MovieChat Forums > Chain Reaction (1996) Discussion > Why cheap, renewable fuel sources aren't...

Why cheap, renewable fuel sources aren't forthcoming

posted 17 years ago by russell100uk
31 replies | jump to latest

I don't know how much of the theory behind the science is actually real and how much is just myth, but even though the movie was average at best, the idea that the government is trying to control and contain the discovery of alternative energy sources is a very pertinent topic in todays economic climate.

Think about what would happen if somebody suddenly went "Hey guys, guess what? We can power our cars and our houses and everything else in our lives using nothing but ordinary, common water, there's no need to give those awful oil companies our hard earned cash anymore"!

Now, first of all, this would cause global financial meltdown because an awful lot of the worlds economy relies on the money generated from the oil industry. Plus, a lot of that Oil money finds it way into America. So, oil shares would become worthless, stock markets the world over would crash and we'd have HyperDepression, similar to what happened in Germany in the 1930's when a loaf of bread cost something like a million deutschmarks. The weak and the poor(that's a lot of the world population) would die of starvation, there would be widespread panic, confusion and rioting and the government would lose control of its citizens the world over. The army would be brought in to try to restore order, but that would just lead to police states. Put simply, the world would never recover from the fallout.

Now, I'm of the belief that the US government already has a cheap, renewable energy source and that for the reasons above they are choosing to withhold it from the world. We can moan about the price of gas all we like, but until they have sucked every last drop of the black stuff from the grounds of the earth they will not switch to this. They are getting to the point where they are trying to monopolise the oil industry, thereby they control ALL of the oil. Hence, once it is all gone THEN they will be able to reveal the alternative power source to the world, but not before.

Whatever you think of the movie, the underlying message certainly provides food for thought.

[–] Jayperdu 17 years ago

Now that is an extremely interesting thought. That is true that tons of people would lose jobs and sources of income, but think about what it means, if it costs hardly anything to produce energy then wouldn't it be cheap to make a bunch of things, and so everything would be cheap, you wouldn't need much money anyways

[–] dan3890-1 17 years ago

Yeah, imagine your cell phone or children's battery-operated toys would each have a tiny power source that never needed charging and lasted a very long time. I think that would simulate growth into a different era than present.

[–] king_of_bob 15 years ago

It wouldn't work that way. You don't get power from the reaction itself. You get the power from burning the hydrogen produced by the process. It would effectively end up working about the same as a coal power plant, only infinitely cleaner. As hydrogen does not produce carbon when burned.

Prof. Farnsworth: Oh. A lesson in not changing history from Mr. I'm-My-Own-Grandpa!

[–] joolztoolz 14 years ago

Yeah, imagine your cell phone or children's battery-operated toys would each have a tiny power source that never needed charging and lasted a very long time. I think that would simulate growth into a different era than present.

What is actually happening in the world of technology is quite different. The technology does exist already to make appliances last a very very long time--however, this would also cause a worldwide economic collapse.

They get around this problem by implementing a pre-determined obsolesence into our products. Cell phone companies couldn't survive if they sold one cell phone that lasted 20 years to each individual. In order to maintain their profit margin--this cellphone would have to cost like a hundred thousand dollars, maybe more.

We're caught in a web of consumerism and are as much to blame for the problem as the people who manufacture these appliances.

[–] SpiltPersonality 14 years ago

We're caught in a web of consumerism and are as much to blame for the problem as the people who manufacture these appliances.

Yup, we could cripple any industry we choose to almost overnight... if we choose to.

That's the rub... people like the stuff they have.

Lets say NOBODY buys a new mobile phone... ever... just decide to 'do things the way we used to before mobile phones. Almost instantly companies would be going busy. It would cause economic chaos so severe that we wouldn't know what hit us. We have it in our power to do so, but we choose not to.

SpiltPersonality

[–] bmodica 8 years ago

"The technology does exist already to make appliances last a very very long time".
Really? Where? I've been hearing this crap for over 50 years. Yet never is it taken into account the cost is so doing. Would you pay, say $85, for a toaster? How about a $17,000 refrigerator? $267,000 car? Sure, these items would be built of superior materials, with exacting tolerances, but who in their right mind would lay out that much money?

