holy shit... NASA and Italy tried an experiment similar to what I had in mind, and they produced 3500 volts before the air trapped in the wire created a plasma which melted the tether (resulting in it snapping and the sattelite being thrown into space) and pretty much ruined the whole mission.

But this just proves that the idea is feasible!!! Maybe if we look into nano-tube research we can construct a strong enough tether...

Anyway, I gotta jet, but check out the article here, Al:

NASA's TETHER GENERATOR

Dr. Kwok was one of my teachers. Taught a boring class that had nothing to do with what he was researching.

WHOOOAAAAAAAA, FUCKING ALBERTA!!!

"In October 2003, Dr. Daniel Kwok, Dr. Larry Kostiuk and two graduate students from the University of Alberta revealed a new method of generating electric power by exploiting the natural electrokinetic properties of a liquid such as ordinary tap water, by pumping fluids through tiny microchannels with a pressure difference. This technology could provide a new power source for devices such as mobile phones or calculators which could be charged up by pumping water to high pressure.

Kwok explained how, when water travels over a surface, the ions that it is made up of "rub" against the solid, leaving the surface slightly charged. Although the power generated from a single channel is extremely small, millions of parallel channels can be used to increase the power output."

Check that shit out on wikipedia here!!!

It's a deal Al. I was thinking we could mount solar panels on it too, and we could use some of the solar energy to convert the electric energy into some sort of compressed energy wave we could beam down to earth.

"The ebbing salty water flowing past London's Waterloo Bridge interacts with the Earth's magnetic field to produce a potential difference between the two river-banks."

WHOOAAAA. The earth is ALREADY making it's own electric generators!!! That's FUCKED!

How bout you figure how to generate the electricity and I'll figure how to get it the fuck down to earth.

Quiet possible. You would need a way to transmit that energy however. Plus calculating your losses, how much money it would take to run it, etc., etc. Yep logistics kill everything.

WHOAAAA... speaking of magnets and sattelites, I just had an epiphany.

Imagine if the entire EARTH was your power generator, and you had a satellite rotating around it's magnetic field at a ridiculous speed... could that not generate "free" electricity???

Oh shit, I'm gonna be RICH when I sell this idea to NASA!!!

"What we have developed is a way to construct magnetic fields so that when you travel round the magnetic fields, starting and stopping at the same position, you have gained energy," McCarthy said.

Isn't that what your every-day basic turbine generating plant does? You know... rotating around magnetic fields to produce electricity? In fact, isn't that the same as your household gas-powered generator works? If they mean they'll just sew batteries into your clothes and place giant permanent magnets all along the sidewalks so that when you walk down the street you've essentially gained "free" energy... well then, that sounds kinda stupid.

But if they've come up with something that's actually ground-breaking... well then, they are fucking brazillianaires in the making. If this shit's legit, they will be the richest people to ever walk this planet.

I still say we set up giant solar-collecting sattelites and beam the power down to earth through microwave. I'm serious- that would solve a lot of problems. One 15-mile solar-collecting station could power New York City in its entirety (or the whole state of Connecticut). And that figure was based off of 1970s solar technology which is nowhere near as efficient as our current solar collecting models.