Wire Power

Some of the cost of such a system could come from the recycling of the existing copper powerlines, transformers, and steel gridwork that make up the powerlines: all at the expense of those existing industries, which if I read our commander in chief correctly, would be bailed out as per everyone except the taxpaying public which will enjoy further forced exploration of their rectal areas!

This is a fine example of an if-then syllogism, where you must meet all the ???if??? requirements to go to the ???then??? outcome.

IF:
- You have a material that becomes superconducting at a high enough temperature to be practically maintainable (e.g., that of liquid nitrogen) and can be bent (this is all the article reports)
- That material will remain superconducting at the high magnetic fields associated with carrying the current associated with a main trunk power line
- The refrigeration system that will maintain hundreds of miles of large-bore pipe at liquid nitrogen temperatures:
o Can be situated in places where people won???t complain (think really big compressors and heat exchangers placed above ground every so often along this line)
o Is factored into the capital cost of the transmission system
o Is factored into the energy loss of the transmission system (where does the power come from to run all these refrigerators?)
- Conventional high-lines or something equivalent remain available to carry the load when the superconducting cable fails, due to refrigeration loss, breach of the pipe, or material fault in the cable itself
- Rights-of-way can be found to permit this big pipe to be buried suitably deeply underground without groundwater and other issues (existing high-line rights-of-way are candidates, but burying a big pipe raises different issues from stringing wire high in the air, including crossing roads, watercourses, gorges, etc. and covering rocky terrain)
- Access to the pipe for maintenance or repair without digging up everything can be provided (perhaps at the numerous above-ground refrigeration stations)
- The overall costs of the cable, pipe, refrigerators, and other components, as well as acquisition of rights-of-way and of doing all the digging and filling, can be covered by some combination of reduced net energy loss and public funding
- Political and business issues don???t get in the way
- The other issues I haven???t thought of are also dealt with

THEN:
- Superconducting cables can beneficially replace high lines

I don't think it's realistic, it's still costs too much to meantaining this system.
Even if it become cheap enough in future, sunk cost must be concerned undoubtedly.

I don't think it's realistic, it's still costs too much to meantaining this system.
Even if it become cheap enough in future, sunk cost must be concerned undoubtedly.

This article is just plain stupid!!! Do realize the cost of placing these cooled cables under ground?
3rdGen @ 05/23/2009 12:39:58 AM

And you are some sort of authority on building transmission lines I presume? Based on your infantile response, it doesn't appear that you know much. Above ground power lines are very expensive to build and maintain. I know this because I flew many sorties as a chopper pilot in support of a few of these projects.

Just look at the cost of building and maintaining this system at the expense of the customers! I cannot see where "free" would come in this!

Enron invented the means to rip us all off for energy, and now it seems that congress has taken that ball and run with it. Our current economic situation was precipitated by energy policy, no one is talking about this. Policies need to be changed immediately to create energy policy which pushes prices down as far as possible, so that the market for durable goods can re-emerge. If not, we are just seeing the beginning of the real economic downturn.

tesla developed wireless transmission of electicity in the 1890s. at the same time he develped a virtually free method of electrical generation. at first j p morgan provided financial backing. when j p morgan realized tesla plan for free electircy beamed to people homes he withdrew the financial backing.

this plan needs to be revived.

The case for centralized megapower generation needs to be presented. I think it has no winning case. If I can generate all of the power that I need to run my household with MIT"s invention (http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2008/oxygen-0731.html) sitting in my basement or outdoor cellar, why would I want to spend any money on a new tech power grid?

The case for centralized megapower generation needs to be presented. I think it has no winning case. If I can generate all of the power that I need to run my household with MIT"s invention (http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2008/oxygen-0731.html), why would I want to spend any money on a new tech power grid?

Aside from the sheer stupidity of this proposal, the author of this pie in the sky article reveals his total ignorance about Electrical Power Transmission.

Copper has not been used as a conductor for Transmission or Distribution lines in recent history. The conductors used for many, many years are ACSR (Aluminum Conductor Steel reinforced) Which is a steel cable wrapped with aluminum wire for conduction of electricity. Copper is very heavy, Expensive, and prone to corrosion. Nice to see how "Well Informed" this Newsweek Exclusive writer is. This story is total rubbish.

Why don't we just save some money, trouble, time, energy, and our environment by encouraging small-scale renewable production at individual homes/businesses/apartment buildings/etc.? It would cost so much less, could be implemented so much sooner and more easily, and bring about a significantly lessened environmental impact than these technological big-fixes.

We seem to want someone else to solve our problems for us. We "ooh" and "ahh" over mega-scale technological fixes. We forever hold out hope for the "future". What about taking personal responsibility, making simple changes right now, and thinking practically rather than future-technologically?

This article is just plain stupid!!! Do realize the cost of placing these cooled cables under ground? Conventional power cables can be placed under ground to as far as I know. The inital cost makes it prohibitive. And would the cost be to replace existing lines? What it the payback time?

At least now the stage is set for nuclear fusion power...put a couple of those puppies on a superconducting grid and noone will ever want for power (or anything else) ever again. You could pump an entire oceans worth of desalinized seawater into a holding tank in the Rockies and not give it a second thought, or convert deserts into arable land, using massive electrical pumps to transport desalinized seawater anywhere you want, regardless of elevation. Electricity costing one millionth of a penny per kilowatt-hour, thousands of times cheaper than now.

At least now the stage is set for nuclear fusion power...put a couple of those puppies on a superconducting grid and noone will ever want for power (or anything else) ever again. You could pump an entire oceans worth of desalinized seawater into a holding tank in the Rockies and not give it a second thought, or convert deserts into arable land, using massive electrical pumps to transport desalinized seawater anywhere you want, regardless of elevation. Electricity costing one millionth of a penny per kilowatt-hour, thousands of times cheaper than now.

The headline for this article reads "how to send electricity across the continent, virtually for free". Then you read the article which describes super conductors which require a cooling system charging and maintaining the system with liquid nitrogen. The claim of "virtually free" is internally conflicting with the article itself and the suggestion that costs would be comparable to a conventional power line is off by at least two orders of magnitude. Further, the statement that the transmission of power is 100% efficient is misleading since the power required for generation and charging of the Nitrogen cooling system must be deducted to provide a meaningfull comparison to a conventional power line. EngineerShorty is being kind in his assessment.

As the saying goes, If it's too good to be true (and that goes for both this article and the comment from 'Dolmance' on the bus-sized, no-melt, no-proliferation-risk plant), it probably is.

@EngineerShorty: I was with you up until the "crazy Greenies" part. Most "greenies" (none of whom, to be fair, are MSM journalists) I know are very skeptical of big techno-fixes like this article discusses.

This is just about one of the most absurd proposals ever, and clearly the result of a 'science journalist' who knows very little about science. The amount of energy that would be required to keep these power lines cold would be far greater than the savings from electrical resistance in copper lines. Think of how much energy it takes to air condition your house at 70 degrees F on a 90 degree day. Now you're talking about refrigerating a cable hundreds of miles long to -170 degrees. If this were even plausible, I'd be all for it, but this is clearly ridiculous, and the so-called 'scientists' who are championing this idea to the naive journalist who wrote this piece must be nothing but a bunch of crazy Greenies with good intentions and lots of chemicals in their systems.