[Hydro]

Hi, I've posted a few times before, and decided to bring up an overlooked issue

I'm actually quite amazed that nobody has mentioned free energy in this forum. There is a massive movement out there towards finding solutions for free energy. At first I dismissed it as something impossible, something against all laws of physics and thermodynamics, yet when I did my research, there is more too these concepts than meets the eye.

Obviously energy cannot be created - or so says the second law of thermodynamics. Yet when changing energy from one from to another, you can in effect, "create" energy. Combining gravity and kinetic energy converted into electricity, could in fact produce some sort of semi-perpetual motion machine.

Before you jump all over me and flame me, take a look at the info that's out there. Like I said, my first instinct was the brush these all off as scams, but history has proven that what we learn in textbooks can sometimes be completely shot down by an invention in someone's backyard. There's even a few companies saying they're finally going public with these machines, the soonest being a demo on August 24.

Here are a few sites that I found info on these free energy devices. Some of them I would take with a grain of salt, but others are definitely worthwhile to read.

http://www.greaterthings.com
http://www.overunity.com (newsgroup)

Some companies that are saying their products are "close to the market"

http://www.environenergy.co.uk
http://www.perendev-power.com/home.htm

Will these things work? I have no idea. The skeptic side of me says no, but there is a side of me that says maybe.

If a company does come forward with something that works, we'll have a complete solution to the coming "peak oil" crisis, if in fact there ever is one.

Imagine the possibilities, free electricity to produce hydrogen, free electricity to convert salt water into fresh water. It would be insane, and it would be a beautiful world.

Stay tuned...

Your comments?

[Whitecrab]

Even if we were to believe them, magnets run out (or require power) and these things will need oil lubrication!

[Hydro]

Even if we were to believe them, magnets run out (or require power) and these things will need oil lubrication!

Not all are based on magnets, and even the ones that are, there are such a thing as permenant magnets. Moreso, some of these machines claim to re-charge the magnets and still produce a surplus of energy.

As for the lubrication. I doubt the world's lubrication needs will ever run out of oil. There's synthetic lubricants for that.

[Whitecrab]

Yeah, I'm just joking. But the laws of thermodynamics seem really, really solid. My old highschool chemistry textbook bragged even if our entire understanding of chemistry was overturned, thermodynamics would still be left unchanged.

Not the kind of thing to bet billions of lives on.

[Hydro]

I don't think you understand. Nobody in the free energy department is trying to dispute the second law of thermodynamics. What they're doing is taking energy sources from two mediums and converting it to one - electricity.

Like I suggested. Dig deeper, its interesting what you'll find.

[Whitecrab]

I tried. No technical details, no technical details, and then the magnetic one's clip page won't load.

[MattSavinar]

Aside from the technical aspects along with the fact we would need to overhaul our entire civilization for this new source of energy, have you considered the consequences of humans truly gaining access to free, limitless, energy?

Would this not just put the crisis off until we have depleted another key resource - or perhaps several key resources? The earth does have a carrying capacity. If we have already exceeded that capacity, more energy will allow us to exceed it even further. If we haven't exceeded it yet (unlikely) "free" energy will certainly allow us to do so.

Of course, at that point, our population would be higher. And when it finally restabilizes, it will restablize at a level lower than it would have had the crash begun with an initially small population.

If we had access to limitless energy, what would stop us from laying the planet bare? I suspect we would consume everything in sight.

I mentioned this in a private email to Dr. Eugene Mallove prior to his murder. He stated it wouldn't be a problem as we could colonize space.

As much as I admire Dr. Mallove, I thought the idea of moving hundreds of millions, if not billions of people off the planet as a "solution" to resource depeletion a tad bit impractical.

Metaphorically: lets you give an 18 year old $1,000,000 and he proceeds to ruin his life. Drugs, gambling, all the things an immature person would do when given abundant money - which is a good metaphor for energy.

Once he begins to deplete his bank account he may start looking for $10,000,000

Given the manner in which he handled $1,000,000, I wonder what he will do if he (miraculously) gains access to $10,000,000? I'm guessing it will only amplify the character faults that caused him to handle the $1,000,000 so recklessly.

We are at the "peak" of the oil age and are closer to destroying ourselves then ever before. Aren't you a bit concerned that if given access to an even more powerful source of energy we will just continue on the same path?

