Chapter 12

I was standing in our original building, the doors shut to the bitterly cold late winter storm roaring outside. We were holding another event, this time I was taking questions as Adam, and our guests were reporters from around the world.

“M Barkley, how many generators are available?” asked the reporter in French.

“The Dominion has offered up to 15 per month, depending on demand.”

“Why are you leasing then instead of selling them?”

“We are offering them at 2 billion dollars each, for a lease of 25 years. That’s a production cost of 5.475 cents per megawatt over those 25 years. If anybody complains about the cost, ignore them, they are insane.

“There is a generally accepted rule that interstellar civilizations may not sell technology to non interstellar civilizations. Lease agreements are a nice and easy way to circumvent the rule.

“I also think that in 25 years we will be able to produce these machines on our own, making purchase unnecessary. Hopefully, by then we will be an interstellar species, so it won’t matter if the Dominion sells us off lease generators that are 25 years old, they are rated for many hundreds of years between maintenance cycles.”

“Mr Barkley, what is your opinion of the work Guardian did on March 3rd? Do you think he overstepped his authority?”

I clicked a button, and a picture of my daughter displayed on the large screen behind me. “This is my two month old daughter Sofia Rose. She was born into a world with catastrophic climate change, nuclear weapons, malaria, zika, covid-19, and other deadly diseases. She’s going to grow up in a world without them. I’m very pleased with Guardians gift. We should really make Guardian day an international day of remembrance.”

“Did you tell Guardian what to remove?”

“I think I’ll decline to answer that question, let’s just leave it at, Guardian did what he thought was best, and considering he’s much older than the rest of us, he’s got the wisdom to match the power.

“Oh, except the Great Pyramid restoration, that was all my idea.” I finished, smiling as a picture of the fully restored white marble clad structure gleamed under the sun with its solid gold capstone appeared on the screen. It looked great next to the new billion dollar museum.

“Mr Barkley, what happens if energy companies reduce the price they sell electricity to their customers?”

“Then everyone benefits. Guardian placed a total of 1,487 generators around the globe. Even at 1 us cent per kilowatt to the end consumer, that’s a daily income of 178.4 million, managing the generators, ZZ Power will only use a tiny percentage of those funds. The rest will be poured into understanding and replicating the technology.

“On that subject, I’m happy to announce that CERN has agreed to take delivery of a generator, and in cooperation with ITER, they will spearhead the disassembly and investigation of the science behind the generator. This is hoped to forestall the disassembly and unavoidable destruction of any generators already delivered,” I announced.

“Mr Barkley, are your companies technologies of off world manufacture?”

“No, I had some assistance for the upgraded versions recently introduced, but I personally made or invented the equipment.”

“If I may ask a follow up question?” the older gentleman asked.

“Go ahead. I’m here to answer as many questions as I can.”

“Why have you not sought patent protection, doing so would allow the technology into the public domain within 25 years.”

“My solar panels are patented, the supercapacitors are patented. I have sought patent protection. Right now there are no laws on the ownership and use of the molecular assemblers. They are being guarded and monitored by the Swiss government, but that was at my request.

“You see wonder machines, producing 43 kilos of vaccine a day. What you don’t see is those same machines producing explosives, poisons, or plagues. It is capable of all of those. Remember the panic when people figured out how to print a gun with a 3d printer? This technology is so much more capable. You don’t want these in the public domain, you want them at centrally accessible locations, properly secured, and monitored like any other hazardous small job factory.”

“Mr Barkley! Over here, Mr Barkley!” shouted a woman.

“Yes, the bouncy lady in blue,” I said smiling.

“We saw your daughter, what can you tell us about your girlfriends, are there really three of them?”

“Why yes, there really are three. Nora, the mother of Sofia Rose, Emelia, and Valkyrie. When there were just two, I considered having them marry each other and take my last name, letting us all legally be Barkley’s. Now that there are three, I have to wait for the laws to change to allow three mates.”

“Can you share a picture of them?”

“I’m sorry, but they declined to be public figures.”

“Mr Barkley, what do you say to those that blame Guardian for the cold this winter?”

“You’re welcome. You have electricity in abundance to ward off the cold, you are not sitting in a house somewhere freezing to death because you can’t even have a working fireplace, and you don’t have to worry about going extinct because of catastrophic climate change anymore. Signs of an impending polar vortex existed long before the Event.”

“What about those places that haven’t connected their generator yet?”

“To the citizens of countries that after two weeks have still failed to connect the generators, you have one choice. Demand your government fix the problem. From what ZZ Power has discovered while monitoring the process is that certain electric companies are dragging their feet, or doing substandard work on the site, causing delays.

“The exception is the Jaipur, India generator, no one expected there to be an underground cave complex under the location the generator was placed. The generator is fine, no damage from the collapse into the sinkhole, but it will be several months before it is safely excavated and relocated.”

“You mentioned companies, are there any you want to single out?” I was asked.

“Our website lists the operational status and location of every generator, as well as what the current price of electricity is for both industrial and private consumers. These initial generators are on a ten year lease, which is being paid by the Dominion. If you are getting power from one of these in your country, and you don’t see a decrease in your bill in the next six months you need to ask your government to investigate,” I said. I certainly wasn’t going to call out PG&E and British Gas on international television.

“Mr Barkley, why are you still planning the Dubai Creek Wind project? What is the point of building such a monstrous structure in the age of generator power?”

“Energy freedom. The Middle East has enormous potential power generation capabilities in solar and high altitude wind. They are an energy production economy, there’s no reason not to ship electricity via supercapacitor ships. It eliminates line losses, and would allow ships to dock, and connect to local grids to supply carbon free power to the biggest cities on the hottest days, and coldest nights.