WHAT WOULD JESUS SAY ABOUT DONALD TRUMP?

Just maybe there is a redeeming virtue to President Donald Trump.  He hates Barrack Obama, despises Nancy Pelosi, and has alienated key world leaders like Ali Khamenei of Iran, Emmanuel Macron and Angela Merkel.  He is a sexual predator, narcissistic and has the worst demeanor for any PUS (President of the United States).  You know he lies and is definitely vengeful.  He colluded with Russia to win the presidential election, and clearly obstructed justice.

He buddies up to dictators and anyone with legal problems, no doubt revealing his wish to be one and sympathy for anyone with his plight.  Putin, Jinping, Netanyahu, Kim, all his close friends.  Even Forbes says he is a bad leader.  The Washington Post reported that Trump is the worst person to ever be president.  Vanity Fair says three in four CEOs treat Trump like a bad herpes outbreak.

But maybe it takes just such an outlier to accomplish certain tasks previously considered to be futile.  Take North Korea, for example, every U.S. president has failed to attain any kind of accommodation with their leaders.  Then along comes little rocket man, Kim Jong-Un, who has ordered hundreds of executions, including members of his family, placed 120,000 of his citizens in political prison camps...and these are just examples.  

Turns out Kim is a perfect model of someone who Trump can identify with, which has led to an odd friendship that could well solve the nuclear dilemma facing Asia and even Hawaii.  So they did meet at the DMZ yesterday, then held a two-man summit for 50 minutes, leading to a call for a new pathway towards accord.  No past POTUS (President Of The United States) could possibly have pulled this off.

Democratic candidates opposing Trump in 2020 blurted a range of concerns and diatribes, as would be expected.  I, however, agree with many Republicans that this was a great historic moment.  There is opportunity at  hand, and I actually expect some form of rapprochement to eventually be reached.

No one ever heard of him before, but 66-year old Stephen Biegun, U.S. Special Representative for North Korea, who came into government from Ford Motor Company, looms to be the key to flesh out the next few steps.  He has strong links with Russia.  Also advised Condoleeza Rice and Sarah Palin, and was close to replacing national security adviser H.R. McMaster, a job filled by John Bolton.

One can just imagine the unfolding scenario, when in September of 2020 Kim Jong-Un meets Donald Trump in the Oval Office and they agree on a plan to de-nuclearize North Korea.  Mind you, this does not mean Kim will give up any bombs.  North Korea will say that nine countries have nuclear weapons, and they will destroy theirs when everyone agrees to do the same with theirs.  Donald Trump gets re-elected PUS and Kim Jong-Un goes on to win the Nobel Prize.

So what would Jesus say about Donald Trump?  Well, maybe Donald Trump is the Second Coming of Jesus.  Incredibly enough, there are two billboards, one in St. Louis and another outside of Waco, suggesting so.  So that question provides an obvious answer.  Just ask Donald Trump.

-

WHAT IN THE WORLD IS HAPPENING THIS WEEKEND?

Well, President Donald Trump is hobnobbing with his pals, Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping and Prince Mohammed Bin Salman in Osaka.  He heaped considerable praise to them all, including Salman.  But didn't he authorize the killing of Jamal Khashoggi?  Said Trump, Salman is angry about it and that 13 people had been prosecuted.  But didn't he order the assassination?  

Anyway, Trump might shake hands sometime in the next 24 hours or so with North Korea's Kim Jong-Un.  Just a photo op at the DMZ, as Kim is not invited to those G20 summits.  Life with Trump resembles a series of chapters not unlike those Saturday afternoon kiddies serials I went to, usually topped off with a cowboy movie.

About Trump's spat with the captain of the U.S. women's soccer team now in France, Megan Rapinoe, who said she's not going to the White House, for her mom would be upset.  She scored those two goals against France in a 2-1 victory.  The one in the lavender hair is Rapinoe.

