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Topic: The upcoming energy crisis. (Read 30711 times)
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Death 999
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We did. You did. Yes we can. No.
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1) Why is it absolutely certain that it cannot be converted, when science still doesn't have a full grasp of physics (there is still so much that is theory, and that is debated back and forth, like the accuracy of string theory?) For instance, zero point might have a different frequency in a higher dimension, or something crazy like that.
A: ZPE is, by definition, the energy that can't be extracted. So, if you can extract the energy, it sure isn't ZPE.
B: just because we don't know everything doesn't mean we don't know anything.
C: I can see one way around the restriction in A, but in order to get the energy out of empty space, you would, at a very minimum, have to break the ability of free space to carry a certain wavevector of electromagnetic radiation, across the entire universe. Assuming you could conquer the causality problems that entails, it is a really bad idea for reasons which should be obvious.
Extracting the energy of a local oscillator can be done, but it just involves lowering the resonant frequency... and we already know how to do that, it's nothing astonishing. And the amounts of energy you get out of it are craptacularly small.
2) Is it also impossible to convert lower frequency energies into ZPE? Send them on a one-way trip, basically? Could this be what happens to matter and energy when it reaches the singularity of a black hole (if such a thing is possible?)
I don't know what you're talking about, and I suspect you don't either.
3) Could ZPE be some sort of property of matter (IOW, it cannot be extracted, and matter cannot exist without it as a component, perhaps?)
You could say that; but instead of just matter, it would be more general.
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Death 999
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We did. You did. Yes we can. No.
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My understanding of cold fusion is that people can't reproduce the initial reaction and nobody is sure whether it actually exists or not. A few years ago my class interviewed a scientist at SRI lab, and the impression I got from him was that they really believed it existed, they just couldn't make it work. Anyway, some humor: Cold Fusion: The Musical
This is right, pretty much.
There are several methods claimed to produce cold fusion.
One definitely works in principle, but is technically unachievable. That is, use a particle accelerator to produce muons, have those muons displace electrons in hydrogen. The muons settle closer to the nucleus than electrons, because they are heavier. This lowers the barrier to fusion greatly.
Problem: muons decay slowly for rare particles, but fast on the time scale of fusion, and anyway, they're hard to make. You'd have to make an incredibly precise muon factory and bury it in a vat of hydrogen.
Another uses a sound wave to make only very small regions of the hydrogen hot. This is the one that is controversial. It's controversial because it hasn't been reproduced and there were some bad experimental techniques used in the original work, and they over-hyped it.
There are some reasons that it might not have been reproducible elsewhere (necessary elements to the setup that they did not identify, and so were not reproduced), but at this point, it seems a dubious claim. Other groups are moving forward with this method; however, they are not trying to reproduce, but simply to produce in the first place, by methods they think are better.
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Deus Siddis
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B: just because we don't know everything doesn't mean we don't know anything.
Yes, but sometimes what you think you know turns out to be more complex (and other times simpler) than originally believed.
I don't know what you're talking about, and I suspect you don't either.
If I knew what I was talking about, why would I be asking all these questions? 
I'll restate, if ZPE is a reservoir of energy that cannot be extracted, can energy be put into it (the resevoir.) Can, say, visible light energy be converted into zero point energy?
You could say that; but instead of just matter, it would be more general.
Do you mean a fundamental element of energy and matter, (and any other forms of anything that are discovered, like dark matter/energy?)
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Death 999
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We did. You did. Yes we can. No.
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I'll restate, if ZPE is a reservoir of energy that cannot be extracted, can energy be put into it (the resevoir.) Can, say, visible light energy be converted into zero point energy?
No, you can't get anything into or out of it. You can sometimes arrange matters so its existence makes a difference, but you have to bring the energy to do so yourself.
You could say that; but instead of just matter, it would be more general. Do you mean a fundamental element of energy and matter, (and any other forms of anything that are discovered, like dark matter/energy?)
Noo... I mean that if something has a wavefunction (i.e. if it exists), and it is subject to some potential (i.e. it interacts with other things), then there will necessarily be some energy in that interaction which cannot be removed. This is ZPE. If you find a way to remove it, then the energy of the new lowest state you found is the real ZPE.
Now, if our theories are even vaguely right, the kind of ZPE we're talking about here is totally inaccessible. We'd have to be about as off as nonrelativistic newtonian mechanics was from a quantum field theory, in order for this to be extracted.
Let's see how off it would have to be.... hmm... I think I found an analogy. It would be about the same as if someone managed to dig a hole in the Earth, kept going down... for 200,000 miles.
Or, it's as if "The Core" represented a valid scientific viewpoint.
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Deus Siddis
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If ZPE is infinite, physics aside, what would be the point of trying to *add* to it?
Is it infinite? I thought it was just unextract-able and in vast quantities. Anyway, I never said I had plans to convert visible light into ZPE, I was just asking if it was possible.
There is no such thing as "infinity plus one".
No, there is no "infinity divided by zero," infinity plus one just equals infinity. . .at least, I think it does. . .
Or, it's as if "The Core" represented a valid scientific viewpoint.
Ah damn, I had forgotten about that movie, now you've reminded my of its existence. . .
An example of infinite, unextract-able stupidness.
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GeomanNL
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I love YaBB 1G - SP1!
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This link gives a fairly recent overview of global energy (oil, gas and coal) reserves and production, it's pretty interesting (note the position of countries like Iran and Iraq). Of course the reserves are economically viable reserves, if energy prices go up, it'll increase a bit.
http://www.geohive.com/charts/charts.php?xml=en_oilprod&xsl=en_res
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Draxas
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More like the "Axis of countries we need to bring the gift of American-style-guns-blazing-democracy," really. True, he's working out of order what with the US and Iraq checked off the list before Saudi Arabia, but take the targets of opportunity as they come, right? 
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Mugz the Sane
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need coffee...
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ZPE is still too theoretical and/or fantastic to be used in any assumptions and "serious" theories.
Fossil fuels are obsolete, or rather are supposed to be. DESERVE to be.
Nuclear fission is a clean source of energy that will last us a long time if managed properly (the way fossil fuels weren't). Also, all the paranoia, controversy and sensationalism surrounding nuclear fission can be blamed only on human error, human deliberate and the manhattan project. Incidentally, I consider the manhattan project viable reason to eradicate the US off the globe - or rather, let's be fair: humanity in its entirety, seeing as the majority of the world's governments (including my own before the 1994 bullcrap) went 'Nuclear bombs! Yeah, we gotta get in on that!'
Assholes.
Nuclear fusion is a viable alternative, but is still in development.
Antimatter still has a loooooong way to go.
Ethanol/methanol is also very viable, particularly in the automotive industry.
So: Fission/fusion power for industrial/commercial use, alcohol for transport. Could work quite well, and is much cleaner than our present system of making the planet uninhabitable.
Geothermal power: Good concept, very viable. Clean.
Hydroelectric power: Yes, good idea, but dams cause far too much ecological impact to be viable. Remember the Yangtse river dolphin?
Solar power: Very good idea. Use an abundant natural resource that isn't going to turn the planet into a barren wasteland over time. Underused.
Discuss. (please note that my hatred for humanity is preferred not to be an item for discussion).
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I'm seriously considering going to Bali to paint nude women.
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