... The individual nano & tetra sized fuel cells would then be made into the vast power arrays needed by the electrical industry and allied energy consumers for a wide variety of applications. [ end of last posting ]
I ended here in my last post, and immediately two questions arise: 1) how would nano or even smaller fuel cells be linked to power arrays to produce needed electrical power? ; 2) would centralized power stations even be necessary should science & technology produce a successful fuel cell power array technology anytime soon?
Let me begin here with the #2 concern first. It should seem obvious that producing onsite or POU ( point-of-use ) power cells ( as in water purification technology ) would be far more cost effective than large, bulky centralized power stations as they now exist. The purpose of the true visionary, of course, would be to put himself - and most others - out of work over time. I speculate that sometime in the 21st century trying to sell power will be about as profitless as trying to go back to steam powered engines would be today on a large-scale basis. While this may anger some industry insiders, the fact is science and technology is moving so fast - probably too fast - that centralized power stations will be an obsolete idea faster than most industry executives realize. For proof of this contention, one only has to look at the history of micro-electronic innovations in the U.S., Europe, Russia, and the Orient since World War II. Remember transistor tube technology? It was a big deal in the 1950s, but was soon gone from the scene. Imagine that kind of progress happening in the grid. IT is beginning to happen now.
We have to start somewhere. Imagine pumping helium gas into one part of a fuel cell. Now imagine pumping heavy water or tritium into another. Now imagine pressuring both into a liquid metal halide bio-fusion reactor cell and bringing the temperature and pressure gradients into a specific vacuum range for a specified time. The result? Helium 3, probably the most powerful isotope now known to science. The theoretical science is one thing, but the technology to make it happen is quite another, as the emitting fuel must in some way be metered and controlled at combustion and then converted to electrical energy. This is the difficult part, but theoretically it is possible to accomplish, assuming one factor - that the proper liquid metal halide could be found to make the initial reaction begin. More is known about the end of the process, using chemical reaction agents to convert the power to electrons - unless only a combustion heat energy is desired. In such case, the fuel cell would be much simpler to devise and would have a much shorter research & development cycle. This would be a good starting point in new product development of the fuel cells necessary to power arrays of various onsite application sizes such that large power stations would soon be poor investments in most parts of the globe.
Stage Two then, would be creating fuel cells that would convert bio-fusion heat energy directly into useable electricity. More about using historical analysis to accomplish that in my next post.
