Monday, February 25th, 2013
Stephan: Today's edition is dedicated to a strongly emerging trend that I have touched on before, but which I believe is now reaching critical mass -- 3-D printing.
This technology is going to change our world even more profoundly than the rise of the internet, because the internet was an additive trend, and 3-D printing is a subtractive one. That is the internet allowed us to do the things we did better and more efficiently. It eliminated the need for some things, like mimeograph machines and carbon paper but was essentially additive.
In contrast, 3-D printing is going to eliminate the need for whole sectors of human history, and its geopolitical implications are almost more profound than I can describe. Factories involving mass production are going to disappear. Nations like China that depend on manufacturing are going to be devastated, unless they plan very carefully. Shipping industries, box makers, machine makers, dealers of many goods, will be rendered redundant, radically changing labor activities.
Whole structures of our economy will crash. 3-D printing is going to allow everything to be made to custom order, whether it is a new ear, or a new transmission. It will also play a major role in the transition from carbon to noncarbon energy.
Those nations which adapt quickly will thrive, those that don't will fall further and further behind.
-- Stephan
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Monday, February 25th, 2013
JOHN J LICATA, Chief Energy Strategist of Blue Phoenix Consulting - The Guardian (U.K.)
Stephan: This is on aspect of 3-D printing's impact on solar energy.
During President Obama’s recent state of the union address, I was particularly drawn to one specific comment he made. The statement by the president I’m referring to was, ‘A once-shuttered warehouse is now a state-of-the art lab where new workers are mastering the 3D printing that has the potential to revolutionise the way we make almost everything.’ 3D printing has been increasingly used to produce jewellery, dental work, prototyping and even creating human organs. However, as an energy strategist, I’m most excited about the potential for 3D printing to revolutionise solar panel and photovoltaic (PV) cell manufacturing.
For starters, for those not familiar with 3D printing, it’s the ability to make a three-dimensional ‘solid’ object from digital design specifications. In other words, 3D printing is really a smart printer that creates objects layer by layer through additive manufacturing or the deposits of materials such as glass, silicon, plastic, resin and ceramic by following a virtual blueprint or animated software.
You may be asking why I’m so positive on its relationship to solar power. Well, that’s easy. Right now there is a huge lack of energy storage, which, coupled with known manufacturing inefficiencies, have damaged solar industry sentiment. Therefore future production of solar […]
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Monday, February 25th, 2013
Stephan: Here is the effect of 3-D printing on aerospace.
NASA engineers are building the largest rocket ever constructed - one that will eventually take us beyond the moon - using 3D-printed materials.
Creating this rocket, called the Space Launch System (SLS), is a top priority at the agency because it has a big date: Obama wants to get humans to an asteroid and then on to Mars by the mid 2030s. To speed up the construction process, NASA is relying on a form of 3D printing to fabricate some of its engine parts virtually out of thin air.
The machine, called selective laser melting, uses a laser to build a component. Unlike traditional rocket building, which relies on welding together disparate parts, 3D printing starts with an empty table. That space fills up with a completed component, built one layer at a time, out of NASA’s 3D-printing material of choice. In this case, plastic.
What used to take weeks to build now only takes hours.
‘We were looking at a way to save costs, be more efficient and reduce weight. That’s how we got here,’ says NASA Administrator Charles F. Bolden, Jr.
‘The big thing about 3D printing is that there are no welds with seams, no places for stuff to leak in a […]
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Sunday, February 24th, 2013
DAVID FERGUSON, - The Raw Story
Stephan: The poison of the Theocratic Right, spills out through our society.
Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives have answered the Senate’s proposal to renew the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) by presenting their own version of the bill, but with protections of LGBT Americans taken out and a loophole that could exempt Native Americans victims of domestic abuse.
According to Think Progress, the House bill could derail renewal of the VAWA, killing any momentum the Senate bill had gathered since its proposal on Feb. 12.
Huffington Post provided a link to the bill and section-by-section analysis, which found the bill lacking any mention of key protections included in the Senate version of the renewal.
The House bill removes ‘sexual orientation
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Sunday, February 24th, 2013
Stephan: Today's issue is a selection of the many stories I have found showing the results arising from the efforts of the Theocratic Right to shape the world as they wish it. I want to be clear that this is only a selection. I could have picked 10 other stories.
Because many of these efforts are either esoteric assaults on regulatory agencies, or programs at the state level, and they get little national discussion, I don't think most people quite realize how pervasive these efforts have been.
This all gets down to voting. All of us who want our country to choose a compassionate and life-affirming course must not only vote, we must take on the responsibility of counseling and assisting others of like mind to vote.
We have to take this very seriously.
-- Stephan
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