Chapter 1053 Huge funding gap and nuclear battery technology

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Ye Zishu is very concerned about the moon travel plan of Baihu Technology Company. He mainly wants to see how big the market for moon travel is at this time.

As mentioned earlier, Baihu Technology Company is facing a large financial gap. It is extremely difficult to make money back in a short time just relying on the current space tourism project.

If it is replaced by a lunar tourism project, it is possible to earn enough money in a relatively short period of time. If calculated at 2.5 billion yuan per person, only a few tens of thousands of tourists are needed to bring them tens of trillions of yuan in income.

The ideal is full, but there are so many people willing to spend this money, even Ye Zishu feels unreliable, 2.5 billion yuan is a lot of money for anyone.

Seeing that June was approaching, Ye Zishu couldn't help but look at the moon reservation status of Baihu Technology Company, and found that the number of reservations was only 5,000, which was far lower than expected.

Although this income is an astronomical figure for ordinary enterprises, and can bring in at least 10 trillion yuan in income, it is not worth mentioning for the money that Baihu Technology Company needs.

He looked at the list, and some of them were often seen in the media. They were all well-known business tycoons. There were also quite a few people who had never heard of them. These should be the so-called invisible rich.

Whether it is domestic or foreign, there are some invisible rich people, and their names are not heard at ordinary times, but their assets are actually very large.

Our country is better. After all, it has been restarted once and has not yet formed a huge invisible rich man. It is different in foreign countries. After hundreds of years of industrialization, even the aristocratic system of the year has continued, and the number of invisible rich people is very large.

Based on this guess, he believed that the scheduled number of more than 5,000 people was far lower than expected. If it was just the wealthy on the surface, this number would not be considered low.

After looking at the number of reservations for lunar travel, he also looked at the cooperation between Baihu Technology and other countries in lunar scientific research. This is also a considerable income for Baihu Technology.

At present, the number of countries that have signed lunar scientific research cooperation with Baihu Technology Company has reached 20, basically all of them are top-ranked countries in the world.

Because if the country is too small, or if the economic situation is not good, it is still very difficult to cooperate in lunar scientific research. After all, money is consumed every moment during the cooperation process.

Although there are a lot of countries that have signed cooperation agreements, the number of scientific researchers who plan to send to the moon for scientific research is still relatively small, with a total of only 100 people.

Most of these countries only plan to send two scientific researchers, and only the top 10 countries in the world send a relatively large number of scientific researchers, usually 5 to 10.

To his surprise,

Old m actually plans to send 15 scientific researchers to the moon. You must know that keeping such a high number of scientific researchers for a long time will cost tens of billions of dollars every year.

According to this scale, it can only bring more than 400 billion yuan in revenue to Baihu Technology Company every year, which also cannot satisfy Baihu Technology Company's desire for funds.

Of course, this does not include the scientific researchers sent by Baihu Technology Company itself and the scientific research personnel sent by the relevant state departments, because their prices are not the same.

The scientific research personnel dispatched by Baihu Technology Company are definitely not included in the income, and only the cost can be calculated. The scientific research personnel dispatched by the state will be given a 50% discount on daily expenses except for the transportation fee.

If there are only 100 international scientific research personnel, then the relevant national departments may send 20 to 50 scientific research personnel to the moon for the remaining positions.

Because if there are too many, the burden is not low, not to mention that the research work on the moon is still dominated by Baihu Technology Company. Anyway, the research results are all in China, so there is no need to send too many people there.

For the remaining vacancies, Baihu Technology Company intends to fill them all by its own people. Anyway, apart from scientific research, their most important job is to mine lunar resources.

Although the mining of lunar resources is mainly based on intelligent mining technology, the area of ​​the moon is not small. If you want to mine enough resources as soon as possible, you need a large number of people.

However, there may be only 100 human scientific researchers here, mainly staying at the base to engage in scientific research work, or to engage in exploration work near the base.

In contrast, the universal robot can move much farther, and will gradually establish several temporary strongholds on the surface of the moon in the future.

The conditions of the temporary base are much worse than those of the permanent base on the moon. It simply cannot satisfy the long-term stay of human beings. Only robots can stay in the temporary base for a long time.

In the future, the temporary stronghold will be the concentration place of mineral resources after mining, and the mined resources will be simply refined, and then wait for the interstellar ships to come and transport them away.

In fact, it's not just Baihu Technology that is facing greater financial pressure. According to the latest Starfleet construction plan, the entire industry under it is facing greater financial pressure.

