[quote=@Willy Vereb] Yeah, returning to the same would be impossible. Utilizing the same technology with a different allocation of materials? Absolutely. You seem to be under the impression that people in the post-apocalyptic world want Toyota cars. No, they just want cars. And again, future tech+ people in the Vaults literally spent decades to work out measures that can accomplish what they want with the limited resources. Microchips, for example. Did you know that CNT is so versatile you can pretty much forget all thoe fancy nanoparticles before? CNT can theoretically also be created by burning coal. Yes. Of course the actual solution would be more complex and I don't wager to tell the solution to something scientists with better qualifications than me are working on right now. Similarly, electric power. DMFC which is basically a battery converting methanol and oxygen for electricity. Sure, it'd require platina electrodes. Except it doesn't. Why? CNT. Efficiency can be a problem, too. Except CNT solves that. Dem three letters are good. Where do you get the tools to make these? Underground CNT fab. Like it or not to house hundreds of thousands of people you practically need to build an underground city. So why stop at the base requirements? Especially in case of sci-fi. And yeah, CNT is promised to work wonders in so many fields. The inner skeptic in me already tells that half of these would eventuall turn out to be sham. Regardless, this is sci-fi. This is fiction. As others said we aren't making a paper on theoretical development level of people 200 years after an apocalyptic war in 2080. We write a collective story. So get used to the pew-pew lasers and other technological elements. No, this does not destroy the setting. Again, Fallout is a longshot from the vision you depicted in your previous posts. [/quote] The problem with the CNT proposal is that though it might be possible: it's one of those things that aren't possible without rubber. And rubber isn't produced native in much of the world. You're not going to find rubber trees in Europe, North America, and synthetic rubber or poly-vinyl may not be on the list of things to produce in oil-producing regions (they might need to fuel their cars, lights, and basic electricity needs as well). And even without rubber you need to rely on some heavy engineering and incredibly low temperatures to pull argon gas from the air in cryogenic distillation. But then we come to the issue again that the requirements to meet may not be within reach of present societies. Rubber and vinyl deteriorates, cracks, and becomes brittle over time. I would know: I handle and deal with this stuff when it fails. Rubber and vinyl is the all important sealant for these processes. When they're over-used and gone then so does the product of this level of refinement. Producing the correct sort of CNTs requires sealed environments either totally free of oxygen or comprising an atmosphere of inert gases. Allowing this too all the same brings us to the point I made in response to Frengo. It shifts the story from relying on remnants to capable able-bodied nation-states, which at that point we would have already restored the pre-existing nations and it's not really post-apoc in the sort the GM appears to want anymore.