusion reactors to create large-diameter (0.5-1.0 meter) plasmas, which must
then be greatly reduced in diameter and volume to be useful. By contrast,
EPS uses much smaller, cheaper hardware to repeatably generate
high-ion-density plasmas that have remained stable in air for up to 0.6
seconds at 1-Torr atmospheric pressures. The EPS/MIT work has drawn interest
from MDA and DTRA for DEW/KEW applications and from Delphi Corporation, a
major automotive electronics firm, which envisions an automotive mini-fusion
reactor that would collide two small toroids generated by 1-meter-long
"neutron tubes" and capture the heat from their collision.

Potential Operational Payoff: used as KEWs, even a tiny (microscopic-scale)
EST would generate enough kinetic energy to destroy any military vehicle or
projectile operating in the atmosphere, including solid-rod anti-armor
penetrators. These charge-neutral plasmas would be produced in large numbers
in rapid succession to form a steerable beam. Impact velocities of 600
km/sec, possibly several times higher, may be possible, based on MIT's
extrapolation of AFRL's compact-toroid acceleration experiments for vacuum.

Metrics:
- Effects: target destruction by kinetic impacts far above hyper velocities
(defined by the speed of sound in metal and nonmetal targets)
- Speed: up to 600 km/sec (MIT estimate), possibly up to 2000 km/sec (EPS
estimate)
- Range: endoatmospheric line-of-sight up to space/atmosphere boundary
(officially defined as 62 miles)
- Power requirements: EPS proposes using EST mini-fusion reactors, whose
initial power could be provided by a car battery, to produce and accelerate
its ESTs.

Cost: no cost data available. The complexity of reliable mini-toroid
formation and acceleration with compact, relatively low-cost equipment
remains to be determined. Yet the fact that the EPS/MIT STTR work this
technology has attracted interest from Delphi is very significant, as the
automotive electronics industry is considered to be extremely demanding of
functionality per dollar and pound (e.g., mil-spec performance at
Wal-Mart-class 'commodity' prices).

Estimated Development Funding, FY 2005-2011 (combined KEW, mini-reactor)
- appr. $2M so far (Army Research Office, NASA SBIR, NASA-IAC (Institute for
Advanced Concepts) grant, BMDO STTR for $1M). EPS estimate: over FY
2005-2009, would need $0.5-$1.0M/yr (not including funding for MIT support),
but with a Phase 1 and 2 SBIR, could achieve a lab demonstration (TRL 4-5)
within 2.5-3 years of a proof-of-principle device that hits targets with
visible kinetic damage. Industrial co-funding from strategic partners
(agreements with Raytheon, Delphi (formerly GM Delco) and Titan Pulse Power)
could accelerate this.
-MIT estimate: with adequate staff and facilities funding ("at least
$2-$5M/year"), could demonstrate basic physics within 2 years, followed by
development of an integratable engineering package.

TRL 3-4. MIT considers these plasmas a revolutionary breakthrough, with
Delphi's chief scientist and senior manager for advanced technology both
agreeing that EST/SPT physics are repeatable and theoretically explainable.
MIT and EPS have jointly authored numerous professional papers describing
their work.

Revolutionary Impact: High - reliable generation and acceleration of these
plasmas using compact mobile machinery could provide US forces with a unique
generic defense against ballistic and cruise missiles, manned and unmanned
aircraft, and kinetic-energy projectiles of all sizes, velocities and
compositions."

funded to $135 bln over ten years. Kennedy put a man on the moon and brought him back in ten years. In the process there were thousands of patents spun off and hundreds of industries born of it. The space program drove our economy for half a century.

When Apollo started trajectories were figured on slide rules. How far did we come . . .

:-)

father-in-law's slip sticks from C+E made from ivory. I also have his drafting tools.

Long ago and far away . . .

The military runs on fossil fuel; all of it except for the few nuclear subs and carriers. When there is a real shortage, you can bet your sweet ass we'll be lining up at the pumps long before the Pentagon shuts down their man-toys.

Anything that might cause a rise in fossil fuel prices in the open market will make it harder to fuel all of the ahips, tanks, and planes.

If they would modernize the military to use more efficient fuels, the rest would follow.

Anything that reduces civilian demand on fossil fuels releases the saved fuel to military use.

It's going to take a decade to change the transportation structure. Even if every auto marketed today was alternative fuel or hybrid it would take five years to replace a substantial number of vehicles on our streets.

The way I see it the most immediate impact on energy will be first conservation and second anything that can plug into the power grid.

Just my thoughts . . .