Starting with the premise that we’ll eventually stop using
fossil fuels, Robert Laughlin imagines the energy sources of
tomorrow Robert Laughlin, a Nobel laureate for his work in
quantum physics, starts his study of our energy futures with an
absurd proposition — that it doesn’t matter much whether we burn
all our coal and oil or leave it underground. It’s a cop-out, of
course. If we burn all the coal, we would probably burn too. But
for the purposes of Powering the Future, it means “we don’t have
to analyze contemporary energy struggles”. Instead, he moves
swiftly on to imagine what a world that does not burn carbon
might look like. He likes nuclear best, and fast breeder
reactors in particular, because they will extend the lifetime of
available nuclear fuel to “about 20,000 years”. But he also has
a soft spot for solar energy, especially solar thermal energy,
which uses mirrors in the desert to heat pipes full of liquid.
Deployed in the Mojave desert in south-eastern California, he
says, the technique could