The result may not be as beautiful as you anticipate.

I ask you: what is the funadmental problem we face now? Is it that we don't have enough energy? Or is it that we have a fundamentally flawed system and the flaws are becoming apparent because we are now running into energy shortages?

If the problem is not enough energy, then finding another source might be the way to go.

If the problem is that the system is fundamentally flawed, then finding another source of energy will just put the crisis off into the future.

At that point, the "restabilization process" will be even more ghastly.

Matt

[EnviroEngr]

Matt aptly sez:

Aside from the technical aspects along with the fact we would need to overhaul our entire civilization for this new source of energy, have you considered the consequences of humans truly gaining access to free, limitless, energy?

http://www.peakoil.com/fortopic185-0.html#1696

[Devil]

I have a proven way of converting gravity into energy. You find a river, either at high altitude or with a large flow rate. You block it to create a large pool of water. You allow that water to flow through to a turbine which may be used to generate electricity. Simple. But there are four disadvantages.

1. it is not free because the infrastructure is very costly and amortisation in the lifetime of the turbines is questionable.
2. the pool of water tends to silt up, reducing the efficiency
3. the environmental and cultural effects are often disastrous, rendering fertile valleys useless, often over tens or even hundreds of km2
4. the loss of human life is unacceptably high (in the last 50 years, it is estimated that over 250,000 humans have lost their lives from dams bursting/oveflowing or penstocks rupturing).

I have visited the Three Gorges Dam nearing completion. I was totally horrified at what I saw. I can foresee the possibility of several scenarios that could lead to disaster. God forbid that it happens, but if the dam should burst, 60 trillion tonnes of water will devastate a large area of China, the first city to be destroyed being Yichang, with 2 million inhabitants living along the Yangtze just 20 km downstream. And why should that happen? Well, just consider the nature of the three gorges themselves. If you want full details, I can certainly give it to you, with photographs I took.

{stylized the list; EE}

[Hydro]

Matt, get a life.

Explain to me how the elimination of coal, oil (except for growing food), and nuclear power would be a bad thing for this earth?

1) No more C02 in the atmosphere.
2) No more radioactive waste.
3) Stronger economies because people will spend money on goods and services, rather than energy. (More jobs)

So how is the world I am describing here, bad?

I've said it before, I'll say it again. People aren't going to just sit around and starve to death "for the sake of Matt's half assed theory". A new energy source will be found (if we're not already using it), and it will replace the old. Life will go on..

Aside from the technical aspects along with the fact we would need to overhaul our entire civilization for this new source of energy, have you considered the consequences of humans truly gaining access to free, limitless, energy?

Would this not just put the crisis off until we have depleted another key resource - or perhaps several key resources? The earth does have a carrying capacity. If we have already exceeded that capacity, more energy will allow us to exceed it even further. If we haven't exceeded it yet (unlikely) "free" energy will certainly allow us to do so.

Of course, at that point, our population would be higher. And when it finally restabilizes, it will restablize at a level lower than it would have had the crash begun with an initially small population.

If we had access to limitless energy, what would stop us from laying the planet bare? I suspect we would consume everything in sight.

I mentioned this in a private email to Dr. Eugene Mallove prior to his murder. He stated it wouldn't be a problem as we could colonize space.

As much as I admire Dr. Mallove, I thought the idea of moving hundreds of millions, if not billions of people off the planet as a "solution" to resource depeletion a tad bit impractical.

Metaphorically: lets you give an 18 year old $1,000,000 and he proceeds to ruin his life. Drugs, gambling, all the things an immature person would do when given abundant money - which is a good metaphor for energy.

Once he begins to deplete his bank account he may start looking for $10,000,000

Given the manner in which he handled $1,000,000, I wonder what he will do if he (miraculously) gains access to $10,000,000? I'm guessing it will only amplify the character faults that caused him to handle the $1,000,000 so recklessly.

We are at the "peak" of the oil age and are closer to destroying ourselves then ever before. Aren't you a bit concerned that if given access to an even more powerful source of energy we will just continue on the same path?

The result may not be as beautiful as you anticipate.

I ask you: what is the funadmental problem we face now? Is it that we don't have enough energy? Or is it that we have a fundamentally flawed system and the flaws are becoming apparent because we are now running into energy shortages?