The big sports story of the week, however, has to be the Yankees and Red Sox each scoring six runs in the first inning of the first ever official Major League Baseball game in Europe.  That first inning lasted longer than an hour, so if you're reading this, switch to your local Fox channel, for the game could still be going with astronomical scores.  London stadium was where the opening and closing ceremonies took place in the 2012 Summer Olympics, and is home to the West Ham United soccer team.  The place is packed with 66,000 spectators who mostly only know the rules for cricket.  You can enjoy for $25 a 2-foot hot dog from the Texas Rangers and another two-footer, a Boomstick Nachos, plus the New Yorker (Doddies Gin with Fever Tree Indian Tonic), The Bostonian (a rum drink), and, in the stands, Pimms.  You can still go tomorrow.  Eight tickets are left for $83 each.  Every player on both teams will get an extra $60,000 bonus just for showing up.

On Friday, the day the USA beat France in soccer, the country hit an all-time 115 F.  It was only 111 F in 2003, the previous record.  15,000 people died from the heat.  I just happened to be in Paris, giving a lecture to UNESCO.

I went on to Dublin, where the crisis on TV had to do with cattle.  Farmers were warned to place a moisturing ointment on the udders of cows.  I was planning to golf, but could not find any sunblock, I thought I finally found something that could protect me, so bought a small tube.  I put it on and could not get it off.  Must have been for cows.

About that London baseball game, they sang Sweet Caroline in the bottom half of the seventh, and the game score ended up 17-13, with 39 hits, most this year in the major leagues.  Who cares who won.  Harry and Meghan were there.

-

-

FINANCING THE ULTIMATE BLUE REVOLUTION

Much of my professional life dealt with the search for funds to support the efforts of the Hawaii Natural Energy Institute at the University of Hawaii and the Pacific International Center for High Technology Research.  I would guess that I had a hand in perhaps securing $100 million for expenditure in Hawaii.

At the UH, HNEI became the National Science Foundation Marine Bioproducts Engineering Center, the Department of Energy's Hydrogen Research and Educational Center and the Department of Interior's Marine Minerals Technology Center.  At PICHTR, our two mega projects dealt with a biomass to methanol plant on Maui and successfully designing, building and testing an open cycle OTEC facility at the Natural Energy Laboratory of Hawaii Authority, detailed in postings this past week.

Here is a quote from PICHTR/HNEI's Luis Vega, one of the world authorities on this subject:

It is estimated that, in an annual basis, the amount solar energy absorbed by the oceans is equivalent to at least 4000 times the amount presently consumed by humans. For an OTEC efficiency of 3 percent, in converting ocean thermal energy to electricity, we would need less than 1 percent of this renewable energy to satisfy all of our desires for energy.  

Vega further reported on PICHTR's open cycle OTEC facility:

The experimental plant was successfully operated for six years (1993-1998). The highest production rates achieved were 255 kWe (gross) with a corresponding net power of 103 kW and 0.4 l s-1 of desalinated water. These are world records for OTEC .

Just to appreciate the enormity of the energy potential represented by ocean thermal energy conversion (OTEC), here is a map of where this renewable option can be tapped (between the north and south 20 degree latitudes):

But how to get the Blue Revolution to move forward from its current Blue Evolution stage of growth?  It took minor miracles to get the power source, OTEC, advanced from concept to reality.  Another one will be required for the Pacific Ocean International Station.  I'm so committed that I donated my penthouse apartment to the University of Hawaii to create a Blue Revolution program on campus and serve as seed and cost-matching to stimulate the long-term effort.

I still have an office on the Manoa Campus, and will continue my efforts into the Year 2020, which will mark half a century of my presence at the University of Hawaii.  By then, I have hopes that sufficient momentum will have been created.

All it will take is one billionaire to fund the PIOS stage.  According to Forbes, last year there were 2,208 billionaires.  John D. Rockefeller (left) became the first in 1916.  Depending on what you use as the relative value over time, $1 billion then would be worth anywhere from $16.2 billion to $409 billion today, the latter figure using inflation adjustments.

Wikipedia says that in 2018 there were just over 14 million millionaires in the world.  That surprises me as rather low, for I would have guessed that almost half of the residents at 15 Craigside were once millionaires, just on real estate value and stock ownership.  However, apparently the official definition excludes property or retirement plans.  On this basis, 6% of Americans are millionaires.

