The far-off fusion race

steve smyth — Fri, 02 May 2008 23:16:35 GMT

Great stuff...but way down a slippery slope.
For a good way to get through until it's ready...click my name below...learn, feel empowered, and have a grin along the way...it works!
No Foolin'!

The far-off fusion race

John, California — Fri, 02 May 2008 23:38:10 GMT

Is a He3 electrostatic fusion reaction aneutronic?

The far-off fusion race

Alan Boyle — Fri, 02 May 2008 23:47:27 GMT

I wanted to add a little bit about private investment in fusion projects, which you hear about from time to time. Here's what Kulcinski had to say about that when I asked him:

Kulcinski: "There's more activity with private funds than I've seen, probably ever in the fusion business. ... There's at least three groups that I know of where they're getting private money, no government money involved.

"What are their chances? Hard to tell, but at least they're not bound by government research. They can study what they want, to get something developed. I think there's a chance - there's as good a chance if not better of developing a commercial product through private money as there is with federal money."

Q: Are the private groups focusing on electrostatic fusion?

A: "No. Well, one is. The others are focusing on other magnetic devices, but not tokamaks. It's interesting: All the private money is in things that are not the mainline approach."

I asked Kulcinski to be more specific, but he declined to go into detail.

The far-off fusion race

Alan Boyle — Fri, 02 May 2008 23:55:59 GMT

Dear John: Yes, helium-3 reactions are theoretically aneutronic. There's a catch, though. With the deuterium-helium-3 reaction, Kulcinski said that there were some side D-T reactions that would give off neutrons. One of the articles I linked to ("grave doubts") was skeptical about the whole idea of using helium-3 for that reason.

Kulcinski really likes the He3-He3 reaction, which would yield two protons and regular Helium-4.

For those who wonder what the heck we're talking about, here's an article about aneutronic fusion reactions:

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1200/is_v132/ai_5223007

The far-off fusion race

Craig, Netherlands — Sat, 03 May 2008 01:06:06 GMT

There are always side reactions to produce some level of radiation, even with He3-He3. However, it is important to look into the assumptions people make when they deride fusion in general.

The difference between inertial approaches and magnetic confinement is fundamental. Most of the problems with Tokamak type fusion come from the fact that the particle speeds are spread out - only the fastest few percent have a chance of fusion, and the rest are just getting knocked around until they hit a wall.

For inertial approaches (both laser and electrostatic), the ions are all accelerated to a single speed, which means you have a lot more control over what comes out, and you waste a lot less energy. So, the whole cry about how D-He3 mixes are essentially D-D/D-T reactors (with their neutrons) is true in magnetic confinement, but much less of a problem in inertial confinement. You can almost "tune" the reaction to whatever level of neutron flux you want - high for medical isotope creation, low for power generation.

The other issue is the type of radiation. While neutrons are almost impossible to stop and they contaminate the vessels that do stop them; alpha radiation is just helium ions - which is the "ash" of He3/He3 reactions. Gamma radiation is also produced, but this is also more easily controlled and its spectrum is tunable as well.

The far-off fusion race

John Christensen — Sat, 03 May 2008 01:12:05 GMT

I'm not sure it's a worthy goal. Spending a lot of dollars on fusion research dosn't make a lot of sense to me.
If we learn to use resources more wisely and make full use of the naturally occurring energy sources around us, I'm sure we can live perfectly comfortable and happy lives.

The far-off fusion race

Thomas Ashby, Calgary — Sat, 03 May 2008 01:39:23 GMT

Fascinating.

The far-off fusion race

Bill Nunamaker — Sat, 03 May 2008 02:49:45 GMT

This is response to John C's comment. Although I do agree somewhat with what you're saying, it does seem a little short-sighted. I agree that we should manage and use our current resources as wisely as possible, but we still need to place a large portion of our (pardon the pun) "energies" towards creating a sustainable alternative energy source.

The far-off fusion race

Andrew, Simi Valley, California — Sat, 03 May 2008 03:48:47 GMT

Though conservation and efficiency have worthy short term effects, the eventual availability of vast amounts of "clean" energy from multiple sources has too many critical benefits to ignore. Providing individuals and industry with highly availible power, in quanities far greater than are availible today, is a worthy goal. Several reasons apply.

New technologies contiue to emerge, enabling everything from efficient water purification to the restructuring of basic material properties. These advances may give future generations the ability to recycle materials and feed populations in ways we can barely imagine today. One element that will be absolutely required if we are to enable thier deployment on a wide scale is abundant, economical energy. This fundemental need lies at the base of the pyramid of all humakind's technological capabilities.

