New generators mean utility firms will certainly raise rates. Yikes.
Dang it. I thought we were done with widespread uses for lead.
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Not at all, lead is still used in many places, around 4-6 million tons a year of new production, plus around the same amount from recycling and scrap. Just not in consumer goods or in contexts where it’s likely to be released in the air and soil. Lead acid batteries are the main application.
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… blow harder 
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Ah right, of course. Lead-acid batteries.
Just that, if every stupid charging cable that frays and gets thrown out in the trash is made of lead, I’m gonna get worried.
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It ain’t real until the oil companies start sweating.
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That’s true, but that would already be a serious waste. Those cables are not a major source of loss. This would be more important for grid power transmission, where we lose something like 5% of all the electricity we generate.
@Tamsin_Bailey I agree it probably isn’t real, but I don’t see why it would bother the oil companies. Any impact would be on electricity use, and it’s not like the natural gas plants are high on the list of what would get shut down any time soon.
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At uni in the late-80s, I was lucky enough to see - in person - a superconducting electromagnet. I remember thinking at the time that finding one that works without liquid nitrogen should be a priority.
Since then… well… I’ll believe this one when there’s a confirming follow-up study.
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It cooouuuld be, but I think this is one of those cases where people writing grant applications strategically ignore serious downstream challenges (see also: 3He).
We already know how to make more efficient transmission grids, and have done since before transmission grids were a thing. We could use better conductors (copper or silver), and power factor correction, or better yet HVDC links, but mostly we just use steel and aluminum overhead AC lines because they’re reliable, sturdy and cheap.
Superconductors can’t generally be welded or soldered, or support their own weight. It may not even be possible to make a thousand-mile cable, let alone repair it in the field. We’re likely talking about underground conduits, or overhead lines that are more like viaducts; and these would be HVDC links too, with the extra equipment that involves.
A room-temperature superconductor would be big news for motors and generators, and MRI machines, and probably new inventions, but for power transmission I’m not sure it would solve the problems that actually exist.
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Oh of course, so many ignored and underused possibilities, some for good reasons, some not. Also the world would be so much more efficient if Edison had had thyristors.
sum cold fusion credentials maybe
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Amazing, and they have minutely described the process with easily available materials. We should know within days if this is replictable!
Remember cold fusion?
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It’s an improvement on the original superconductor - mercury.
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i WANT to believe , really i do !
https://www1.grc.nasa.gov/space/science/lattice-confinement-fusion/
but , alas , it this were true , this lenr variant would have been replicated at your local 2 year associate degree universities , let alone more prestigious institutions
and , i have high hopes , thoughts , and prayers for room temperature and atmospheric pressure superconductors which carry a reasonably high current
and , fully legal , federally legal even , marijahoochie pot , that would be nice - -
is plant based " not-Ham " kosher ? almost maybe ? reformed ? ? and , if i squint realllly hard ?
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Heard this too many times alongside “room temperature fusion” to get excited.Gen-X physics nerds are rarely hopeful. Last time I was hopeful was when the LHC found evidence of the Higgs Boson.
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