The construction cost of nearly 2000 trillion yuan, even if it is not profitable, is calculated based on the construction cost, and it will cost nearly tens of billions of yuan.

And his current annual net profit is only less than 300 trillion yuan, and the short-term real estate income must be taken into account. In fact, the annual net profit is less than 200 trillion yuan.

Coupled with the current investment in the new manufacturing industry chain, the mouse is also not low. In fact, in the next five years, his entire industry will face huge financial pressure.

The reason why he said it was 5 years was mainly because he hoped to complete the new shipbuilding orders within 5 years, so that he would have a fleet of 10 medium-sized interstellar ships as the core.

This means that the space pattern in the solar system has basically been established. If it is like squeezing toothpaste, it will cause too much trouble, and the resistance encountered internationally will be even greater.

Even if 10 fleets are too large, he believes that at least 5 fleets will be built within 5 years, which can suppress international interference to some extent.

These five fleets must have at least one military fleet and at least one scientific research fleet. The former is guaranteed to have absolute force deterrence, and the latter can help us better understand the entire solar system.

The remaining 3 fleets are transportation and mining fleets, of which 1 mining fleet and 2 transportation fleets are required. The two ships are of the same type, but equipped with different equipment.

If it really doesn't work, it can only develop through loans. In the past, his industries adopted relatively conservative business strategies and did not borrow from banks on a large scale.

The reason why the domestic economy can develop so fast without large-scale borrowing and there is no shortage of funds is mainly because the foreign exchange surplus is too high.

In addition, the domestic economic operation efficiency is very high, and the capital turnover rate is also not low. As a result, there does not seem to be a shortage of funds in the country, at least his industries are not short of funds.

In fact, appropriate loans are conducive to economic development, especially at the critical moment, when a large amount of borrowing is used to complete key projects, the effect is more obvious.

He is not worried about repaying the loan after borrowing money. As long as a valuable asteroid is mined from space, the value created is enough to repay the loan.

For example, Baihu Technology Company has already conducted a survey on Lingshen Star, which is a valuable asteroid located in the asteroid belt, not too far from the earth, only about 500 million kilometers away.

Calculated according to the current price of mineral resources, mining this asteroid can create a value of 420 billion yuan. Based on the domestic population, the per capita value is as high as more than 30 billion yuan.

Although too many resources will lead to a decline in resource prices, but at present only we have the ability to mine space, which means that we have the right to price resources.

The price is definitely not as expensive as it is now, but it will not really become the price of cabbage. If you can't use it up for a while, you can use it slowly to maximize its value.

Just relying on resources to make money is not very high-level to him, and there are actually a lot of resources in space, not to mention the resources in the asteroid belt.

There is also the Keyinbo belt in the outer solar system, where the total amount of matter is equivalent to the mass of a Mars, and the exploration value is much greater than that of the asteroid belt.

If you explore further outside, it is the Otter cloud. Although the mass density is not too high, the total weight may be equivalent to 100 Earths. Many comets may come from the Otter cloud.

So as long as we go to space and can easily collect mineral resources from space, mineral resources will no longer be so scarce, and their value will definitely shrink significantly.

The real development still depends on the level of science and technology. At present, the conventional industry has developed to the level of our country and has basically peaked. If we want to continue to develop, we must make more major breakthroughs in science and technology.

At present, there are industries that are expected to drive the continued development of the economy. The first is the interstellar ship project, which not only has a high technological content, but also can create a huge industrial system.

You must know that with so many companies under his umbrella, he has invested at least a few trillion yuan to as much as ten trillion yuan every year in the past few years, which is obviously driving economic development.

Relying on the interstellar ship project, it is possible to carry out interstellar mining, interstellar exploration, interstellar scientific research, planetary transformation, etc. The benefits brought by each project are unimaginable.

In fact, the interstellar ship project is not only the interstellar ship itself, but also many technologies that can promote industrial upgrading and push the conventional industrial system to a new height.

For example, in the interstellar ship project, there is a sub-project, which is what we often call the personal mech, which is used for personal space activities and enhances personal mobility in space.

If it goes through a certain level of civilian use, the personal mecha industry alone can create a lot of economic benefits, but it is still considered unnecessary, and it will not be used for civilian use for the time being.

The second is the new manufacturing technology system he gave last year, which is different from the manufacturing system of the interstellar ship project, although the technology involved in the interstellar ship project is equally advanced.

In fact, it can be regarded as a continuation of the existing industrial system, but it is more complicated and high-end. Of course, the gravity and anti-gravity devices he provided cannot be counted.

