Unlimited Power

One of our baby A.I. overlords has given humanity the answer to our energy needs for a long time if we dare to reach for the stars.

Preface

The amount of energy mentioned in this article could be considered arbitrary; however, it was inspired by a Star Trek Voyager Episode in which an alien species was said to have a star system where this amount of energy was being used.

9 million terawatts!

Q: How much energy would be required to sustain a 9 million terawatt transmitter?

A: The energy required to sustain a 9 million terawatt transmitter would be enormous. A terawatt is a unit of power equal to 1 trillion watts, so a 9 million terawatt transmitter would require 9,000,000 terawatts of power. In perspective, the world currently consumes about 16 terawatts of power. So, a 9 million terawatt transmitter would require about 562,500 times as much power as the world currently consumes.

The amount of energy required to sustain a 9 million terawatt transmitter would also depend on the efficiency of the transmitter. If the transmitter is very efficient, it will require less power. However, even if the transmitter is very efficient, it will still need a lot of energy to operate.