PROGRESS AND VISION FOR THE BLUE REVOLUTION

Blue Revolution Hawaii last year organized a session at Aquaculture America 2018 to encourage early thinking of the concept.  Board member Benny Ron has been working with NOAA and international partners in advancing the field.

Usually, on all campuses world-wide, there is a solid core of ocean scientists dedicated to measuring, modeling and repeating the process with better equipment over time.  Now and then there might be a couple of ocean engineers, half helping those scientists with the technology of measurement, and the other half attempting to create a career to apply ocean science knowledge, linking with industry to do something useful for the economy and world.  There is almost no federal funding in this esoteric area.

In essence, the Blue Revolution is that esoteric field.  The Blue Revolution has been touted for three decades as something ideal for the future of our society, for, while producing sustainable products and clean energy, shows promise for reducing the incidence of hurricanes and remediating global warming.  As the ocean gets most of the warming, the concept shows promise for reversing climate change.

While we have been drawing together the various elements to build the first Blue Revolution Platform, the greater vision has to do with what could be the ultimate outcome.  The magnitude of this effort could well rival the to monumental accomplishments in modern history:  The Manhattan Project and Project Apollo.

So let us first quickly review those two previous great challenges:  beating Hitler in his quest for the Atomic Bomb, and overcoming the Soviet Union in space with Project Apollo to the Moon.  Both efforts cost $25 billion, but only $2 billion was spent to build the bombs, which has a worth of $25 billion today.  On the other hand, Apollo actually cost $25 billion in the early to mid 70's, or $150 billion in 2019 dollars.

If Hitler succeeded before the Allies, who knows what the world would be today.  The success of the Apollo Project has been said to be primary reason why the USA prevailed over the Soviet Union around 1990, bringing an end to the Cold War and the fear of a nuclear winter.  Sure, we still have a mettlesome North Korea, a pugnaciously commercial China and a noisy Russia, but the Doomsday Clock remains precariously set at 2 minutes to Midnight mostly because of global climate change.

So that is the next greatest challenge for Humanity and Planet Earth?  Overcoming Hitler led to nuclear power, but fission using Uranium and Plutonium, with the potential for more bombs, led to Chernobyl and Fukushima, with a continuing rocky future.  The Apollo Project showed that there was no really attractive commercial case for the Moon.  How now, can we go one better by marshaling international cooperation towards a reduction of carbon dioxide combustion, while actually enhancing long-term human productivity?

This was the breakthrough clue I needed to make the Blue Revolution the next great solution.  The key is that the Blue Revolution can be profitable.  Just absorbing carbon dioxide makes no sense because it is too expensive.  Clean coal technology similarly is a money-loser.  There is no way to make a profit from reducing carbon burning, except using something else.  And one of these could well be ocean thermal energy conversion, or OTEC.

That is the advantage of the Blue Revolution, for the whole process will be powered by OTEC, a technology that begins to become competitive only at 1000 MW sizes and larger.  The total system, thus, uses the heat of the ocean, which is replenished by the sun, with the cold portion coming from Arctic and Antarctic regions.  In addition to electricity and freshwater, there will be a cornucopia of desirable products such as next generation fisheries, marine biomass plantations, hydrogen, biomethanol, comfortable new habitation options, exciting entertainment enterprises and much more.  These Blue Revolution platforms will in time become floating cities.  Most of them will be positioned along the equator, where the temperature difference is the greatest, and where hurricanes don't cross.  Of course, many platforms will be in hurricane formation zones, and the drop of ocean surface temperatures by a degree or two can eliminate the formation of these ocean storms.  And much of the ocean can be utilized for these purposes:

Let us say, then, that ocean cities and Disneys-at-Sea someday become significant, how exactly will global warming be remediated?  For now, take my word that there is promise. Not conventional snake oil, I have evidence in the next paragraph

The French invented OTEC (to the right, Jacques-Arsene d'Arsonval).  Here are two French sources I co-authored, providing intriguing insights:

• Energy from the Sea:  The Potential and Realities of Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion
• Artificial Upwelling for Environmental Enhancement

For decades, our team has hinted that a sum of $1.5 billion was necessary to kick-start the Blue Revolution.  This will get you a floating platform, possibly powered by a 10MW OTEC facility, supporting an array of experiments to develop sustainable co-products.  At least, at this cost, perhaps an enterprising billionaire seeking a legacy could be found to lead the effort.

The reality is that something closer to $150 billion will be required to support a full industrial park with a 1000 MW OTEC plant.  If the first system makes money, more will be built.  After all, the Navy has proposed a Columbia-class nuclear submarine force estimated to have a lifecycle cost of $347 billion.  What a $150 billion tab does is eliminate a simple billionaire, for even Jeff Bezos only has $131 billion.  But what an opportunity to save the Planet while making money.

No question that this military expense will improve our national fighting-ship.  But why, for we always annually spend more for war than the next seven nations put together.  Well, Bernie Sanders has said that the correct answer is 12 countries, but certainly somewhere in between those numbers.  Perhaps Bernie has special info, for the estimated U.S. military spending from 1 October 2019 to 20 September 2020 shows our country spending more on defense than the next NINE countries, combined.