Billy the Kid

[–] howard-gardiner 17 years ago

There's lots of researchers trying to find alternative sources of energy. The science in the movie has some basis in fact, using lasers and specific frequencies to split the hydrogen and oxygen atoms apart is actually really being done. However, the energy to make this happen exceeds the energy output of burning hydrogen as fuel. Which the laws of thermal dynamics already predict. Would the government need to control the science? I'm sure that would be necessary for sure, to protect the economy. Would the real power brokers of the world want control of the technology first? Absolutely. So the real question is...
Who is really in charge; the government, or the power brokers who already control the money, the energy, the largest corporations and the military? I wouldn't bet on the government having much to do with any of this.

[–] bmodica 8 years ago

You are correct about the energy input is greater than its output. The bond of hydrogen to oxygen in water is extremely strong. And if such technology were profitable, why wouldn't that technology be immediately forthcoming? So a coal producer now produces H2. They'd still make profit.

Billy the Kid

[–] Nemesis42 8 years ago

If there were a 'resonate frequency' that could be efficiently applied that could assist in the unlinking of the bond, the energy required would be reduced. In the macro scale, crystal can be shattered by audio. On the molecular scale ...

[–] 8 years ago

[deleted]

[–] jimrip2004 17 years ago

"Think about what would happen if somebody suddenly went "Hey guys, guess what? We can power our cars and our houses and everything else in our lives using nothing but ordinary, common water, there's no need to give those awful oil companies our hard earned cash anymore"!"

Umm.. you might wanna pay a LITTLE more attention in science class. Do you know how much stuff is made from plastic? How irreplaceable it is to the medical industry? Do you know where polyester comes from.. as in cotton/polyester which makes up most of your clothes? Vinyl? The carpet you walk on? Do you know where that comes from? Trees, maybe? There will always be need for oil and it's by-products.

[–] russell100uk 16 years ago

Fair point, I guess that partly came from exasperation at having to pay over a £1 per gallon to fill up my car now, I mean, as far as consumer spending goes, that's why most of our money ends up in the oil company pockets, right? Sure, other things use plastic but we don't directly buy the oil for that, so it doesn't seem such a bad deal, but when you buy it direct, at thew forecourt, you really feel the pinch, especially when you see the profit margins for these oil companies stretches into the billions.

Plus, oil supplies are running out, so I guess we better find another substance that can help us make plastic pretty sharpish!

[–] hvatum 16 years ago

The problems with renewable sources of power come down to basic physics. The potential source dealt with in the movie, fusion power, is currently being researched by a large international team with a budget of billions of dollars. The research is entirely open. If you like, you can examine all of their reports research papers at the following address:

http://www.iter.org/

There's nothing hidden about new energy sources. Certain proprietary details are hidden, but that mainly has to do with manufacturing techniques. For example, the processes used by companies like Nanosolar.

The real obstacle to adoption of renewable technologies is energy storage as well as bringing the cost down a lot for solar panels. The sun doesn't always shine and solar panels are still too expensive. Nuclear is cheap and could be done now, but people are scared of it, so for the time being we're stuck with coal and oil.

[–] bikebryan 15 years ago

This movie really wasn't dealing with Fusion. They were not trying to fuse anything; they were dealing with Sololumenesence to SPLIT water atoms, not fuse them.

[–] rroach50 15 years ago

russell100uk wrote, "I mean, as far as consumer spending goes, that's why most of our money ends up in the oil company pockets, right? .... especially when you see the profit margins for these oil companies stretches into the billions."

The greatest "profit margins" from oil are found in the nations of Saudi Arabia & Kuwait. They're producing oil at around $4 a barrel and have sold a lot of it in the past year to the oil companies for over $100.

The largest oil company, Exxon-Mobil has less than 1% of the world's oil reserves and they, like the other oil companies actually have low profit margins compared to other industries. The billions they make are from selling so much of their product.

Microsoft has the highest profit margins of any large company and Exxon-Mobil would have to charge well over £25 a gallon for its petrol to get anywhere near that software company's profit rate. Don't confuse total profits with the percentage one is making off of each sale.

You are under the misconception that oil is a major money winner for the U.S. when in fact, the use of oil has been an increasing drain on the American economy since the 1000% price increase of the '60's and '70's and its growing dependence on oil outside of its borders. The benefit of Exxon's $40 billion of profits in 2007 to the U. S. economy was dwarfed by the $455 billion paid that year to import 62% of its oil. Presently, Canada is the country supplying the most oil to the U.S. and for that country, unlike the U.S., the oil business is still a net profit producer.

