Kardashev scale
By RedDawn, 2010-02-08 16:15 in News
Kardashev scale
is a method of measuring a civilization's level of technological advancement.
# Type I — a civilization that is able to harness all of the power available on a single planet — has approximately 1016 or 1017 W available. Earth specifically has an available power of 1.74 × 1017 W (174 petawatts, see Earth's energy budget). Kardashev's original definition was 4 × 1012 W — a "technological level close to the level presently attained on earth" ("presently" meaning 1964).
Methods by which a civilization could feasibly advance to Type I:
* Large scale application of fusion power. Type I implies the conversion of about 5 kg of matter to energy per second. This can be achieved by fusing approximately 1,000 kg of hydrogen into helium each second, a rate roughly equivalent to 3 × 1010 kg/year. A cubic km of water contains about 1011 kg of hydrogen, and the Earth's oceans contain about 1.3 × 109 cubic km of water. So this rate of consumption can be sustained over geological time scales.
* Antimatter production is still beyond our civilization's ability to utilize as a power source, but any civilization with the technological ability to produce or collect anti-matter in large quantities cheaply, would have a mechanism to produce power on a scale several factors above our current level of technology.
* Solar energy — converting sunlight into electricity by either solar cells or indirectly through wind and hydroelectric power. Currently, there is no known way for human civilization to successfully utilize the equivalent of the Earth's total absorbed solar energy without completely coating the surface with man-made structures, which is presently not feasible. However, if a civilization constructed very large space-based power satellites, Type I power levels might be achievable.
# Type II — a civilization that is able to harness all of the power available from a single star, approximately 4 × 1026 W. Again, this figure is variable; the Sun outputs approximately 3.86 × 1026 W. Kardashev's original definition was also 4 × 1026 W.
* A Dyson sphere or Dyson swarm and similar constructs are hypothetical megastructures originally described by Freeman Dyson as a system of orbiting solar power satellites meant to completely enclose a star and capture most or all of its energy output.[13]
* Perhaps a more exotic means to generate usable energy would be to feed a stellar mass into a black hole, and collect photons emitted by the accretion disc.[14][15] Less exotic would be simply to capture photons already escaping from the accretion disc, reducing a black hole's angular momentum; known as the Penrose process.
* In sufficiently large number of stellar systems, absorbing a small but significant fraction of the output of each individual star.
Type III — a civilization that is able to harness all of the power available from a single galaxy, approximately 4 × 1037 W. This figure is extremely variable, since galaxies vary widely in size; the stated figure is the approximate power output of the Milky Way. Kardashev's original definition was also 4 × 1037 W.[/color]
Type III civilizations might use the same techniques employed by a Type II civilization, but applied to all of the stars of one or more galaxies individually. They may also be able to tap into the energy produced from a supermassive black hole which are believed to exist at the center of most galaxies.
Type IV level which controls the energy output of the visible universe; this is within a few orders of magnitude of 1045 W. Such a civilization approaches or surpasses the limits of speculation based on current scientific understanding, and may not be possible.
In the Star Trek universe, the race known as the Q Continuum are beings of unlimited power that have existed since the begining of the universe. They can alter reality in any way conceivable, at any point in time. They have no apparent malice or bias toward lower lifeforms and, cannot influence one another.
There are many historical examples of human civilization undergoing large-scale transitions, such as the Industrial Revolution. The transition between Kardashev scale levels could potentially represent similarly dramatic periods of social upheaval, since they entail surpassing the hard limits of the resources available in a civilization's existing territory. A common speculationsuggests that the transition from Type 0 to Type I might carry a strong risk of self-destruction since, in some scenario, there would no longer be room for further expansion on the civilization's home planet, similar to a Malthusian catastrophe. Excessive use of energy without adequate disposal of heat, for example, could plausibly make the planet of a civilization approaching Type I unsuitable to the biology of the dominant life-forms and their food sources. If Earth is an example, then sea temperatures in excess of 35 °C would jeopardize marine life and make the cooling of mammals to temperatures suitable for their metabolism difficult if not impossible. Of course, these theoretical speculations may not become problems in reality thanks to the application of future engineering and technology.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kardashev_scale[color=#EF2929][/color]
is a method of measuring a civilization's level of technological advancement.