And the new manufacturing technology system, in the final analysis, belongs to the bionic manufacturing technology, which cannot be said to be more advanced than the technology of the interstellar ship. It should be said that the two have their own strengths.

Of course, this is just the beginning. If the new bionic manufacturing technology reaches its peak, the potential will definitely be much higher than the starship technology he gave.

It's just that the difficulty is much higher for the interstellar ship project. The interstellar ship project conforms to our consistent cognition and is more in line with human thinking habits. Although it is difficult to do, it is not so clueless.

However, the new bionic manufacturing technology has actually touched the forbidden area of ​​"God" to create life, turning all things into half life, which is impossible for conventional technology systems.

If it develops to the peak, perhaps the interstellar ships built in the future may be half-life technology products, and the advanced level is definitely much higher than the current interstellar ship technology.

Putting aside these long-term expectations, he should now consider how his industry can earn more money in a short period of time, and even if it cannot completely make up the funding gap, it should try to reduce the funding gap as much as possible.

Originally, he didn't plan to worry about the industry under his umbrella this year. After all, he has been promoting the revolutionary development of the industry for so many years, and he is already a little tired.

He hoped that the industries under his umbrella would generate a steady stream of development momentum. Even if the development was slower, he would not particularly mind. After all, he wanted them to learn to walk before they could run.

But now it seems that he can't wait that long. According to their self-development speed, the domestic economy can reach a growth rate of 5% every year.

With such a large domestic economy, every 1% increase is extremely difficult. It's not like the old m can do it by sucking blood from the world.

With the current size of the economy, blood transfusions from any country in the world can't actually play a big role. If you want to continue to develop, you still have to achieve it through your own growth.

It's just that Ye Zishu didn't know how to develop new industries for a while. New industries must have sufficient volume, and small-scale industries simply cannot drive this giant economic ship through the waves.

What he can think of now is the energy and power industry. At present, there is controllable nuclear fusion power generation technology, which means a continuous supply of electricity.

Although electricity has entered thousands of households, there are still many places where the joints have not been opened up, because there is still a technical shortcoming in one place, and that is power storage technology.

Even though he has given Huanyu Group a lot of battery technologies, but these battery technologies are all chemical batteries, which not only have low energy storage density, but also have certain safety hazards.

Even if he pays special attention to safety, the limitations of chemical batteries are there. Once they are destroyed, there is still the possibility of explosion and spontaneous combustion.

Moreover, it is difficult for chemical batteries to exceed the energy density of petrochemical energy in theory. In many fields, petrochemical energy still has an irreplaceable position.

If we can solve all the problems in this link, it means that we have mastered all the joints of energy production, energy storage, and energy utilization.

Modern science and technology is based on energy. If all links are connected and they are in a leading position in the world, then it is equivalent to mastering the global energy industry.

He doesn't care much about exports. After all, we already have a large trade deficit. Even if we have advanced technology, they will not be able to exchange equivalent products.

Trade itself emphasizes coming and going. We get the products we need by exporting products. If there are no products we particularly need, exporting is of little significance.

More importantly, according to the law of normal development, when a country's industrial technology reaches a certain level, it will be difficult for low-end industries to survive because of high labor costs.

However, my country has both artificial intelligence technology and advanced robot technology, so labor costs will no longer be the reason for the relocation of low-end industries in my country.

This also means that our country can realize the whole industrial chain operation from high-end to low-end. Although this is not conducive to the common prosperity of the world, it is not worth mentioning compared to safety.

Although the relocation of low-end industries can bring many benefits, but too many relocations of low-end industries is tantamount to handing over the lifeblood of the supply chain to others.

If the normal trade is fine, once there is a problem, it means that the supply chain system is disordered, leading to a shortage of goods, and inflation is bound to happen.

The commodities that people usually come into contact with the most are not so high-end. They are mainly low-end products, which are closely related to daily life and directly affect the living conditions of residents.

Based on this principle, according to the actual situation of low-end industries, the employment fee given by his robots is not very high, because once it is high, the competitiveness will decline, and it will be difficult for business owners to operate.

Unable to think of a better industry for the time being, he can only plan to make up for the weak links in the energy industry and take the lead in completely phasing out fossil energy in the country.

Leaving aside changes in other industries, at least the domestic auto industry will face new opportunities for development. Previously, fuel vehicles were mainly sold in China.

After these years of rapid development, it won't be long before the domestic car sales will go downhill, at least when every household has a car, the car sales will definitely not be as high as it is now.

