What President Trump Can Do With The American System 2.0 - Flipbook - Page 17
massive productivity upshifts were associated
with an array of unique technological advancements (shifting to higher quality coal, adding
coke, introducing oxygen blast furnaces, computer controlled systems, etc). But the invariant
to every technological upshift was the increasing energy 昀氀ux-density of the mode of production (measuring the concentration and intensity
of energy used in the productive process).
With each new technology, not only did the
total energy applied increase, but, more importantly, the concentration of the energy throughput (the energy 昀氀ux-density) increased—tripling
between 1830 and 1900, and tripling again from
1900 to 1970. Energy 昀氀ux-density is a key metric
for technological advance and increasing productive
powers of labor.
This type of progress is indispensable for
negentropic growth, as the total annual steel
production was able to leap by orders of magnitude, from one million tons in 1880, to 10 million tons in 1900, to 100 million tons in 1950,
while the percentage of the labor force employed in
steel production was nearly constant, at about 0.75%,
across the entire time. This is negentropic growth:
an expanding energy of the system (to support
an advancing economy) is sustained by a 昀椀xed
percentage of the labor force. This would have
never happened without the use of strong tari昀昀s during this period.
Already in the 1980s, plasma separation technologies were being developed that operated at
double (or more) the energy 昀氀ux-density, holding the possibility of massive gains in output
per worker. Today, new methods of steel proPromethean Action
duction, solely by electricity (through electrolysis), could be another revolutionary game
changer. Future technologies for raw materials
processing at higher energy 昀氀ux-densities won’t
be limited to steel production, but can ensure
e昀케cient and economical domestic production of
a wide variety of key minerals and raw materials. A massive increase in energy supply at substantially lower costs is key, and we will return
to that point in our discussion of infrastructure,
below.
Creating New Natural Resources
There is another dimension to these advances
that requires special emphasis: increases in the
so-called natural resources available. In reality, the
term “natural resources” is a terrible misnomer,
as the decisive factor that determines if something is or is not a useful resource is the level of
science and technology developed and applied
throughout your society. As we’ll focus on in
the concluding section of this pamphlet, such
revolutions are the basis for a cultural optimism
celebrating a newfound appreciation for the notion of mankind as a unique creative force in the
universe.
With advanced (speci昀椀cally high energy 昀氀uxdensity) modes of production, deposits currently considered to be low quality or useless
can become economical and pro昀椀table. We’ve
seen this quite clearly in the energy sector
with fracking (hydraulic fracturing) and other
advanced oil and gas extraction technologies,
which have opened up massive deposits that
page 15
