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I can't find any place that gives a number other than for a $10c$, 8 lightyear trip being something like 68 exajoules (off the top of my head, might be wrong). I'm sure the math would tell me this if I understood it, but what I'm looking for is determining energy consumption for a given distance and "speed" from at least $0c$ to $1000c$ and how much the size of the field affects the consumption.

I'd prefer a simple equation that I can input into Google Sheets, or write a small JavaScript program so that I can mess around with the variables to use for my purposes, but I don't know if that is possible.

What I am doing is designing star ships for a sci-fi universe and part of that requires storage capacity of fuel and such, and I'd like it to be relatively accurate.

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    $\begingroup$ I think your question is not so bad, it is a specific feature of this community that they unlike the - anyways mainstream -, but unconventional GR applications. The main, real problem of your question that the Alcubierre drive is a very theoretical thing and you want engineering calculations from that. It is like if you would want to calculate the effectively of nuclear reactors from the isotope masses. $\endgroup$
    – peterh
    Commented Jul 17, 2017 at 2:57
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    $\begingroup$ I've deleted some inappropriate comments and their responses - please take note that stuff like that shouldn't be posted. Remember to be nice. On the separate matter of the topicality of the question: the Alcubierre drive itself is an established research topic on which papers have been published and vetted, even though the drive itself doesn't exist. So I'm leaning toward this question being on topic here. $\endgroup$
    – David Z
    Commented Jul 17, 2017 at 3:13
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    $\begingroup$ Possible duplicate of How much Energy to create a 'warp field' according to White? $\endgroup$
    – StephenG - Help Ukraine
    Commented Jul 17, 2017 at 4:21
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    $\begingroup$ @David-Z It's not really on topic. How can it be : it's unanswerable. The OP wants data we can in no way work out. How much capacity does the fuel take up ?!?!? What's the fuel ? How efficient is it ? This is just wild guesswork, not physics. It's a sci-fi story, for heaven's sake. $\endgroup$
    – StephenG - Help Ukraine
    Commented Jul 17, 2017 at 5:34
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    $\begingroup$ White not e-mail Harold White? His e-mail address is on the paper if it's the one linked to in the earlier question. $\endgroup$
    – StephenG - Help Ukraine
    Commented Jul 17, 2017 at 7:02

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Here is a report of NASA research on the drive:

Last year, Sonny White revealed a new design (pictured top) for the Alcubierre drive that reduces the energy requirement from the total mass-energy of a planet the size of Jupiter, down to the mass-energy of Voyager-1 (700 kilograms). We say “mass-energy,” because no one quite knows how to fuel an Alcubierre drive, with some research suggesting that it might require more energy than the mass of the observable universe, or possibly negative amounts of energy. Basically, though, according to NASA’s preliminary research, the energy requirements appear to be somewhat feasible if the drive is doughnut shaped (like the image at the top of the story) rather than a flat disc.

This link talks about the economic cost:

the current cost of producing 1 gram of antimatter is about \$100 trillion. But, with completely unsupported optimistic estimates, you might get that down to \$10 billion per gram. So, with the most wild-eyed pie-in-the-sky estimates, fuel alone will cost you \$3.5 quadrillion — roughly the entire economic output of the world for forty years.

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  • $\begingroup$ I have this... I need to know how Speed, field size, duration effects energy consumption. Does a ship going 1c and 1ly take 80 times less energy? Is the longer it is active more efficient? If I putt the field around a 2 meter object does it take less energy than a 100 meter object? More? The same? This is what I'm trying to figure out... Also... the above doesn't provide the size of the field in the first place so it's not really useful by itself... $\endgroup$
    – Durakken
    Commented Jul 17, 2017 at 4:44
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well, in order to go 10c Harold white claims it requires 700 kg or 62.9 exajouls of energy for a a spaceship that is 10 meters long with a initial velocity of 0.1c he claims the equation to calculate the apparent velocity is Vini x Y = Vapa where Vini is initial velocity Y is the the higher dimensional boost field value and Vapa is apparent velocity so at 0.1c in order to go 10c you need a boost field value of 100 so 700 kg (62.9 EJ) = a boost value of 100 i dont know how to calculate for any other values the best i can give just use the the percentage like a boost field of 50 is 50% of the 100 so just divide 700 kg by 2 (or times by 0.5) but i am not sure if that would be accurate or not i also dont know how fast the energy density would be ossilating read these papers by harold white http://u2.lege.net/cetinbal/PDFdosya/AlcubierreWarpDriveSpacetime.pdf https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20110015936.pdf https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20130011213.pdf

i also recommend learning the math of general relativity

but again it is a Sci-Fi universe it doesn't need to mimic reality perfectly

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