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Re:Successful room temperature ambient-pressure magnetic lev... by htrp on Friday August 04, 2023 @09:42AM (#36999909)
Doesn't matter if you can cover all of the Sahara with panels and get near lossless transmission.

Economies of scale do apply.

Re:Successful room temperature ambient-pressure magnetic lev... by moffkalast on Friday August 04, 2023 @10:51AM (#37000834)
They apply to some degree, but it still takes X amount of materials to make each panel, you don't magically get more because you're making a continent worth of them. Even if you magically reduce the overhead 50% somehow, that's still only 18x which is not even close. Plus the fixed cost of making a laughably absurd amount of superconductor, and the monumenal logistics of deploying and maintaining all of it likely puts the project into net negative for a decade or two.

Saharan dust will also cover those panels in like a day. Probably makes more sense to float them on some body of water instead, with automatic washing and cooling?