A couple of days ago, Investopedia speculated on who would become the first trillionaire.  They eliminated Warren Buffet because he is too old, and Bill Gates because he would need to find another Microsoft, but is now focused on charity.  Potential candidates include Mark Zuckerberg, who is only 26 and worth $7 billion, and if he finds a way to grow his wealth at 10%/year, would become a trillionaire at the age of 60.  

They add Craig Venter of genomic fame, if he finds a cure for cancer or synthetic biology for new biofuels.  But he is already 72.  Jeff Bezos?  Maybe by 2042.  But that speculation was made in 2017 before he got into marital difficulties.  Also, Larry Page and Sergey Brin of Google are mentioned, plus Jack Ma and Ma Huateng of China.

I purposefully pinpoint trillionaires because they will be the keys to the Ultimate Blue Revolution.  If global climate warming turns out to be truly serious, the United Nations will be useless as the spearhead.  Countries will mistrust each other.  Industry will be stymied by their conservative boards.  A credible visionary who is also a trillionaire will have the best chance of orchestrating a partnership of his peers with giant corporations and nations to take the necessary steps.  I've long felt that a benevolent dictatorship was the ideal form of government.  This trillionaire will need to be just that.  The $150 billion cost of the Pacific Ocean International Exposition (POI Expo) by 2050 as the initial endeavor will triumph by showing that global warming remediation can be engendered, and at a profit.  

These mega ocean platforms will mushroom if POI Expo, staged as the 2050 World's Fair, succeeds.  But can you build a thousand of them in a short period?  As significant as global heating might be, the effect will just get worse over the next century.  There probably won't be a tipping point where recovery becomes impossible.  This short period could well become a century, providing a sufficient period for the Ultimate Blue Revolution to unfold as the dominant solution to save Planet Earth and Humanity.  Of course it's best to prevent the misery, but the reality of people and politics is such that steps are only taken when it is almost too late.

-

THE ULTIMATE BLUE REVOLUTION

More than 70% of the Earth surface is covered by oceans, which hold 97% of the available water.  The ocean is deeper--Mariana Trench at 36,070 feet--than Mt. Everest is tall (29,029 feet, or 5.5 miles).  The average depth of our oceans is 2.3 miles (12,144 feet).  

You would think that the lower you go, at some point, the deep ocean water should get warmer, for the core of our planet is hot (more than 9000 F).  But that is not the way our oceans work, for the deeper you go, they actually get colder, reaching around 4 C at around 1000 meters, or 39 F at 3280 feet.

Why?  Cold water has a higher density than warm water.  The colder temperatures from the Arctic and Antarctica circulate like a global conveyor belt, or thermohaline circulation, slowly moving through the ocean depths. One complete cycle can take 1000 years.

Another interesting fact about our oceans is that the near surface is a nutrient desert because micro-life consumes these minerals.  However, much of what thrives in the photic zone (where the sun shines), eventually die, and drop to greater depths while decomposing back to the same original chemical composition, called the Redfield Ratio.  These concentrations (phosphate and nitrate) increase with depth, as shown to the right.  Most of our seafood comes from those regions of our oceans where natural upwelling occurs, bringing these nutrients up towards the surface.

Thus, in the middle of the ocean you have ideal conditions for productivity:

• The temperature difference between the surface waters and deeper fluid below 3000 feet can be combined through ocean thermal energy conversion (OTEC) to produce electricity and freshwater.

• However, if this artificially upwelled deep ocean water can somehow be maintained in the photic zone, this will be like getting free fertilizer to initiate and support biological growth.
• Thus, marine biomass plantations can be supported and next generation fisheries can be initiated.

• Thus, by closing the growth cycle from phytoplankton to copepods/zooplankton to small fish to larger predators, you can create an ultimate ocean ranch.
• All terrestrial farms use fossil fuels and emit carbon dioxide.
• Ocean farms not only will be in harmony with the environment using OTEC, but potentially enhancive, for global climate change can be remediated.  The carbon dioxide coming up with the deep water should be absorbed by marine plants.  Plus, this growth might also help absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere with the addition of some iron.  Much of this remains controversial, but nevertheless worthy of exploration.

