> What does the future look like when we have 10 times the efficency on energy use
Energy efficiency improvements of that magnitude don’t exist. In most industries, getting a 10% efficiency improvement would be groundbreaking. These are limits dictated by physics.
True, an overall 10% improvement is a big number, one order of magnitude is SF now.
But for single technologies, more than 10% is possible, internal combustion engines vs electric, incandescent light vs led..
So reasoning on the global efficiency (resource and energy use, recycling of materials, capture of wasted energy, ) is the mainline to go.
IN nature photosynthesis is around 100% efficient.
> IN nature photosynthesis is around 100% efficient.
If your measure of efficiency of photosynthesis is how much sunlight is turned into chemical energy, its in the low single digit percentages. C4 photosynthesis is something like ~4% efficient, C3 is lower still.
Ops, true, overall photosynthesis is low, i remembered some higher capture eff. at some wavelenghts..
(just retina photon conversion is about 50% IIRC)
Energy efficiency improvements of that magnitude don’t exist. In most industries, getting a 10% efficiency improvement would be groundbreaking. These are limits dictated by physics.