Incidentally, until Exxon and Mobil merged together, the world's largest oil company was Royal Dutch Shell and Shell is a British and Dutch co.

[–] joolztoolz 14 years ago

Presently, Canada is the country supplying the most oil to the U.S. and for that country, unlike the U.S., the oil business is still a net profit producer.

I did hear a statistic once where it was predicted that Canada will eventually become the third largest oil producing country in the world.

Our forests also produce something like one third of the world's oxygen and we have among one of the biggest supplies of fresh water on the planet.

If the power ever goes out in North America--we'll have 300 million houseguests within a week or two. We've got the room. We can squeeze you in somewhere up here. Hope you like snow.

[–] jejozi 10 years ago

Here in the future we're now paying less than $2.00 per gallon. Lol

This will be the high point of my day; it's all downhill from here.

[–] eeboy 16 years ago

This didn't happen when oil was discovered and started to be used as a fuel source. Additionally, oil revenues form a very small part of the worlds economic output. It does however fuel economic growth. Therefore I would expect that the introduction of a cheaper more abundant energy source to oil would probably increase the rate of economic growth.
As for the oil companies they're products could still be used for lubrication, plastics and other petroleum by-products.
Anyway, there isn't even enough water in the world for us all to drink it let alone run our SUV's on!

[–] russell100uk 16 years ago

"Anyway, there isn't even enough water in the world for us all to drink it let alone run our SUV's on!"

The premise of fission energy is harnessing the power of the atom, the theory is that a single drop of water could power a medium sized city for two weeks, or something along those lines. As for not enough water to drink, that's completely untrue. True, the majority of the Earth's bodies of water consist of salt water, which makes drinking it a big no-no without de-desalinization, which is why third world countries struggle because they don't have the infrastructure or the money to afford such a thing. However, if we just want to use it's atomic power then it'd be fine and it would (if it ever becomes possible) solve an awful lot of problems.

Then again, it'll probably cause a fair few new ones too, such is the way with innovative progress.

[–] WilSpeaking 16 years ago

It is about power alright, getting power, keeping power and getting more power. And cheap, plentiful, widely available power would cause those in power to lose power.

[–] buzzerbill 16 years ago

I just finished watching the movie, and like most Hollywood movies dealing with science, it gets it mostly wrong. No one in Hollywood understands physics. If there were cheap alternative energy, trust me, it would be available. The economic benefit would be too great to ignore. Oil companies would switch to producing complex chemicals from petroleum--which is what we should be doing anyway instead of burning it. Biggest impact would be in oil-producing countries which would of course lose revenue. Frolm a US point of view, there would be no real benefit from hiding it!

The problem is, the eco-nazis object to biofuels,nuclear power (safest, cleanest thing going), additional production, hydroelectric (the poor fish and think of the kayakers!) and other sensible near term solutions. Wind, geothermal, solar, and fuel cells are promising, but the efficiency needs to be increased by several orders of magnitude before there are large-scale commercial. And Hollywood follows pseudo science.

[–] Rabbit-Reviews 12 years ago

While I agree with you on eco-nazis and their objections, I think that cheap alternative energy is something that should be available to us now, but it's not (I wonder why)
The reason for this is, I think, the lack of support from the governments and corporations. Introduction and implementation of new technologies is very expensive and commercial companies are not willing to take those steps in this type of environment, and not to mention the steps before that: Research and Development.
And that is their right, but this is where the government should step in and push towards the goals that benefit the humanity and not corporations and individuals. With the proper support from the government, I believe that this issue would be resolved very quickly...

Only movies that are worth watching: http://www.rabbit-reviews.com

[–] king_of_bob 15 years ago

You don't need FRESH water for this process. So drinking water is irrelevant.

Prof. Farnsworth: Oh. A lesson in not changing history from Mr. I'm-My-Own-Grandpa!

[–] joolztoolz 14 years ago

Anyway, there isn't even enough water in the world for us all to drink it let alone run our SUV's on!

What planet do you live on anyway? I'm from planet earth--we have this phenomenon called rain. My planet is two thirds water--you should come live here. We've got tap water, we can take a bath, shower, wash dishes, water our lawns, drink beverages which all contain water, food also contains water. We've got alot of water on planet earth. You should come for a visit some time--bring your surfboard.

