I realize the title of this thread seems weird. I was thinking about this topic after reading a few articles on what might happen in a decade with the coming advent of the electric vehicle.
For those not familiar, the thought is that the electric car might do to the combustion engine what the digital camera did to film. Once the technology matures enough and the costs come down, there might be a very, very sudden shift. Yes, there have been electric cars in the past and are now, but for a myriad of reasons they haven't proliferated. The biggest reason is the battery.
Yes, electric cars have fewer moving parts. That is a big plus, but even without the fancy on-board computers, you still contend with battery capacity, cycles of recharging, and cost. We are seeing not only dramatic improvements in lithium tech, but also the potential in alkaline batteries. However, we still have a bit of a ways to go, and it is clear that this involves a very complicated interplay of materials, arrangement inside the battery, and high-tech factories that won't cause a fire. But we are getting there soon.
Internal combustion engines, however, will probably still reign supreme in power output for a long time to come. ICE vehicles won't go away just yet -- if ever. But how does this apply to BattleTech? Why overthink this?
As the developers have changed over the years what technology is in our universe, I was wondering why most vehicles in the Inner Sphere wouldn't just be electric (fusion) rather than so many having combustion engines. I mean, if the electric cars have fewer moving parts and we are getting good battery tech now, it would be nice to have a reason for the prevalence of ICE in our universe other than that is what the writers decided 30 years ago.
And I recognize that this might be a bit of a silly exercise -- I mean, who cares, right? But bear with me because I feel this kind of sums up BattleTech and gets to the whole tech disparity thing.
Making batteries involves a lot of technical processes. It involves factories and a knowledge base and access to materials that aren't that easy to come by. It is easy to see how the Succession wars could upend all of that and crush industries. We are where we are now because of improvements over the past century. Microchips are in the same ballpark: if we suddenly lost all the microchip factories, how do you start over?
But the internal combustion engine? All you need is a lathe, die making, casting abilities, and access to decent metals. That is a much lower barrier to entry. And while getting good at those skills involved is not easy, it doesn't involve fragile technology to just get started. Suddenly you can rebuild the world with simple tools. Then just get a generator/alternator and a primitive battery and you are good to go for your electricity.
And that is my little thought exercise about why even with the simple chemistry of the battery, the combustion engine doesn't just disappear in our war-torn universe.