Tim Sallume's blog

Reinventing Fire: A 50-year energy plan to a 2050 economy with no oil, no coal and no nuclear

Submitted by Tim Sallume on Tue, 2012-05-01 19:49

In our modern lifestyles, we often have to make difficult choices.  But the most difficult choice may be realizing that there is just a completely better way.

http://www.ted.com/talks/amory_lovins_a_50_year_plan_for_energy.html

The tale of the two nuclear power plants

Submitted by Tim Sallume on Sun, 2012-04-01 04:20

I can't help but think of The Three Little Pigs when I hear about these two Japanese power plants.  The first nuclear power plant built a 10 meter (33 foot) wall, which was built to government standards, and it was hit by a tsunami.  The second nuclear power plant built a 14.8 meter (48.5 foot) wall, based on data that on a tsunami that hit on year 869, and was also hit by the same tsunami (the same one that made the first plant a radioactive mess).  The second plant also was built so that the water intake would still work when the tsunami was expected to suck back the water right before it hit.  Long story short, Onagawa still stands and does not have nearly the problems that Ishinomaki had. Read more »

Feast or Famine? Well, both actually.

Submitted by Tim Sallume on Sat, 2012-03-03 23:35

I've always been fascinated by the idea of the false dichotomy.  It is either A or B.  For or Against.  Paper or Plastic.  Working with computers for most of my life, you would think that I would be the first to go "Well, sure, things are either True or False.  0 or 1."  But ironically, when you start coding, you learn that most solutions exist as a linear combination, more like 20% A, 35% B, 37% C, and the rest is Pure Freaking Magic. Read more »

Imagine a world without free knowledge

Submitted by Tim Sallume on Wed, 2012-01-18 04:23

Today marks the day that sites like Google and Wikipedia will show what the internet might look like if Draconian laws are passed to stop infringement.  Such laws would require constant vigilance, patrolling for whatever the government defines as illegal and silencing it before the government takes down your site.  Under the auspice of copyright infringement, it could easy grow into policies similar to North Korea or China where unpopular ideas would simple vanish under the crushing weight of the law. Read more »

Batteries still not included

Submitted by Tim Sallume on Sat, 2011-12-10 23:14

One of the problems with getting all our electrical energy from renewables, is that they are not a constant supply of energy.  Geothermal is the rare exception, it produces heat energy constantly.  And even with a steady supply, electrical demand isn't constant, spiking in the daylight, especially in the summer with air-conditioning and going to almost non-existent at the late night hours. Read more »

What if a million people all worked together to accomplish something?

Submitted by Tim Sallume on Wed, 2011-12-07 04:21

It started with a simple idea, how do you stop computers from flooding a website with an automated program?  The answer was text recognition known as a CAPTCHA.  The annoying picture of text that humans can translate into actual characters of text.  Which wasn't a bad idea, but it wasted 500,000 man-hours of human effort per day. Read more »

"You've seen something as fresh and tasty as meat, but inorganically [grown]..." - Cmd Riker

Submitted by Tim Sallume on Sun, 2011-11-13 12:11

In the near future, it will be possible to grow meat. The practice promises to be more humane, sustainable, and efficient than conventional meats, with one analysis suggesting it would:

  • use 35 to 60 percent less energy
  • emit 80 to 95 percent less greenhouse gas
  • use around 98 percent less land.

In a world where nearly half of all crop production is used to feed livestock, a move towards artificial meat may be inevitable.

Source: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/11/11/us-science-meat-f-idUSTRE7AA30020111111

The Future of Cities - Charter Cities

Submitted by Tim Sallume on Thu, 2011-06-09 14:30

I was skeptical that the WRSC and GENI could work together.  At times, it seems the only thing their philosophies have in common is they both present road maps towards the future.  WRSC talks about how we're going about to set new policy and integrate new technologies, GENI is all about uniting the world in one electric grid with a policy that was designed more than thirty years ago.  WRSC is all about cutting-edge technologies while GENI has an extensive paper-based archive.

Paul Romer gave a TED talk in 2009 on Charter Cities and for the first time, I can finally see some common ground between GENI and WRSC and see how a hybrid of these two different philosophies might work together mutually in harmony.  Read more »

The Paradox of Technology

Submitted by Tim Sallume on Sun, 2011-05-22 09:56

The more I learn how technology was developed, the more I wonder how we will develop it in the future. Read more »

Electrolysis Breakthrough for Solar Storage

Submitted by Tim Sallume on Sat, 2011-04-02 20:26

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have combined a liquid catalyst with photovoltaic cells to achieve a super efficient (nearly 100%) electrolysis.

This becomes a very effective storage system. One obvious extension of this would be the cost-effective storage of daytime solar energy for night-time use. Excess capacity during the day could be stored as hydrogen and oxygen, then used in fuel cells at night when needed. Read more »

Syndicate content