tmp_f59497a75d8ceb820dc0aeddc2b436a0_SyoNZl.fixed.tidied

by Regolith (mobi)

  Ultracapacitors could not compete with what batteries could do best, but they could do what batteries could not: store a lot of energy over millions of recharges. A battery can power a laptop, but ultracapacitors could power the laptop manufacturing plant. As Jackson expanded to fifteen deep sea fish farms, he needed thousands of bigger, better ultracapacitors to store his solar and wind energy for the night shift.

  Once he won election as governor of Arizona in 2002, he bought out the other investors and took the company private. Then he gave the company a statewide contract, millions in state tax credits to build a local factory, and marketed to other states, utilities, and big corporations, with all profits reinvested into making bigger and better ultracapacitors.

  The ability to store large amounts of electricity gave new life to solar and wind farms – thousands of them grouped together. Factories that used a hell of a lot of energy like utilities, automakers and steelmakers could now cover their parking lots and buildings with his cheap organic solar. The ability to store large amounts of electricity helped him sell more solar and wind products. Utility companies became his biggest clients because they lose whatever electricity they don’t use, in addition to the 6% on average that they lose in transmission.

  So Jackson dominated another global industry, replacing backups in large buildings, factories, and utilities.

  Cooper gave him his due props.

  But then a Chinese automaker came calling, wanting to know if he could mass-produce them small, light, and cheap enough to power a car. Toyota’s hybrid Prius has been around a dozen years. Chrysler was making a pure electric car, the Dodge Circuit EV roadster. Tesla had the all-electric $100,000 roadster that used thousands of small lithium-ion batteries. Fisker Automotive had a $87,500 plug-in sedan called the Karma. GM hoped to mass produce their Chevy Volt plug-in electric, even though the Volt’s 200-lithium-cell battery pack cost $16,000.

  Unfortunately, plug-ins kill batteries by fully depleting them. So battery-powered electrics and hybrids are great for those who never need to drive them far. Like, say, on golf courses.

  For example, GM’s Volt needs a 10-year, 150,000 mile warranty in order to get the coveted California Air Resources Board credit. Drivers need range, but those who drive it too far deplete it, which means it won’t last either 10 years or 150,000 miles. So battery-powered electric cars cannot be driven too far without being recharged, yet every recharge reduces their life span. What they couldn’t do is have a powerful battery that would last a long time. And no automaker wanted to pay $16,000 for a 400 pound battery that they could not guarantee to last 150,000 miles.

  Enter the fucking Chinese.

  Jackson had just opened a next-gen ultracapacitor factory near his other clean energy and home construction companies in Shenzhen, just north of Hong Kong on the mainland, and the second busiest Chinese port after Shanghai. Shenzhen-based auto newcomer BYD (“Build Your Dreams”) started mass-producing a plug-in electric sedan in China in 2008, right after billionaire investor Warren Buffet bought a 10% share of BYD for $1.8 billion HKD (Hong Kong dollars). It used an electric motor and a 67-horsepower, 1-liter gasoline engine for a combined output of 168 hp. But they couldn’t get a battery that lasted long enough on a charge or live long enough with frequent recharging. Plus ultracapacitors are better at releasing electricity (for fast acceleration) and collecting electricity (with regenerative braking).

  So they asked Jackson if he could make an ultracapacitor that could replace the car battery. After intense study, the short answer turned out to be “no”. Not without redesigning the entire fucking car. Staring at a huge opportunity, Jackson hired auto designers to completely re-design the modern fucking car.

  The trick was the lightest possible car frame and recharging the ultracapacitor as often as possible, even in small amounts. The solution turned out to be coating the outer car body with organic solar. Organic solar cells are made from pentacene -- sheets made of rings of hydrogen and carbon that occur naturally. Since engineers do not have to chemically manufacture them in the complicated process required for silicon panels, the organic cells are far less expensive, but less efficient – 6% compared to 22%. They look and feel like 35 mm rolls of film. However, unlike silicon, organic solar cells are weather and scratch resistant, hold paint well, “bounce” back from small dents, and the ultrathin reels can be “painted” seamlessly onto virtually any flat surface, including windows. Adding organic solar cells to the car body added just a hundred dollars to the production cost, but saved that much in fuel every year.

  A car body painted with organic solar could literally recharge itself while sitting in the driveway, the office parking lot, or while driving in bumper-to-bumper traffic. After all, the average car is parked 96% of the time. Solar constantly recharging the ultracapacitor meant smaller, lighter, cheaper ultracapacitors, fuel cells, and fuel tanks, which reduced production costs.

  The Landshark also used regenerative brakes to charge the ultracapacitor, as well as a new cousin: a shock absorber called GenShock invented at MIT that converts vertical motion caused by bumpy roads into useful electricity. Hence, Jackson’s car is constantly charged by 1) a car body painted with organic solar, 2) regenerative brakes, 3) shock absorbers, and 4) transparent photovoltaic windows that use heat resistant glass which dramatically cuts air conditioning costs. Those who only drive short distances could conceivably go years between refills. Drivers could refill with pressurized hydrogen canisters from Home Depot.

