Why non-profit?

Discuss funding sources for polywell research, including the non-profit EMC2 Fusion Development Corporation, as well as any other relevant research efforts.

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jsbiff
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Joined: Wed Nov 18, 2009 7:33 pm

Why non-profit?

Post by jsbiff »

Anyone know why EMC2Fusion was setup as a non-profit? I mean, I guess it's noble if Dr. Bussard wanted to see this technology benefit all mankind without profit, but. . .

Let's face it, *someone* is probably going to make huge, massive profits if the EMC2 designs work anywhere near as well as Bussard thought they would. It might not be EMC2 though, it might just be energy utilities like Duke Energy, First Energy, et. al.

I'd like to *invest* in polywell fusion, I think, because I think that if patents were secured, EMC2 could have it's own license to print money in a few years. I'm less inclined to donate money so someone else can get rich at my expense.

I have wondered over the last couple years since I first heard about Dr. Bussard and the polywell concept, if they couldn't have had all the money they needed for research years ago if they weren't a non-profit.

I mean, I'm all for donating to feed hungry people who have no current prospects (esp. children), help provide healthcare for people who can't afford it, helping even to rebuild place like Haiti, where there's no real prospect of getting a return on investment, but the people really need help anyway.

I'm not as excited about donating money for what might be the most significant wealth-creating invention ever, and not getting any return on that investment.

I suppose maybe there's another way to look at it - donating now may help me later by lowering energy costs, which would both directly benefit me in the form of lower energy bills, and indirectly benefit me in the way of a stimulated economy. Also, the potential environmental benefits vis-a-vis global warming. But, I can't help feeling like, in the short term, anyone building a polywell reactor won't be doing it to sell electricity at cut-rate prices. They'll sell the electricity at just below the price anyone else in the market can sell (based on generation from gas, coal, oil, etc), taking huge profit margins.

After all, in a relatively 'free' electricity market, if the cheapest competitor can only produce and sell electricity at the cheapest at a price of, say, 5c per kwh, even if a utility *can* sell it at 1.9c per kwh, they're gonna sell it at 4.7 - 4.8 c/kwh (cheap enough to undercut the competition and no cheaper, that is). Of course, when enough of the polywells are producing enough power, oil, gas, coal will get cheaper because of supply/demand, which will likely force the price of polywell power to go lower - but that process will take awhile, and in the meantime, anyone operating a polywell might well be minting money.

Might as well be me.

I'd really love to see electricity sold much cheaper, and eventually it'll happen, but not for years, maybe decades.

I guess I'll just have to invest in whatever utility companies first jump into deploying these (if they even work, which, of course, is still to be proven, but it sounds like there's a fairly good scientific basis to believe this *should* work).

KitemanSA
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Re: Why non-profit?

Post by KitemanSA »

jsbiff wrote:Anyone know why EMC2Fusion was setup as a non-profit? I mean, I guess it's noble if Dr. Bussard wanted to see this technology benefit all mankind without profit, but. .
Energy/Matter Conversion Corporation (EMC2), the company that Dr. Nebel is now the chief scientist of (that is not necessarily his title, but you get the idea) and which now has a fairly large "Recovery Act" contract via the Navy is NOT a not-for-profit corporation. The "EMC2 Fusion Development Corporation" (EMC2FDC) (also not a NFP corporation according to the latest IRS list of NFPs) is a donation target of the New Mexico Community Foundation which IS a not-for-profit organization. The NMCF can accept donations for scientific purposes and contract EMC2 via EMC2FDC to do specific research. I believe EMC2 can make a profit on that contract, but there may be significant restrictions.

Got it?

KitemanSA
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Re: Why non-profit?

Post by KitemanSA »

jsbiff wrote:I'd like to *invest* in polywell fusion, I think, because I think that if patents were secured, EMC2 could have it's own license to print money in a few years.
The patents that WERE secured have run out and they have NOT been extended. There has been speculation (by me for one) that one of the reasons that EMC2 has been so closed-mouth about results is that they don't want to start the clock ticking on a new patent. If they publish relevant information, they have a limited time to file. If they DON'T publish, they can file at any time, unless someone beats them to it. :wink:

jsbiff
Posts: 106
Joined: Wed Nov 18, 2009 7:33 pm

Re: Why non-profit?

Post by jsbiff »

KitemanSA wrote:
jsbiff wrote:I'd like to *invest* in polywell fusion, I think, because I think that if patents were secured, EMC2 could have it's own license to print money in a few years.
The patents that WERE secured have run out and they have NOT been extended. There has been speculation (by me for one) that one of the reasons that EMC2 has been so closed-mouth about results is that they don't want to start the clock ticking on a new patent. If they publish relevant information, they have a limited time to file. If they DON'T publish, they can file at any time, unless someone beats them to it. :wink:
I guess that makes sense - obviously the Wiffleball as previously incarnated, didn't actually work. Probably they are making some progress last year and this year on some key part or modification of the design which, I would think, can be patented. Since the old patents, as far as I can tell, are basically useless, as long as they can get a new patent on whatever key modification(s) is(are) necessary to get the whole thing working, it's as good as having a patent on the whole thing, seems like.

KitemanSA
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Joined: Sun Sep 28, 2008 3:05 pm
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Post by KitemanSA »

That has been my hypothesis.

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