If the problem is not enough energy, then finding another source might be the way to go.

If the problem is that the system is fundamentally flawed, then finding another source of energy will just put the crisis off into the future.

At that point, the "restabilization process" will be even more ghastly.

Matt

[MarkR]

Those 'free energy' links are not very exciting. While I wish for the hypothetical 'perpetual motion' machine, I fear that we will never see one.

The 'products' showcased above are little more than scams.

The enviroenergy 'gravity' generator is nothing but a grossly overcomplicated version of a perpetual-motion idea that has been around for centuries - putting weights on one side of a rotating wheel, and then taking them off before they rise. Fine, but how do you get the weights back up again?

The perendev magnetic motor is more interesting, but permanent magnets are not a source of energy. Again, this is the latest in an innumerable list of attempts to produce a permanent magnet driven motor. Note that the only video/photos you get are of the motor starting to spin. There are no videos or demonstrations of the motor actually running and doing work (or even running at idle).

Magnets can loan you some energy - a piece of metal can be attracted to the magnet, and useful energy can be extracted from the motion. However, you need to give that energy back in order to pull the metal away from the magnet again. All this talk about 'focusing' magnetic fields is just nonsense - it would be equivalent to saying that it would be more efficient to launch a space rocket horizontally because it would experience less gravity.

Indeed, I've even seen some scams who have claimed that this energy in permanent magnets is free. It's not, it has to be added during manufacture. When a unmagnetised 'blank' is charged it takes magnetic energy from the 'charger'. If that is an electromagnet then there will be a slight increase in power consumption as the magnet charges.

There is much 'scientific' interest in 'overunity' devices - mainly on internet forums/newsgroups. So far, no one has ever demonstrated such a motor/turbine. A lot of people get confused by not understanding energy measurement.

People claiming to have demonstrated new 'electrolysis' devices often overestimate hydrogen production, by not taking into account, gas temperature and moisture content (these devices frequently produce much steam due to pitiful efficiency).

I've seen people run alternators but fail to measure 'power factor' on the output - e.g. they think the 10 A at 110 V coming from their generator is supplying 1100 W, when it might only be supplying 500 W.

[JLK]

Yet when changing energy from one from to another, you can in effect, "create" energy.

Sorry, this is wrong. In practice, you are actually wasting energy (increasing entropy) when this happens.

Combining gravity and kinetic energy converted into electricity, could in fact produce some sort of semi-perpetual motion machine.

No it can't. Sorry. From a thermodynamic perspective, this is all pure fantasy.

[Hydro]

While I will agree with you that some of those free energy devices out there are scam artists, some of them actually have some merit. We'll see what happens with the SPEGG on August 24th, and as for Perendev, he does have a video of the machine working:

http://www.perendev-power.com/mm_exclusiveclip.htm

There is a longer video I've seen as well with an explanation. Now the skeptical side of me says we can't see the other side of the machine, so it may be baloney, but the other side of me says it could be legit. I'd never, ever, ever throw any money at one of those machines until they're proven to be legit, yet I have a feeling we're going to see someone come up with something that defys everything we know about energy. It's only a matter of time.

Those 'free energy' links are not very exciting. While I wish for the hypothetical 'perpetual motion' machine, I fear that we will never see one.

The 'products' showcased above are little more than scams.

The enviroenergy 'gravity' generator is nothing but a grossly overcomplicated version of a perpetual-motion idea that has been around for centuries - putting weights on one side of a rotating wheel, and then taking them off before they rise. Fine, but how do you get the weights back up again?

The perendev magnetic motor is more interesting, but permanent magnets are not a source of energy. Again, this is the latest in an innumerable list of attempts to produce a permanent magnet driven motor. Note that the only video/photos you get are of the motor starting to spin. There are no videos or demonstrations of the motor actually running and doing work (or even running at idle).

Magnets can loan you some energy - a piece of metal can be attracted to the magnet, and useful energy can be extracted from the motion. However, you need to give that energy back in order to pull the metal away from the magnet again. All this talk about 'focusing' magnetic fields is just nonsense - it would be equivalent to saying that it would be more efficient to launch a space rocket horizontally because it would experience less gravity.