• Also, too, if a sufficient number of these Blue Revolution platforms are logistically placed, hurricanes can be prevented from forming.  Stephen Salter (right), Bill Gates and Nathan Myhrvold have a patent to use old tires and long tubes to keep ocean surface temperatures below 26.5 C (79.7 F).  Sounds like a cheap way to do this, but there still remain associated costs and no actual profit.  This is the same Salter, retired from the University of Edinburg, whose mechanical duck for wave power has mostly failed.

• Bill Gates has another patent, with Ken Caldeira of Stanford, to tap the deeper cold water and spray it from a moored ship.  This one is a lot more expensive and also has not gained any traction.  Of course, no real profit, save for the reduction of damages if it does prevent hurricanes from forming.  The Ultimate Blue Revolution will not only accomplish that task, but also, in parallel, be a money-making enterprise.

In the meantime, what protection do these floating cities and industrial parks have against hurricanes?  Easy, no hurricane has ever crossed the equator, something to do the nature of the Coriolis force that creates them.  Thus, 1000 MW pods supporting a million people each will someday be located at or near the equator.  Later, as hurricanes are prevented, they can also be located within the 20 degree latitude region.

But isn't it hot and uncomfortable at the equator?  The deep ocean water after utilized by the OTEC facility to produce electricity and freshwater will still be very cold, and can subsequently be passed through heat exchangers for air conditioning, before release into the sea to fertilize micro- and macro-biomass and next generation fisheries.

The Ultimate Blue Revolution will in time number a thousand or more mega-facilities for a billion or more people total.  Eight years ago, one of my HuffPos was titled The World Population in 2050 Could Well be 7 Billion.  Today, Planet Earth has 7.5 billion, and growing.  My point was that, as the economy of all countries improve, someday, the population will peak and begin to fall, as is already happening in Japan, and should in Europe by 2021.  The United Nations has projected that this peak will occur in 2100 at nearly 11 billion.  But how many people in 2200 or 3000?

So I mis-projected by a few years.  However, I still think that an ideal  population for this world, considering the available resources and projecting future average consumption with recycle, is less than two billion.  This range was also selected by Paul Ehrlich, noted for his Population Bomb.  Can you believe he published his best seller 51 years ago?  Gizmodo suggests essentially the same.  So someday, with the Ultimate Blue Revolution, half the world population, or more, could well be living on the ocean.  Perhaps it will take into 2300 or 3000, but that is my ultimate projection.

That, essentially, will be the Ultimate Blue Revolution.  Some time after 2100, but perhaps 3000, half of our population will live at-sea in mostly self-sufficiency.  If the latter time frame, then everyone will have been genetically engineered to be smart, athletic and good looking.  The aging gene will have been checked, and births will only be allowed to keep the world population at an optimal level.

My very first Huffington Post publication had to do with world peace.  Humanity should by 3000, and, hopefully as early as 2100, attain world peace.  The U.S. this year will spend more on war than the next seven nations combined.  If you add Japan as the eighth, then those countries will in total spend a couple more billions than the USA.  Can you imagine how much more productive our nation especially, and whole world too, will be when all these "wasted" funds are instead applied to infrastructure, education, environmental enhancement and productive causes?

Only with world peace and a check on global warming will it be appropriate to plan for space colonies and missions to Mars and beyond.  Sure, scan the skies for messages from extraterrestrial intelligence, for this effort will be a hundred times cheaper than sending humans into outer space.  Ah, the possibility of capturing the Encyclopedia Galactica streaming in from outer space beamed by a civilization a billion years ahead of us is worth a shot.

One top bar headlines this week in the Star-Advertiser tossed out:  Hawaii telescopes identify car-size asteroid blasting toward Earth.  So  I went on to read the article and found out that this "killer" merely burned up in the atmosphere and tiny remnants fell into the Caribbean south of Puerto Rico.

If another asteroid becomes a threat, like what happened 65 million years ago, killing off the dinosaurs, first, the odds are really low for the next million years, and second, we should have the technology in time to shoo it away.  If Bruce Willis and his crew accomplished that task in Armageddon more than two decades ago, we should be able to do that again in the long-term future.

Here are five more potential cosmic catastrophes, and none of them particularly worries me.  The Sun will someday grow in size at the end of its life cycle and burn Planet Earth to a crisp, but that is said to be 7.6 billion years from now.

