The Next Big Thing

[KRSESQ]

For a long time now I've been convinced that the world is ripe for another civilization-changing breakthrough. Like mass production in the early 1800s gave rise to the industrial revolution, like the telegraph and telephone revolutionized communications, like the airplane revolutionized transportation, something big is simmering in the wings, waiting to break into the limelight and change the entire world.

This may be it:

http://www.changingworldtech.com/home.html

This Thermal Depolymerization Process, can take any waste product containing carbon and convert it into high-grade oils, sterilized water, and any number of marketable chemicals and minerals. It produces no waste products of its own. It's clean, economical and scalable.

Imagine thousands of plants using this process to convert the waste product of all the worlds major cities. Landfills will be a thing of the past, as will water pollution from agricultural runoff.

from the Kansas City Star, July 28, 2001:

"This is tremendous,"[scientist Paul] Baskis said. "From the tests we've run in our pilot, we know that if we took all the agricultural wastes (in America) and converted them into oil we could make 12 billion barrels per year." The U.S. uses, on average, 19.4 million barrels a day ['prox' 7 billion barrels per year].

For additional info, see the May, 2003 issue of Discover Magazine, on your newsstands today!

I'm excited!

Kevin

[CHHAS]

Wow.. that sure does seem to hold a lot of potential.

[KRSESQ]

The oil industry even loves it because it can be used to extract marketable chemicals from the toxic, difficult-and-expensive-to-dispose-of byproducts of petroleum refining.

It can also be used to purify coal of sulfur, heavy metals, and other contaminants to make it cleaner-burning.

Kevin

[Technoid]

Sounds almost too good

[SpiralDragon]

sounds great....

[az]

Yeah, that would be nice - I've read about some technology that reminds me of that device in the flying DeLorean, was it called Mr Fusion?

But you know, technological progress is nice and all, but we're really in need of a new ethical/philosophical/social advance. The gap between technology and wisdom is widening. We are powerful as never before, but are we really mature enough for all this power at our fingertips? Can we, as individuals, society, or societies, cope with all the problems globalism, fast transport and instant communication bring? Are we reasonable enough to not abuse the power to destroy the entire planet (I think not, otherwise we wouldn't have built such devices of mass destruction)? Can we really live happily in big cities, work at megacorps, in an ever-more challenging and competitive world? Aren't the current societal and governmental systems made for much smaller groups, and don't they fail in these glorious days?

AZ

[Dilitante1]

here is a good idea/tech but will it be applied towards processing old landfills thereby saving the planet in the long run?

[KRSESQ]

Originally posted by az
Yeah, that would be nice - I've read about some technology that reminds me of that device in the flying DeLorean, was it called Mr Fusion?

But you know, technological progress is nice and all, but we're really in need of a new ethical/philosophical/social advance. The gap between technology and wisdom is widening. We are powerful as never before, but are we really mature enough for all this power at our fingertips? Can we, as individuals, society, or societies, cope with all the problems globalism, fast transport and instant communication bring? Are we reasonable enough to not abuse the power to destroy the entire planet (I think not, otherwise we wouldn't have built such devices of mass destruction)? Can we really live happily in big cities, work at megacorps, in an ever-more challenging and competitive world? Aren't the current societal and governmental systems made for much smaller groups, and don't they fail in these glorious days?

AZ

In the case of technologies that could be turned into terrible weapons, I tend to agree. In this case, though, we're talking about a technology that (hopefully) could improve the standard of living and reduce the impact of humans on the Earth.

We have to remember that the only thing this technology does is provide us with new tools. Tools are inanimate, amoral objects. What makes a tool good or evil is how WE use it, and it's more of a comment on us than on the tool.

As far as destroying ourselves with our technology, I like to believe that we're past the most dangerous point, when we were poised to incinerate much of the planet with nuclear weapons. Current events notwithstanding, we were closest to Mutual Assured Destruction in October, 1961, and maybe again in 1973 during the last Israeli/Arab war. Frankly, I think our weapons are less of a threat to humanity today than Mother Nature herself is.

Kevin

[KvHagedorn]

If this technology is viable, Arabia's oil wealth will be obsolete and they will not be able to sustain their current populations there. Guess what will happen? Mass emigration.

[Brian Ellis]

KvH

Don't worry. This looks like a good scam, ready for next Tuesday.

[funky-d-munky]

Lets turn waste into oil, so we can burn more oil and in turn it into waste?
Well I don't see the world doing a 180 anytime soon, so what the hell, cheap gas is better than expensive gas. But somehow you just know that you'll see pigs fly first.
The "Next big thing" better take us out of the expensive, dirty, toxic fule realm. Or we ain't goin no where.
funky

[Wombat]

I think you're overlooking the obvious. The Internet is only about 1/2 or 2/3s to maturity at this point.

[UtwigMU]

Well the law of energy states that energy cannot be nulified and cannot be mad out of nothing (OK, let's leave particle physics aside here).

So if you take waste that has low energy level and turn it into something that has high energy level such as oil, you have to expend energy.

From where does this energy come into the system?

We are able to make sinthetic oil for quite a time. It's only that it doesn't pay off compared to drilling. Not even all drilling has equal price, for instance, oil in Iraq and in Saudi Arabia is cheapest to extract, not so in Russia and some other places.

For instance I read about Austrian farmer, who is defying German saying "Aus scheiss kann man nicht dem Feuer machen." (You cannot make fire out of shit.), who is using fermenting of organic waste to provide heat for his farm and even local school.

There are manny technologies capable of producing energy, but little developed. Also if I were a major oil company or saudi sheik, I'd immediately purchase pattents and save them in the draver untill oil runs out.

[Paddy]

Following what UtwigMU said, I wonder quite what the energy expendature would be.... I couldn'r find anything specific on their site.... I guess it would be a lot.

[KvHagedorn]

The next big thing is the obsolescence of humanity.