[himata4113]

I don't think 10x density is possible without getting into nuclear, at least not with the chemistries we know of today, everything at a certain point becomes an explosive.

Speaking of nuclear, getting tons of the material that powers mars rovers and putting them in every home would generate enough power for decades... At the cost of being able to build a nuclear bomb in a garage.

[Aboutplants]

The next revolution will be small scale generation. Fuel cells, extremely efficient cheap solar, even smaller modular reactors, etc.

I live in western Pennsylvania and have both natural gas and electric service, a roof and 1/3 acre of land to utilize. I would love to get rid of at least one of my utility bills and I’m becoming more interested in decoupling from the electric grid than natural gas service. I dream of a future where competition comes to monopoly utilities by way of direct competition with each other as there is a not so far off future where I can utilize solar, batteries and a natural gas fuel cell to cut ties with my Electric Utility. If that kind of competition can exist then the game is on for those utilities to start fighting for customers.

[bluGill]

With modern heat pumps and induction stoves getting off of natural gas is fairly easy for most people and saves money in the long run. Meanwhile the grid is switching to renewables so getting off gas is your best investment. You can get of electric too, but on your 1/3rd acre that probably means significant lifestyle compromises - I will be impressed if you are willing to live with them.

[Tostino]

Batteries are cheap enough to build (using a commercial installer completely kills the economics, because you're paying five to ten times the actual cost in the US) a reasonable size personal battery bank (~100+ kwh), paired with some overkill solar, to totally replace the grid in a lot of cases. GP isn't limited to rooftop solar with 1/3rd an acre, so they can do it quite cheap if they want.

[robocat]

> love to get rid of at least one of my utility bills

Some places don't allow going off-grid. They force everyone in neighbourhood to pay for gas and/or electricity infrastructure even if you're not using it.

So many people have gone offgrid solar in Pakistan that it is causing severe issues for their electricity market and existing infrastructure.

[GuB-42]

The problem with the stuff that powers mars rovers (RTG) is that gives off constant power. If your RTG gives off 100W, you will always get 100W, no more, no less, until it progressively decays on the scale of decades. You can't even turn it off.

The energy density is great, but the power density is really bad. For most applications, you still want a battery in addition to the RTG.

I don't know how easy it is to make a nuclear bomb from them, it is not the right isotope. You can probably make a nuclear exploding thing, like a dirty bomb, but not the nuclear bombs we know.

[himata4113]

The hard part of enrichment is getting to around 20%, after that it actually becomes easier. They're slow-decay isotopes yes, but I am fairly sure you can build a multi-stage device to create a superheated plasma to release all that energy in a fraction of a second since they are capable of chain reactions and it is largely dictated by heat.

Last time I looked into this was 5 years ago so my memory is a bit fuzzy, take it with a grain of salt.

And yah, batteries would still be needed to even out the load, but it is extremely predictable and can be offset with preheating water and other things during valleys of usage, also those rovers actually have 500w of power!

[GuB-42]

It is actually the opposite, RTGs use plutonium-238, which is much more radioactive than the plutonium-239 used in bombs. And it is a problem because it will blow up before you can assemble enough of it to make a big nuclear explosion. In addition, it is not as fissile as plutonium-239.

I don't know about production, it is a hypothetical and I just assumed you had a bunch of plutonium-238 available, but as I understand it, rather than being an enrichment problem as with uranium-235/238, it is just not made using the same process as plutonium-239 to begin with.

[cestith]

I seem to remember recent advances in TMSR research and construction. Those tend to e much safer and have safer byproducts than uranium or plutonium fueled water-cooled reactors.

[utopiah]

In term of dual use nuclear seems culturally radically different from everything else, wondering why.