For now, let's focus on the most promising profit-making opportunity to save Planet Earth and Humanity from global warming.  Whether the Blue Revolution develops to become the Ultimate Blue Revolution is beyond even my vivid imagination.

-

PACIFIC OCEAN INTERNATIONAL EXPOSITION

A week ago I reported on two tiny signs of potential development for the Blue Revolution.  I also better described a concept I first introduced on 6 April 2019, a $150 billion Blue Revolution platform as the modern-day answer to the Apollo Project, which served to bankrupt the Soviet Union and end the Cold War, and the Manhattan Project, as an antidote to Hitler, terminating World War II.  

The threat today?  Global climate warming, which could well be that mythical World War III.  If international cooperation does not work, where Donald Trump is now the poster villain, all the potential geoengineering solutions just cost too much money, and some look downright frightening, where the mere introduction could lead to WWIII. I introduced this concept more than a decade ago in the Huffington Post.  The uniqueness of the proposed Pacific Ocean International Exposition is that the Blue Revolution should turn a profit, while preventing global warming, plus retarding hurricane formation.

The Seasteading Institute is already spearheading enterprises in the open ocean.  I wouldn't say their form of government will resemble Libertarianalism, but there definitely will be less government interference with business.  Their intention, too, is to start  each enterprise with profit in mind.

I've of course been dabbling with the Blue Revolution for at least 30 years, early on highlighted by a keynote presentation to the First Very Large Floating Structures Conference:

In 1991 Hawaii State Senator Richard Matsuura and I presented the first paper on the Blue Revolution, a concept that returns as the key to the future. (That was from The Huffington Post, but this blog site also had a posting on the subject.) 

Nearly a decade ago I met with Guy Toyama, and our discussion led to the formation of Blue Revolution Hawaii:

Guy's legacy might well be Blue Revolution Hawaii and the Pacific International Ocean Station.  A couple of years ago, we were having lunch in Kona when he mentioned how billionaire Gordon Moore had provided funds to initiate the Thirty Meter Telescope Project (TMT).  As Guy had an office at Keahole Point at the entrance of the NELHA, why not the Blue Revolution with support from a billionaire?  Thus was born Blue Revolution Hawaii, which proposed the Pacific International Ocean Station.  Guy created the presentation for PIOS, which I presented at the Seasteading Institute's conference in San Francisco.  

I'll soon report on how much that decade-long delay of the TMT cost Hawaii.

Blue Revolution Hawaii proposed the Pacific International Ocean Station (PIOS) to test out all the engineering and early business models for enterprises on a floating platform to be placed in the Hawaiian EEZ to the west of Oahu.  Half the $150 million cost will be for a 50 MW ocean thermal energy conversion (OTEC) facility, which will provide electricity, freshwater and nutrient deep-ocean cold water.  The architecture will be pioneering and is undergoing review.

There has been interaction with a variety of international academic (this photo is of Leighton Chong and I having lunch with Zhejiang Ocean University at Orchids), governmental, industrial and other organizations showing interest in this pre-commercial effort to develop sustainable products from the sea:  seafood, marine biopharmaceuticals, ocean biomass plantations, hydrogen, biofuels, etc.  An important facet is environmental:

• Can upwelling be utilized to remediate global warming?
• What are the prospects for a thousand 1000 MW ocean cities to be continuously supported by the available deep ocean water at 39 F?  There is more than enough warmer surface water.
• Will hurricane formation be retarded or prevented by raising the surface temperature a degree F or two?
• And what about hurricanes, for several of them yearly approach the potential site of PIOS?

Financing will determine the course of the project, and the first phase could well be the utilization of a 10 MW OTEC power plant with a segmental floating platform, which can be augmented over time.   Even at this first stage, there will be housing and support provided, with docking facilities.  This will be like the Natural Energy Laboratory of Hawaii Authority, but at sea.

Timing of the above?  2030.  Funding?  We need to find that visionary billionaire seeking a maritime legacy.  There are hordes of them now in space:  Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin, Elon Musk's Space X, Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic and Yuri Milner (left), who wants to know, are we alone in the Universe?