  Using an amorphous metal frame to take off several hundred pounds, Jackson now had a car design and business model that would allow him to dominate the global automaking industry.

  But, then, he went one crucial step farther.

  Instead of producing cars himself which, admittedly, is a bitch of a headache, he entered an agreement with BYD to buy up to 250,000 Landsharks a year. BYD already had several factories and the Chinese government seemed willing to lend them the money to build a new state-of-the-art factory, so Jackson asked them how many Landsharks BYD could make a year, including the new plant. Since they figured they could probably build just over 200,000 units a year, Jackson promised to buy up to 250,000 a year for ten years. China already offered a 60,000 yuan ($8800 USD) electric car subsidy, giving Jackson a big domestic market as well.

  Jackson knew introducing them to the public was crucial, so he sold them through a reverse auction where insatiable demand and limited supply quickly drove up the price to over $100,000. Which became a selling point and a marketing tool as the Landshark became a status symbol.

  Meanwhile, the financial crisis that resulted in Bush’s 2008 Wall Street Bailout was still increasing unemployment in China. Too much unemployment threatened the government’s image as capable governors. Fearing the seeds of revolution, they offered to expand capacity to as much as Jackson felt comfortable buying. They were willing to build BYD several next-generation factories if Jackson became a guaranteed buyer. They even offered very favorable prices, preferring to take a loss as long as they employed a few million more Chinese workers. Which, admittedly, is much cheaper than suppressing rebellions.

  The Chinese made an offer Jackson couldn’t refuse.

  With prices so low, Jackson decided to make the most of it by promising to buy up to ten million vehicles a year, not that he ever expected a tiny Chinese automaker to ever produce so many. The Chinese government, however, needed to give jobless workers hope, so they held a joint press conference to announce the government was loaning BYD several billion to make several large next-gen production plants that would employ several million Chinese. They even opened up a new school to train these new workers while the factories were being built. Jackson became a household name in China as the guy creating several million jobs.

  So, to Cooper’s fury, Jackson was not only going to become the biggest automaker in the world, but was doing it with other people’s money. Cooper knew that Jackson was counting on him as president to buy several million of those vehic
les to replace the federal government’s fleet. Jackson already told him that his SUV would be a great replacement for the post office’s 260,000 mail delivery vehicles, much less their freight trucks. Plus, Jackson wanted to allow state and local governments to buy into the pool to replace police cars, as well as school and inner city buses. Which Cooper hadn’t promised to do yet, if he won.

  Yet the political profit was so much more:

  Jackson had a car that didn’t consume oil, pollute, or contribute to global warming. Since transportation accounts for two-thirds of America’s oil consumption, and vehicles alone consume 44% of all oil in America, replacing gas and diesel vehicles with plug-in solar fuel cells would make America energy independent. This would save millions of Americans from dying prematurely from air pollution, save generations of kids from asthma and respiratory diseases, keep millions of workers at work instead of sick, and prevent future wars over oil. America remained at the mercy of oil exporters like Russia, Iran and Venezuela for only as long as its drivers consumed 150 billion gallons a year of gas.

  Instead of an expensive national dealership distribution system, Jackson used a website where buyers could order exactly what they wanted -- outer color, interior, sound system, etc. The waiting list was over a year long anyway, so Jackson made a virtue of necessity. Or, in computer parlay, he turned a bug into a feature. Buyers could even track their car online though the production and delivery process, a la FedEx.

  “I’m the Landshark girl,” Monique admitted, quite pleased that he recognized her from just two commercials that ran briefly. She appeared in tons of magazine ads, but print ads didn’t matter to models like television did. Fame to an aspiring actress is like dope to an addict. “Last week I finished several commercials for the new 2012 models. Are you familiar with plug-in fuel cells?”

  Cooper flashed her his trademark smile, the one that barely fit on his face.

  Jackson’s beautiful sky-blue Landshark stood out more than his borrowed three ton Hummer. Which was the point. While the Hummer looked like a land yacht, the Landshark looked like it could fly. Or swim. But the beauty of the Landshark was not just skin deep. It was the economics that rocked the industry.

  Because the Landshark was freed from designing around big boxes like the engine, steering column, and trunk, it was far more evenly balanced, with its weight lower and better distributed to give it an optimal center of gravity which enabled it to hug curves at high speed.

  But the best part was each skateboard chassis could accommodate dozens of different bodies, including compacts, vans, sedans, pickup trucks, and SUVs. Switching vehicle bodies only required tying down a dozen connection points and inserting the control wire into the main port. Because the bottom half of the vehicle was the same, one factory could produce dozens of vehicles with one platform, without costly makeovers. In contrast, GM had 68 car models using 50 different platforms.

  While every major automaker develops models and then tries to share platforms to reduce costs, Jackson first designed a common platform, then came up with various models to build on that platform. Or, specifically, four platforms that theoretically could handle every car, truck, van, and SUV he imagined making. And even that fourth platform would make various buses, freight trucks, SUV limos, and an armored military transport that could accommodate an entire light infantry platoon. Designing several platforms was hard, but made turning out various models relatively cheap, fast, and easy.

