The 8008 1755

The original reason is twofold. First, the magnet material is brittle, and has a tendency to fly apart just when the electricity generation gets exciting. Second, the "Bosch design" alternator where the rotor current is what regulates alternator output is a stroke of genius that makes it possible to regulate hundreds of Amperes with a little transistor.

The clue is to use that transistor to regulate the current through the rotor, and thereby control the magnetic field.

Same construction.

They don't need much of a magnetic bias to be able to bootstrap. It can be done by magnetizing the steel.

The "hydrogen economy" is a pipe dream about the most difficult part of the energy economy to make sustainable.

We can make electricity based on windmills, solar thermal stations, hydropower, tide and wave generators and non-reprocessing nuclear plants at about $80 per barrel; plus significant landscape cost.

Some projects will start to pay off at around $50-barrel; and those see profitability now. We do have a level of oil price that start to make sense from a sustainability standpoint.

But none of those can help propel your SUV. The only solution for that is batteries; and that option is really quite unattractive; also from the reason stated above.

At $150-barrel photovoltatic, regenerating nuclear and farming alternatives become attractive. The only one that can help propel vehicles is the farming alternative. Biodiesel would cost around $12-gallon in sustainable quanbreasties.

The other options will require some really hard choices for the various societies of the world.

A diesel-electric car does have efficiency advantages, especially when biodiesel has to be used. Running the engine effectively should reduce the fuel consumption by around 50%. That will be very significant when fuel prices hit $15-gallon.

I don't see it in as bleak terms. We will have to pay a lot more for energy; but at $200-barrel most options are profitable. If we can afford to pay for it is another matter entirely.

But it seems the free market is going to work towards a sustainable solution.

Note to nuclear energy:

Using existing fission-methods in an enrichment-generationpurification cycle is probably the best option we have if we want to use nuclear energy. We will make a lot of low-grade nuclear waste, but this waste is not orders of magnitude more dangerous than the ore was for starters; and the high-grade waste must be kept for reprocessing. It will require a whole different regime from what we have today, and will require as much, or more, expenses at destilling and reprocessing as with generation; and this will drive costs up.

Possibly as high as farming energy.

-- mrr