Reply To: T-shirt designers unite and take over

[Aeronaut]

Brian H wrote:

5MW (nominal) is not necessarily 5 times more than 1MW (nominal). Tradeoffs such as cooling system requirements on a case by case basis, electrode life and true replacement costs of high wear parts will determine the actual power level that any power block is operated at.

BTW- what is it you want to see from FF before it ships? Are you looking for a specific set of specifications, a price point, some type of social impact? Something else? Please enlighten me.

PS- Google’s logo looks a lot like a plasma power plant today. 🙂

Before it ships? I would expect to see some moves on the stock and commodity markets as anticipation of consequences. An explosion of ideas and entrepreneurial inventiveness as the possibilities sink in.

The FF should “ship” (be licensed) when a proven replicatable design is in hand. Anything else would be irresponsible, possibly illegal.

As far as the power levels go, AFAIK those are rated output numbers, not fuzzy nominals. And as long as the service cycle is not more than once or twice a year, I don’t see any cost or other problems with increased “wear”. Remember the revenue from a year’s operation, even billed at ¼¢/kwh, would be around $110,000 with the savings benefit being at least 10X that, so replacement costs are not a significant inhibition from using 5MW instead of 1MW generators — especially since the capital cost of each is likely to be similar.

Excellant. We are more or less on the same page. I like the part about commodities prices in particular. Nominal as I use the term refers to pulse frequency and the related engineering and maintenance requirements when operated above 330 hz.

http://subatomicprecision.com is now under 800 words, with lots of bullet points. The headline is “What If Tomorrow Was Different?”.