[–] akridine1 16 years ago

I agree with some of that but i dont understand why you think a loaf of bread would cost rediculous ammounts of money?

energy costs dictate how much we pay for products, if the energy costs are nothing then the production of the product costs very little so the retail price of that product is also very little.

the only people who'd suffer from free energy would be captalist businesses and governments

everyone other than oil companies and governments would benefit from free energy.

Hydrogen cars are very simple to make but their not being made because you'd never need to visit a fuel station, you just top the water up in the car, switch the ignition to start the hydrogen extraction and fire up the engine when extraction is at its peak, the hydrogen then powers generators and the engine which recharge the battery required to start the extraction process and give the car power.

all this talk about hydrogen cars requiring hydrogen fuel stations is *beep* its propaganda used to keep the stupid people stupid.

[–] 16 years ago

[deleted]

[–] rroach50 15 years ago

"the only people who'd suffer from free energy would be captalist businesses and governments"

The only nations that would suffer would be the nations whose economy is mostly based on selling oil found on its land e.g. Saudi Arabia, Kuwait.

"Hydrogen cars are very simple to make but their not being made because you'd never need to visit a fuel station .... all this talk about hydrogen cars requiring hydrogen fuel stations is *beep* its propaganda used to keep the stupid people stupid."

A car that uses hydrogen in the same way that a normal car burns gasoline is indeed not difficult to build but you're talking about extracting hydrogen from water and that is something completely different. It's also not feasible because the energy needed to obtain the hydrogen from the water takes more energy than the resultant hydrogen produces from burning it. In fact, for the near future, the most economical source to obtain hydrogen is natural gas not water.

In order to have hydrogen burning cars instead of gasoline, we certainly will need to have stations selling hydrogen. Since hydrogen is stored as a gas instead of a liquid, one will be getting far less mileage per tank and making even more frequent stops.

Fuel cells that use hydrogen offer some promise for the future but they are an electrochemical conversion device. Like the hydrogen burning car, they also will require an infrastructure to distribute hydrogen.

[–] rndhyd 16 years ago

Economy collapse? Ridiculous. Money would be lost, but more would be created.

Oil sales in the US might be $800billion now. What if the same amount of energy could be created for $50billion.

Of course, keep in mind that petroleum is used in many other products besides energy. The prices of those products would go down too.

Agriculture used to employ 95% of the workforce. Now it's <1%.

[–] jasonmcsween 16 years ago

If you could feed a family with a slice of bread instead of a loaf.. you would no longer need the loaf.
Same goes for oil shares.

[–] AtheistRevolution 14 years ago

Nice conspiracy theory. But here is the real issue. It would cost trillions to implement renewable and clean energy.Some people act like you can build some solar panels outside a city and it can power everything. Now the real issue is natural gas,coal,etc are integrated into the present power grids. Nuclear energy could power cities but then there is the waste problem and people don't want plants behind their house.

Hydrogen could run vehicles but then there is the costs of converting all the infrastructure such as gas stations,pipes,etc. Ethanol from sugar cane or corn is just stupid and will destroy food prices and supplies.Biodiesel like hydrogen needs a power source to produce and the infrastructure issue.Of course we get into cold fusion but you have to get it to work first.

Also solar and wind are limited technologies.Now on to your car running on water ridiculousness. Do you really think you can power an engine on water alone?Lets say you could but it would cause rusting and it would be inefficient. You wouldn't be able to generate as much energy as fuel and other sources.

Now if you have to add an additive to deal with rusting and other issues then you're back at the same problem.And then you get into the issue of freshwater and saltwater.You would need freshwater to power it.So then you're tapping into drinking water,wells,etc.Hydrogen basically has all these problems.It would take more energy to produce and then you're only get half as much energy.

You should do more research before throwing out some conspiracy theory.Renewable/clean energy didn't just pop up with hippies. Its been around for centuries. Water and wind technology were used to run a lot of ancient inventions.Also solar energy was used by the Romans. But none of that could beat the energy of oil,coal and other fossil fuels. They're cheaper and provide more energy faster.Not to mention all the products that can be made from oil.

There isn't any other way developed to make certain products.So the real reason why we don't have solar,wind,etc on massive scale is that these technologies were hard to store,develop,etc.Even today we still have that issue. You will never see the entire world powered by solar,wind,etc. Without something like cold fusion,nuclear is the future.

Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful.