>Kondratievian upswings. Total Material Requirement (TMR) of industrial
>economies continues to grow, despite so-called dematerialisation and
>virtualisation. No technologies seem to exist or be hidden deep in labs
>which can fundamentally reduces TMR's, or for that matter launch the
>world economy on a radically new, non-carbon, non-fossil energy path.
Well in terms of "dematerialization", George Gilder style, the microprocessor did allow the shrinking of the size of a room sized computer to that of a fingernail and thus enabled the achievement of a comparable reduction in power consumption. If there were now as many mainframe computers in offices and homes as there are PCs and programmable computers, the world's electrical grip would already be used up. It was by reducing its power usage to just a few watts from thousands (dematerialization) that the microprocessor has made the computer revolution possible.
But Mark is still right.
A single PC is a great conservation improvement over a single mainframe but in real life the old machines have been replaced by hundreds or even thousands of personal computers. Beyond the ordinary PC features we also have data communications, fax modem boards, and screen saver programs--though most computers are not turned off even during the 80% of the time they are not in use.
What began as a conservation movement has now become a major drain on the world's electrical power. The world's more than 200 million PCS already accounting for more than five percent of all commercial and industrial power usage, a ratio expected to grow by a percentage point per decade. According the EPA (1996 figures), PCS and peripherals already consume $2 billion worth of electricity each year--forcing power plants to annually produce as much carbon dioxide as 5 million automobiles. The EPA also estimated that for 30 percent to 40 percent of PCD users who left their computers on day and night the cost of electricity jumped to as high as $105 per year--compared to just $35 for 8 hours per day of computer use.
The govt has been pursuing the Green PC program to move from a 5 volt standard to a 3.3. volt power standard but have confronted the problem that as voltage drops, it becomes harder to distinguish between real signal and surrounding electrical noise.
The development of systems management software also allows the shutting down of circuits until the processor is needed.
Source: Michael Malone, The Microprocessor: A Biography, 1996 p. 117ff
rb