For the record, here are some 2018 graphics showing the last official comparison:

$150 billion Blue Revolution platform (to the left, actually, is something from the Seasteading Institute) will be step one to solve our looming global warming problem.  Why?  Each will turn a healthy profit, while remediating climate change.  The more money they make, the more they will be built.  After all, remember how expensive both the Manhattan and Apollo Projects were?  Well:

So, you ask, where can anyone find $150 billion to build the first Blue Revolution Challenger?  Blue Revolution Hawaii has taken on that mission, with the first step to be an experimental platform.

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THE LATEST PROGRESS ON THE BLUE REVOLUTION

Half of you reading this blog could well be first-time viewers, so let me begin with a short tutorial on what exactly is the Blue Revolution.  I can send you to SIMPLE SOLUTIONS for Planet Earth, which has a full chapter on this subject, but let me begin with several articles published in The Huffington Post:

• The Dawn of the Blue Revolution
• The Ultimate Ocean Ranch
• Blue Revolution
• The Blue Revolution is the Optimal Solution for Japan

Here is a 20-minute clip from a gathering hosted by the Seasteading Institute (SI) in San Francisco, providing further details on the Blue Revolution, and, in particular, the Pacific International Ocean Station, proposed by Blue Revolution Hawaii.  SI recently hosted a conference in Tahiti and has found another partner in this French colony.

Joe Quirk moderates an excellent summary of what is becoming the Blue Revolution.  You spend hours/day watching television.  In a fraction of that time, by clicking on what he has titled, The Eight Great Moral Imperatives, you, too, can become a Blue Revolution Pioneer.  Joe also recently published a book:

SEASTEADING:  How Floating Nations Will Restore the Environment, Enrich the Poor, Cure the  Sick, and Liberate Humanity from Politicians

The Seasteading Institute, founded by Patri Friedman and Wayne Gramlich, with funding by Peter Thiel, is leading the way towards a future of seaborne platforms in international waters.  They believe this future is now, and the effort should be entrepreneurial.

Blue Revolution Hawaii, working with SI, is using a more traditional strategy, with plans to design, build and operate a developmental floating city to best determine future marine economies and technologies.  We have already secured an endowment for the University of Hawaii to initiate the program.  While we, too, seek governmental and industrial funding to carry out this mission, we most seek an imaginative and dedicated billionaire to gain a legacy as the founder of the Blue Revolution, for the initial project, the Pacific International Ocean Station (PIOS), is anticipated to cost $1.5 billion
.  

While significant, it should be noted that the International Space Station (ISS) has already cost more than $150 billion, and is expected to crash back into Planet Earth within a decade without the formation of even one company.  Thus, for one percent of the ISS, PIOS will develop a range of sustainable ocean resources in harmony with the marine environment.  In fact, two  natural benefits could well be remediation of global warming and prevention of hurricane/typhoon formation.  

The next Economic Frontier will certainly not be Mars, but the Blue Revolution, with prospects for enhancing the environment.  The ISS is one of half a million pieces of observable space junk up there, and each one cost a lot of money.

So what am I doing to stimulate progress for the Blue Revolution?  Well, for one, I am responsible for that endowment to the University of Hawaii, and a post-doc from Nihon University is soon to arrive to help initiate some research.  I recently gave several speeches touching on this topic:

• My talks to MENSA (at their Pacific Regional Conference in Honolulu)
• A testimonial I provided in Tokyo (right) on the retirement of Tadashi Matsunaga as President of Nokodai, also known as Tokyo University of A&T.  Interestingly enough, a quarter century or so ago, Professor Matsunaga served as the first International Professor for the Blue Revolution at the University of Hawaii.  I suggested, as he now has nothing to do (which actually is not so, for he is even more involved now with too many things--former president of Japanese universities become especially important citizens) he might want to return to Hawaii to help lead this effort.

For the future, I was asked to present a talk in Las Vegas to the February World Aquaculture Society gathering, co-authored by Leighton Chong and Tetsuzan Benny Ron:

Blue Revolution Hawaii:  Proposal for a Pacific International Ocean Station.

Click on these two blog sites for more information:

• Blue Revolution Hawaii
• iBlue Revolution

While not yet organized as a real Blue Revolution activity, you can nevertheless from January of 2020 join me for a World Cruise.  Hopefully, Tadashi and Mayumi Matsunaga will be on board, for he was the one who stimulated this fantasy.  You can even help us select the cruise line:

Crystal for $30,955 could well be the Blue Revolution ship of choice.  Four months to cruise the world:

That itinerary is for 2018, so by 2020 maybe Crystal will truly go around the world...and probably cost more.  That is currently my problem, as these global journeys only feature cabins for two people.  I can barely afford myself, so a companion needs to be able to absorb her own cost.  Better yet, perhaps I'll find someone who could help subsidize my fare.  Amazingly enough, there are a few potential candidates who have progressed through either step two (join me for lunch or dinner so we can talk about it) or step three (a short cruise to determine if we are compatible).  Step one is just contact me.  Still searching for the perfect prospect, and some decision needs to be made by next year.

The key requirement for the Blue Revolution is to find that second billionaire (SI has Peter Thiel), or team of them, visionaries emboldened to develop the pathway for Humanity to ensure for a sustainable Planet Earth.  The sea around us is the most sensible and affordable setting to advance this cause, and the endeavor will only be attained with the right leadership and inspiration.

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