Elektron: Electrical systems in retrospectand prospect

Daedalus

Volumn 125, Issue 3, 1996, Pages 139-169

  Ausubel, Jesse H ^a   Marchetti, Cesare ^b  

^a Rockefeller University   (Austria)

^b INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR APPLIED SYSTEMS ANALYSIS   (Austria)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0005193022     PISSN: 00115266     EISSN: 15486192     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Article

References (35)

1. "Oh subtle fire, soul of the world, / beneficent electricity / You fill the air, the earth, the sea, / The sky and its immensity." Quoted in Robert Darnton, Mesmerism and the End of the Enlightenment in France (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1968), 29.
2. Edgar Allan Poe, The Science Fiction of Edgar Allan Poe (New York: Penguin, 1976).
3. For general histories of electrification, see Thomas P. Hughes, Networks of Power: Electrification in Western Society (Baltimore, Md.: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1983);
4. Richard F. Hirsch, Technology and Transformation in the American Electric Utility Industry (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989);
5. David Nye, Electrifying America (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1990);
6. Wolfgang Schivelbusch, Disenchanted Night: The Industrialization of Light in the Nineteenth Century (Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 1988);
7. and Sam H. Shurr, Calvin C. Burwell, Warren D. Devine, Jr., and Sidney Sonenblum, Electricity in the American Economy: Agent of Technological Progress (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1990).
8. For data and information on the early history of energy and electricity, see H. D. Schilling and R. Hildebrandt, Primarenergie-Elektrische Energie, Die Entwicklung des Verbrauchs an Primarenergietragern und an Elektrischer Energie in der Welt, in den USA und in Deutschland seit 1860 bzw. 1925 (Essen: Vertrag Gluckauf, 1977).
9. Henry Adams, The Education of Henry Adams: An Autobiography (Boston, Mass.: Massachusetts Historical Society, 1918; reprinted Boston, Mass.: Houghton Mifflin, 1961).
10. Such diffusive processes are well fit by the logistic equation, which represents simply and effectively the path of a population growing to a limit that is some function of the population itself. For discussion of applications of logistics, see Nebojša Nakićenović and Arnulf Grübler, eds., Diffusion of Technology and Social Behavior (Berlin: Springer, 1991).
11. On the basic model, see S. Kingsland, "The Refractory Model: The Logistic Curve and the History of Population Ecology," Quarterly Review of Biology 57 (1982) : 29-52.
12. A kilowatt (kW) is 1,000 watts; a megawatt (MW) is 1,000,000 W; a gigawatt (GW) is 1,000 MW; a terawatt (TW) is 1,000 GW. US generating capacity was 735 GW in 1990.
13. 2/R, where V is voltage and R is resistance.
14. John Winthrop Hammond, Charles Proteus Steinmetz: A Biography (New York and London: The Century, 1924).
15. Chauncey Starr, "A Personal History: Technology to Energy Strategy," Annual Review of Energy and the Environment 29 (1995): 31-44.
16. Cesare Marchetti, "Fifty-Year Pulsation in Human Affairs: Analysis of Some Physical Indicators," Futures 17 (3) (1986): 376-388.
17. For an analysis of electricity projections, see Charles R. Nelson, Stephen C. Peck, and Robert G. Uhler, "The NERC Fan in Retrospect and Prospect," The Energy Journal 10 (2) (1989): 91-107.
18. See Lee Schipper, "Life-Styles and the Environment: The Case of Energy," Dædalus 125 (3) (Summer 1996).
19. Jesse H. Ausubel and Arnulf Grübler, "Working Less and Living Longer: Long-Term Trends in Working Time and Time Budgets," Technological Forecasting and Social Change 50 (3) (1995): 195-213.
20. Peggy L. Jenkins, Thomas J. Phillips, Elliot J. Mulberg, and Steve P. Hui, "Activity Patterns of Californians: Use of and Proximity to Indoor Pollutant Sources," Atmospheric Environment 26A (12) (1992): 2141-2148.
21. Sulfur and other emissions from power plants also cause ills, but these have proven to be largely tractable. See Nebojša Nakićenović, "Freeing Energy from Carbon," Dædalus 125 (3) (Summer 1996).
22. Jesse H. Ausubel, "Energy and Environment: The Light Path," Energy Systems and Policy 15 (3) (1991): 181-188.
23. N. Nakićenović, L. Bodda, A. Grübler, and P.-V. Gilli, Technological Progress, Structural Change and Efficient Energy Use: Trends Worldwide and in Austria, International Part (Laxenburg, Austria: International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, 1990).
24. Cesare Marchetti, "Society as a Learning System," Technological Forecasting and Social Change 18 (1980): 267-282.
25. While Carnot efficiency (now about 60 percent) limits heat cycles, fuel cells do not face such a limitation, as they are not based on heat cycles.
26. Gaslight, with a mantle with rare-earth elements, was a superior source of bright light for a period.
27. The plasma struck between the two carbon electrodes also emits.
28. Sticking to monochromatic light, a ray proceeding in a resonantly excited medium stimulates emission and becomes amplified. Amplification is relatively small with present devices; hence the ray must travel up and down between mirrors. But no physical law limits amplification to such low levels. Semiconductor lasers, pumped by electric voltage, might hold the solution. In a second stage, they should also operate for a number of colors.
29. 1.
30. For example, airplanes of the type ATR-42 or Dash.
31. R. Nieth, W. Benoit, F. Descoeudres, M. Jufer, and F.-L. Perret, "Transport interregional à grande vitesse - Le Project SWISSMETRO," Ecole Polytechnic Federale de Lausanne, 1991.
32. 11 joules, or approximately 140,000 kilowatt hours. A mean loss of 10 percent would require 14,000 kWh for one thousand seats, or 14 kWh per seat over 500 km. This would correspond to 84 kW per passenger at a typical trip time of 10 minutes (e.g., Bonn to Berlin). 27 For example, fifty trains might operate in each direction, spaced one minute apart. They can start from different stations or lanes. One per minute would be the frequency in the neck of the tunnel.
33. For discussions of models of organizational change in the electricity industry, see Judith B. Sack, research memorandum series on "Global Electricity Strategy" (New York: Morgan Stanley),
34. especially "The Darwinian Theory of Distribution" (12 December 1995),
35. and "An Interrelated World" (29 February 1996).