# Type I — a civilization that is able to harness all of the power available on a single planet — has approximately 1016 or 1017 W available. Earth specifically has an available power of 1.74 × 1017 W (174 petawatts, see Earth's energy budget). Kardashev's original definition was 4 × 1012 W — a "technological level close to the level presently attained on earth" ("presently" meaning 1964).
Methods by which a civilization could feasibly advance to Type I:
* Large scale application of fusion power. Type I implies the conversion of about 5 kg of matter to energy per second. This can be achieved by fusing approximately 1,000 kg of hydrogen into helium each second, a rate roughly equivalent to 3 × 1010 kg/year. A cubic km of water contains about 1011 kg of hydrogen, and the Earth's oceans contain about 1.3 × 109 cubic km of water. So this rate of consumption can be sustained over geological time scales.
* Antimatter production is still beyond our civilization's ability to utilize as a power source, but any civilization with the technological ability to produce or collect anti-matter in large quantities cheaply, would have a mechanism to produce power on a scale several factors above our current level of technology.
* Solar energy — converting sunlight into electricity by either solar cells or indirectly through wind and hydroelectric power. Currently, there is no known way for human civilization to successfully utilize the equivalent of the Earth's total absorbed solar energy without completely coating the surface with man-made structures, which is presently not feasible. However, if a civilization constructed very large space-based power satellites, Type I power levels might be achievable.
# Type II — a civilization that is able to harness all of the power available from a single star, approximately 4 × 1026 W. Again, this figure is variable; the Sun outputs approximately 3.86 × 1026 W. Kardashev's original definition was also 4 × 1026 W.
* A Dyson sphere or Dyson swarm and similar constructs are hypothetical megastructures originally described by Freeman Dyson as a system of orbiting solar power satellites meant to completely enclose a star and capture most or all of its energy output.[13]
* Perhaps a more exotic means to generate usable energy would be to feed a stellar mass into a black hole, and collect photons emitted by the accretion disc.[14][15] Less exotic would be simply to capture photons already escaping from the accretion disc, reducing a black hole's angular momentum; known as the Penrose process.
* In sufficiently large number of stellar systems, absorbing a small but significant fraction of the output of each individual star.
Type III — a civilization that is able to harness all of the power available from a single galaxy, approximately 4 × 1037 W. This figure is extremely variable, since galaxies vary widely in size; the stated figure is the approximate power output of the Milky Way. Kardashev's original definition was also 4 × 1037 W.[/color]
Type III civilizations might use the same techniques employed by a Type II civilization, but applied to all of the stars of one or more galaxies individually. They may also be able to tap into the energy produced from a supermassive black hole which are believed to exist at the center of most galaxies.
Type IV level which controls the energy output of the visible universe; this is within a few orders of magnitude of 1045 W. Such a civilization approaches or surpasses the limits of speculation based on current scientific understanding, and may not be possible.
In the Star Trek universe, the race known as the Q Continuum are beings of unlimited power that have existed since the begining of the universe. They can alter reality in any way conceivable, at any point in time. They have no apparent malice or bias toward lower lifeforms and, cannot influence one another.
There are many historical examples of human civilization undergoing large-scale transitions, such as the Industrial Revolution. The transition between Kardashev scale levels could potentially represent similarly dramatic periods of social upheaval, since they entail surpassing the hard limits of the resources available in a civilization's existing territory. A common speculationsuggests that the transition from Type 0 to Type I might carry a strong risk of self-destruction since, in some scenario, there would no longer be room for further expansion on the civilization's home planet, similar to a Malthusian catastrophe. Excessive use of energy without adequate disposal of heat, for example, could plausibly make the planet of a civilization approaching Type I unsuitable to the biology of the dominant life-forms and their food sources. If Earth is an example, then sea temperatures in excess of 35 °C would jeopardize marine life and make the cooling of mammals to temperatures suitable for their metabolism difficult if not impossible. Of course, these theoretical speculations may not become problems in reality thanks to the application of future engineering and technology.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kardashev_scale[color=#EF2929][/color]
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