from March 2010 ABT

technical article

Engineering Advice Leads China to World Power National Status

China became an emperor-controlled government around the first century of our post-BC existence. This form of government, which did not effectively encourage engineer-led progress, ended when Japan conquered China at the beginning of World War II. Then a Russian-initiated Communist Party tried to take over the government by adopting communist principles, and the nation was on the verge of collapse. Then China’s leaders invited a team of four American engineers to come to China to give them advice on how they could recover that nation’s world-power status. The key advice was to get engineering universities started and produce graduate engineers who could help make government decisions that would raise the nation to world-power status. This advice was followed and subsequently China is today the world’s leader in developing and exporting electronic-based products.

Light-Emitting Diode Gives 100% Efficiency

Around 10 years ago I visited China to see the hydro-power developments that were taking place on the Yangtze River. I also visited the laboratory of an engineer who lived at the edge of the Himalayan Mountains in the western region of China. He demonstrated to me a light-emitting diode which produced light but did not deliver any sensible heat, like an incandescent lamp produces. Consequently, it is a 100% efficient light source in contrast to our everyday incandescent lamp bulbs. Factories that manufactured these lamps were built, and families in China were encouraged to reduce their electricity bills by adopting these lamps rather than filament lamps.

These lamps were available for exporting, but our petroleum industry effectively discouraged use of them in America because they could affect the consumption of petroleum in our electricity-producing power plants. In other nations light-emitting diode lamps are available in stores.

Electric-Propelled Vehicles in Wide Use

In America, vehicles propelled by petroleum products are effectively promoted and are in wide use. They have around 40% efficiency in delivering the consumed petroleum energy in propelling the vehicle and dissipating the rest of the energy in heating our atmosphere with heat supplied by radiators, exhaust gases, and air that circulates through the car. A battery-powered electric car can deliver 80% of its consumed energy in propelling the car. However, use of electric cars is not encouraged. For example, the California legislature once passed a law requiring a fleet of electric cars to be hauled to a mountain site and be smashed.

In comparison, China minimizes its petroleum consumption by enabling people to travel by other means. Electric cars that are propelled by battery power are being manufactured and are available to buyers. They even have battery-powered cars that carry an engine which can propel the car after the battery energy is exhausted after around 50 miles of travel. Now available are electric bicycles that can travel 30 miles before the storage battery’s energy is exhausted and riders have to deliver propulsion power with their leg muscles. Chinese engineers have even developed roller skates powered with motors that get energy from a battery carried by the traveler in a back sack.

When the Chesworths bought ABT in 1995 from its editor of 30 years, Henry Oman came with it to provide articles and meeting reports from time to time. A 1940 honors graduate of Oregon State University, he worked six years for Allis-Chalmers, then 43 years for Boeing in Seattle, retiring in 1991 at age 73.

For Boeing he worked on electric power projects ranging from deep underground missile bases to Mars-bound spacecraft. His specialty was application of systems engineering in solving power and energy problems that earned him two patents. He is a former editor of the IEEE Aerospace and Electronic Systems magazine and he wrote the Energy Systems Engineering Handbook published by Prentice-Hall. He is a Fellow of the IEEE and an Associate Fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. He also is listed in Who’s Who in Science and Who’s Who in the World.

A widower at age 36, he married his second wife, Earlene, in 1954. They have two daughters, one a schoolteacher, the other a civil engineer in Alaska, and a son who works for Boeing in St. Louis. Henry swims three days a week and has a collection of cars that includes a 1957 Chevrolet and four 1968 Volkswagens: a squareback, a fastback and two Bugs which he and his son have periodically dismantled, cleaned and put back together. Henry will turn 92 in August.