  And refueling was as easy as plugging into a 220 outlet, buying a canister of pressurized hydrogen gas, or just leaving it out in the sunshine. That eliminated the chicken-and-the-egg dilemma of sinking trillions in a vast hydrogen distribution network. If clean energy was the future, then Cooper was looking at tomorrow.

  “I’ve heard of them,” Cooper obliquely answered her. “You know how I can get one?”

  Monique leaned towards him and whispered.

  “Don’t tell anyone, but Henry’s prototype is a piece of shit. That’s why he won’t sell it. He only drives it to show off or get on TV. Lorena won’t touch it because it’s so unreliable. He’s getting the very first 2012 model to replace this piece of crap.”

  Cooper loved hearing bad news about Jackson.

  “I won’t tell a soul,” he lied.

  Despite having decided to replace federal gas hogs with plug-ins as much as possible, Cooper still had not told Jackson yet. He hadn’t decided what to ask for in return. Jackson was always pestering him for something. Cooper wanted something back. But when you’re already the president of the United fucking States, what more could you possibly want?

  A billion dollars.

  The thought hit him like a brick. He said it again in his own mind, loving the sound of it. One billion dollars. Now that’s validation! He then wondered what Jackson would have demanded if their positions were reversed.

  Monique wrapped her arm around his and walked him into the house as he, still flying like a kite, reveled in the most unexpected sex of his life.

  And, as it turned out, the last.

  If he only knew how many cameras filmed his infidelity, then he would really realize just how fucked he truly was.

  8

  Buck naked in his second floor bedroom, Henry Jackson’s only son watched his longtime lover feed his warm cum to the next likely president of the United States. They just had sex minutes before, so Monique must really hate that guy to make him drink David’s juice. David had done a lot of mean things in his life, but feeding a guy someone else’s sperm topped them all.

  If he wasn’t busy masturbating while operating three hidden video cameras, he would have screamed at the top of his lungs. Although it wasn’t clear what he would have screamed.

  Named after his grandfather the astronomy professor, rather than his father the governor, he insisted on being called “David” instead of “Henry” or “Henry David” because he did not like being in the shadow of his father. David and his father had enough bad blood between them to stock a blood bank. Although a compulsive workaholic like his father, he otherwise did everything possible to appear different.

  Jackson spent most of David’s childhood building his fish farms in the South Pacific. David tried all of the usual attention-getters, like excelling at sports, shooting, flying, martial arts, and learning the family business, but his father always seemed to have more important things to do than spend time with his only son. Other kids would have concluded that this was somehow their fault. Not David. He concluded that his father was an asshole. And grew up with enough issues to employ an army of shrinks.

  David worked off the anger by kicking the shit out of people, first in martial arts tournaments, sometimes in bars, and later in semi-legal cage fighting bouts. He only stopped when he beat the reigning cage fighting champion to a bloody pulp, giving his father the governor another public relations bitch slap.

  What kept David so pissed is that his father did the opposite with Lisa. His father tried to justify it by explaining that he was not spending more time with his daughter – his daughter was spending more time with him. In other words, she spent her free time with him; he was not spending his free time with her. Like David cared. While his father joked that Lisa was the son he had always wanted, Lisa had the father that David always wanted.

  But that did not mean he wanted his father to fail. His father promised to fund his “special projects” if he scored big, and so David had serious chips on the table. Money drove father and son apart, so maybe money would help them connect once again.

  The trauma of losing his wife to leukemia made wiping out deadly diseases his mission in life. So an obsessed David earned both a doctorate in microbiology and a medical degree, although he never took the medical exam because, quite frankly, he should not be around people. No, David wanted to become a research geneticist like his mother. Or, rather, manage genetic researchers.

  David had two obsessions, and his twin six-year-old kids by his dead wife were not among them. First, he wanted to rid
the world of genetic diseases via pre-conception screening of the egg and sperm. Choosing the best sperm and egg did not involve any genetic cloning or manipulation. This would prevent millions of babies from being born with disease and disabilities. No genetic disease has ever been cured. Prevention is the only cure. Or, as his mother phrased it, “prevention is the cure.”

  Which is why he needed his father. Geneticists could identify ever more bad genes, while making screening eggs and sperm ever cheaper, but most people would continue to have babies the old fashion way unless the pre-screening and artificial insemination was fully covered by health insurance.

  God, he hated politics. And politicians.

  Babies screened of genetic diseases would be stronger, healthier, and live longer. Studies showed that people would pay ten year’s income for another good decade of life. The several thousand dollars invested would save hundreds of thousands later. Crippling conditions like Down’s Syndrome would be wiped out forever. As the genetic screening became better, more and more bad genes would be screened out. Every generation would enjoy greater quality and quantity of life, and turbocharge the economy with healthier workers productively at work instead of in hospitals.