It is impossible to have one car per capita in the future. Even if there is such a high ownership rate, it will cause serious traffic congestion, and there will not be so many parking spaces.

According to the original plan, each family owns a maximum of two cars, and the maximum number of cars in the country is about 600 million. If there are more, it will bring many additional problems.

At present, the number of domestic automobiles is about 260 million. After deducting the operating vehicles, there are about 200 million family cars. In my country, there are only about 400 million households. Nearly half of the households own cars.

At the current speed of car sales, in another four years or so, the goal of having a car for every household can basically be achieved, so the bottleneck of conventional cars will come soon.

In fact, he can't predict what kind of impact it will bring, but he knows that there will be a lot of help, so he incorporates new energy storage technology into the research and development plan.

The new energy storage technology is different from the energy storage he gave to Kirin Energy Industry Group. Because it is too advanced, it will not be sold externally at present, and even it is only used in a small number of areas internally.

As far as the current battery technology is concerned, the battery that is one level higher than the chemical energy battery technology is the isotope battery, also known as the nuclear battery.

It's just that the isotope battery in the natural state relies on natural decay and has a certain constancy. The speed and time of decay cannot be controlled artificially, and the size of the power output cannot be controlled.

In fact, it is not suitable for daily use. Many people in previous lives wanted to use carbon-14 to make nuclear batteries for power batteries, which is just an unrealistic fantasy.

For example, using a carbon-14 nuclear battery in a car, unless the car is always moving at a uniform speed, or only requires a small change in power, is obviously impossible.

Then it is necessary to equip additional energy storage equipment to store the electricity released by the relatively uniformly decaying nuclear battery, and then obtain electricity directly from the additional energy storage equipment when needed.

If this is the case, it would be more convenient to directly install an energy storage battery. Anyway, the car is not incapable of charging, so why use a nuclear battery to provide energy on it.

Therefore, isotopes that decay naturally are not suitable for use as energy storage batteries for daily life. Only in scenes like space, where they cannot be charged, isotope nuclear batteries are used.

The nuclear battery he wants to develop now must meet two conditions. The first condition is that it can be charged, and the internal power does not depend on the isotope decay of the material itself.

This involves how electricity can turn a stable isotope into a radioactive isotope, because only when this problem is realized can the nuclear battery be charged.

The second condition is how to release energy freely instead of waiting for radioactive isotopes to decay naturally. Many application scenarios like this are very troublesome and not universal.

If the energy released over a period of time is constant, it means that acceleration is meaningless, because without an instantaneous burst of energy, acceleration cannot be achieved at all.

The third condition cannot be γ-decay, because the γ-rays formed by this kind of decay are highly penetrating and can cause long-distance damage. If it is this kind of decay, the safety will be much worse.

Combining these three conditions, in fact, this kind of battery is no longer a traditional nuclear battery, although it uses the decay of radioactive isotopes to release energy.

But it involves the reverse radiation process, transforming a stable daughter nuclide into an unstable radioactive parent nuclide, which is impossible in the natural state.

Moreover, with the current human technology, it is still impossible to achieve this reverse transformation process, which is also a problem that he needs to solve. If it is too simple, he does not need to do it himself.

In fact, the battery technology he brought up before is a bit similar to nuclear batteries, but it only involves beta decay, which is not a real nuclide change, so it is not a real nuclear battery.

The battery used by the universal robot belongs to the battery technology that releases energy through pure beta decay. Since it is not a nuclide change, it means that the atomic nucleus remains unchanged, but the number of electrons has changed.

So this kind of battery is not actually a nuclear battery, it can only be said to be an ingenious electron capture battery, which has higher energy density and better stability than chemical batteries.

However, compared with the real nuclear battery, the energy density is still much worse, so he is a little entangled now, whether to continue researching nuclear batteries, or directly sell the battery technology of the general robot.

The two battery technologies have their own advantages and disadvantages. The battery technology used by universal robots is very mature, less harmful, and the price will not be higher than the sky, but the energy density is still slightly worse.

The energy density of nuclear batteries is very high, and a small battery can drive a car to run, but the price is very expensive, and it can only be used in high-end fields, not in ordinary civilian fields.

After thinking about it, Ye Zishu decided to do both, gradually using more advanced nuclear batteries internally, and the batteries used in general-purpose robots can be used in the products sold to the outside world.

In this way, there will be no conflict between the two, and the existing technology can be used to make money and make the best use of it.