by Robert Gary

Created on: February 16, 2009

A national energy spine, which might be a 20,000 megawatt cable running down the median strip of Route 80, would allow power to be wheeled from the East Coast to the West Coast and vice versa. With a four hour time difference between the two coasts, the peak load times are four hours apart. The energy spine would allow all the power resources on both coasts to meet the peak load demand on either coast. What this means, is a lot less power plants on both coasts. It also means greater power reliability on both coasts. Fewer costly brownouts in southern California or New York City would be one of the benefits of the transcontinental energy conduit.

The cable itself, should be selected based on a prize contest open to corporations headquartered in USA, employers in USA, of citizens of USA, who pay taxes in USA, and who meet basic ethical and environmental standards. A lot of companies would be eliminated by these screens, but there would be enough left to come up with a whole new generation in cable technology and thus win the prize, and the contract. The prize should be enough money so that it covers the cost of the research, let's say $10 Billion.

It's not necessary for the cable to be superconducting, in fact it's probably not desireable, at least for the initial cable placed in the conduit. The best high-temperature superconductors right now still require liquid nitrogen cooling, which is not a real complex or dangerous technology, but it would be quite costly to install and maintain on a 3000 mile basis. The materials required for the best superconducting cables today are rare and costly. Rare Earth elements are brittle and don't make particularly robust tough cable, so let's stick with a cost-effective next generation cable that is super-efficient at high voltages but does not need to be superconducting.

This thing should be buried in a pipe conduit six to ten feet underground. The idea is that this pipe conduit is the permanent infrastructure that the taxpayers are buying. The cable itself can be replaced every 50 or 100 years as technology creates more efficient cable materials and techniques of fabrication, and operation.

The project is similar to the National Defense Highway System. It runs down the median strip of a National Defense Highway, and so minimizes the permissions required from the states. It contributes greatly to the National Defense by reducing our national need for imported oil. Beyond that, it is similar because the construction of the conduit

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