Indeed, I've even seen some scams who have claimed that this energy in permanent magnets is free. It's not, it has to be added during manufacture. When a unmagnetised 'blank' is charged it takes magnetic energy from the 'charger'. If that is an electromagnet then there will be a slight increase in power consumption as the magnet charges.

There is much 'scientific' interest in 'overunity' devices - mainly on internet forums/newsgroups. So far, no one has ever demonstrated such a motor/turbine. A lot of people get confused by not understanding energy measurement.

People claiming to have demonstrated new 'electrolysis' devices often overestimate hydrogen production, by not taking into account, gas temperature and moisture content (these devices frequently produce much steam due to pitiful efficiency).

I've seen people run alternators but fail to measure 'power factor' on the output - e.g. they think the 10 A at 110 V coming from their generator is supplying 1100 W, when it might only be supplying 500 W.

[Chicagoan]

If we had access to limitless energy, what would stop us from laying the planet bare? I suspect we would consume everything in sight.

That is my worst fear. We must learn to live in equilibrium with nature. With limitless energy, we would see no need to change our ways.

[Hydro]

How does our energy supply dictate how we interact with nature? Government policies on pollution, de-forestation and CO2 emmissions are what is the problem.

I don't see how unlimited free, non-polluting electricity could pose any threat the the environment.

What is the difference between an $8000 magnetic machine that produces electricity 24/7 versus a $20000 wind generator that produces electricty when the wind is blowing? Neither have a bad impact on the environment.

[Aaron]

Thanks to MarkR...

I just could not bring myself to harpoon this one. No matter how badly it needed it.

I might be gettin soft huh?

[MattSavinar]

Hydro:

A couple points:

1. If you want to make me look bad, it's time to stop the "get a life" comments and start doing some research on my background. As I have stated time and time again, just do a google search for "Savinar - Law Students Gone Wild" and post what you find.

2. I couldn't help but to laugh when you referred to my "half assed- theory" in light of the ultra-credible links you provided.

You could have at least provided a link to Dr. Mallove's site:

infinite-energy.com

The man has credentials, provides technical details, studies, logical articles and the stuff is even being reviewed by the DOE again.

If you're going to advocate for new forms of energy, you owe it to yourself to do a google search or two and find some credible links/articles

The link with the chessy-music playing? Really . . .

Matt

[MattSavinar]

How does our energy supply dictate how we interact with nature? Government policies on pollution, de-forestation and CO2 emmissions are what is the problem.

I don't see how unlimited free, non-polluting electricity could pose any threat the the environment.

What is the difference between an $8000 magnetic machine that produces electricity 24/7 versus a $20000 wind generator that produces electricty when the wind is blowing? Neither have a bad impact on the environment.

Because unlimited, free energy will allow us to consume every resource on the planet and for our population to just keep growing.

Our population will continue to grow until Planet Earth is "standing room only."

Even if my apartment has free energy, it still only has one toilet. If I had 15, 20 people living here, we'd have sh-t all over the living room.

Matt

[smiley]

LOL

Things must have gotten more desperate than I thought when people start looking into the old pepertuum mobile again.

Next thing they start looking for the secret stone that turns gold into oil.

[Hydro]

No it doesn't. I asked you this already, how would "free energy" enable us to consume "every resource on the planet".

Just because it is called "free energy", doesn't mean it has no cost!! Wind power can be considered "free" because it comes from the Sun. However it costs money to setup and maintain. So that is an acceptable solution to you? But something that doesn't require the Sun, say a "magnetic motor",
which has a setup cost and a maintenance cost, would all of a sudden give us the ability to consume "every resource on the planet". I told you.. government regulations protect the planet, not our sources of energy.

Nice try.

How does our energy supply dictate how we interact with nature? Government policies on pollution, de-forestation and CO2 emmissions are what is the problem.

I don't see how unlimited free, non-polluting electricity could pose any threat the the environment.

What is the difference between an $8000 magnetic machine that produces electricity 24/7 versus a $20000 wind generator that produces electricty when the wind is blowing? Neither have a bad impact on the environment.

Because unlimited, free energy will allow us to consume every resource on the planet and for our population to just keep growing.

Our population will continue to grow until Planet Earth is "standing room only."

Even if my apartment has free energy, it still only has one toilet. If I had 15, 20 people living here, we'd have sh-t all over the living room.

Matt