PIOS will pave the way for the Pacific Ocean International Exposition (POI Expo).  In that posting of a week ago I suggested the timing would be for POI Expo to be the site of the 2030 World's Fair.  Perhaps PIOS might want to consider that attraction, for on further reflection, my sense is that POI Expo will become functional around 2050.  In addition to the reality of how long things take to happen, the timing is particularly ideal, for the very first World Expo occurred in London in 1851, two centuries before.

It should take a decade for PIOS to fully develop the cornucopia of products and environmental enhancement thrusts capable of being drawn together for the Pacific Ocean International Exposition.  Various initiatives should be ready for full development by 2040, beginning with one 100 MW module.

By 2050, the power capacity should be up to 1000 MW, with a range of industries and entertainment attractions, and here to the right is an architectural concept advanced by Shimizu Corporation:

• Disney-at-Sea and/or Marine World and/or Ocean Kingdom (the largest ocean theme park is located in Hengqin Island, China)
• ultimate ocean ranches
• seafood products feeding at the lowest trophic level
• whale shark
• rabbit fish
• range of fish species nearing extinction to return to the wild
• marine 
• biomass plantations to provide feedstock for biofuels 
• terrestrial crops developed to grow in seawater 
• biopharmaceuticals 
• omega-3 fatty acids, particularly EPA and DHA
• anti-inflammatories
• anti-cancer medication
• more

2050 should be just about the right timeframe for Rinaldo Brutoco's Hydrogen Clipper to be fully commercial.  No reason why this next generation dirigible shouldn't be able to fly at 300 MPH (the Goodyear blimp plugs along at 50 MPH), taking less than eight hours to make it from San Francisco to POI Expo.  A thousand passengers can be dropped off with each flight, and the airship refueled with hydrogen, while hovering over the airport, which will be as large as a helicopter pad, for it will never actually land.

Worried about safety as influenced by the Hindenburg disaster?  Engineering studies show that hydrogen can be designed to be safer than jet fuel.  If what Toyota and Honda are developing with hydrogen-powered fuel cell vehicles are any indicator of promise, the Hydrogen Economy should be in full bloom by 2050.  While hydrogen flight is now in stall, the lowest weight for energy availability will someday prevail, especially as the waste product will be water, not carbon dioxide.  

It's pretty clear that the POI Expo will be located south of Hawaii at the equator, where  hurricanes will not be a problem.  Imagine the cost of having to buy land to build a colony for a million people, where freshwater,  farms, industries and complete infrastructure will be available.  Well, that ocean space is free, freshwater will be "free," and fertilizer (from upwelling) will be free.  Ocean transport is the lowest mode of shipping.  The energy will be renewable, meaning there will be carbon credits to gain by then, for the floating metropolis will enhance the environment.

The larger question is one of funding.  The threat of Hitler and Soviet Union spurred the Manhattan and Apollo Projects.  The U.S. government paid for both.  Global warming looms to be at least as menacing.  Five years ago the International Energy Agency suggested a cost of $44 trillion.  Last year year this price went up to  $54 trillion.  But that is only to prevent a 1.5 C temperature increase.  Bring that up to $551 trillion for a need to combat 3.7 C.

From Axios:

There's $500 trillion of wealth on planet Earth, give or take: Maybe $230 trillion in land and property, $200 trillion in debt and $70 trillion in equity.

In perspective, the Manhattan Project would cost $30 billion today.  Apollo Project?  $300 billion.  Thus, POI Expo at $150 billion is in the range of those two other monumental efforts.

Global warming is a coming global calamity, so the USA will not be alone this time.  Also, too, if POI Expo promises profits, then the private sector should want to get involved.  Amazon and Apple are both worth around $800 billion today.  But companies have risk-averse boards.

The opportunity of a future trillionaire to spearhead this challenge becomes obvious.  The first will not come along for another quarter century, but the timing is right for those individuals to take the leadership role.

Next, the Ultimate Blue Revolution.  Remember, more than 70% of Planet Earth is covered with water.  The graphic to the right comes from a friend who passed away two decades ago, Athelstan Spilhaus.  What if our oceans some day support a thousand ocean cities and industrial parks, and more?  When?  More details tomorrow.

-