In the real world, nine or ten billion people will never conserve enough to stabilize the planet to the degree needed. Advancements in medical science and global healthcare may also add decades to the average lifespan in a few generations. Technically based solutions to sustaining a clean, balanaced and comforatble world are the only viable path available. The road to a prosperous and healthy furture must be fundementally paved with clean and adundant power.

Fusion may play a key role, and needs more of our attention. No matter on a nationalistic or global scale, energy equals quality of life. There is simply no way around it.

The far-off fusion race

BC, Dayton OH — Sat, 03 May 2008 05:31:16 GMT

I can tell you as a true insider, there are big things on the horizon...very big...and we're not talking 20-30, we're talking 5-10...and yes, inertial glide is key. aneutronic is basics while cqytronic ( next up level of quantum phys) is next step and tolkomac's will be thought of quite differently...as in a silica bottle containment effect...it's time for change in this world...in this present carbon footdance, we all will be breathing solids...best we develope gills...

The far-off fusion race

Jim Beal, Madison, WI — Sat, 03 May 2008 05:38:18 GMT

I would argue that there is nothing more "naturally occurring" than the energy of the sun. We need to fully understand our fundamental energy source.
Ignorance will make us forever uncomfortable.

The far-off fusion race

Marty Lynch, Daytona Beach, Florida — Sat, 03 May 2008 05:48:27 GMT

To me it is so refreshing to see that really smart people are utilizing the elements (pun intended) around us to solve our energy problems. Our species has been given the ability to look around and find solutions. I suspect fossil fuels will be as antiquated as a club. In the big picture even fusion, by what ever method (even on the back of a Delorean hehe) it is achieved, will be a stepping stone to an even greater energy source. The entire universe is composed of energy and so it is up to us to develop ways of accessing it. I think Maxwell had it right. Naturally occuring energy sources don't always need a match to touch it off.

The far-off fusion race

Heath Hooper, Aiea, Hawaii — Sat, 03 May 2008 07:34:58 GMT

Fusion power seems like an ideal large-scale energy solution, as it solves the problems on how to power the hydrogen economy and is the ultimate clean energy solution. I feel we should try to focus on fusion technologies for large-scale power generation and hydrogen for mobile applications. As far as neutronics is concerned, we have been designing pressurized water fission reactors for 60 years that take into account the fast-neutron embrittlement effects on core materials all the way through core life, so i don't see any reason why it would be more difficult with fusion... a neutron flux doesn't really contaminate metal, it just makes it stronger and more brittle (aside from some capture gamma's and whatnot.)

The far-off fusion race

Duncan Renaldo, Seattle, Washington — Sat, 03 May 2008 08:46:37 GMT

Fusion will secure the future of the human race. Besides eliminating material scarcity, life off the grid will have an unprecedented impact on societies and culture, all for the better.

The far-off fusion race

Keegan, Brisbane Australia — Sat, 03 May 2008 11:34:33 GMT

I would put my money on EMC2's Polywell, Non Maxwellian, Anuetronic, Inertialy electrostatically confined fusion system.

Thanks to its unique design and incredible power density calculated to be 65000 times that of the Tokamak it would run of other NEUTRON FREE reactions whose elements can be commonly found on Earth.

p + B11 -> 3H4 + 8.6MEV. (hydrogen + boron -> 3 Heliums)

The far-off fusion race

Roy Fritz Butt, Mt — Sat, 03 May 2008 12:21:32 GMT

It is nice that we are developing different uses for what is left of our naturel recources but wouldn't it be better to develope energy from from our industrial wastes we are making now. Rather than polute our earth with more things that we do not know how to control or clean up so we can live. We cannot even get rid of our waste from our reactors as it is.

The far-off fusion race

Allyn Smith, Grand Rapids, Michigan — Sat, 03 May 2008 12:39:08 GMT

Writing as a non-scientist, it seems to me there must be a better way to create the energy we need. The current method of using heat(by nuclear,coal,gas,ect..to turn water to steam) to turn a generator seems to me to be an antiquated, inefficient and expensive way to go about it.
Solar power (to some type of a device to some type of battery) would be much cleaner, efficient and inexpensive.

The far-off fusion race

RIck, Simi Valley CA — Sat, 03 May 2008 15:00:20 GMT

Decreased funding for all levels of science has been the status quo for the last seven years. It's political, driven by certain fanatics.

The far-off fusion race

fpl — Sat, 03 May 2008 16:09:35 GMT

The earth itself is one big electric generator….all you need is too learn how to tap into it…you can see it with lighting strikes…do you know how many strike every second 24/7 around the world…do you know how much energy that it produces…why not build power stations that capture that energy by producing a artificial stream from the air itself 24/7...all you need is a few high bi-metal poles to induce lighting.

The far-off fusion race

TallDave — Sat, 03 May 2008 17:06:03 GMT

Alan,

Thanks for the update on EMC2 from Nebel. Great to hear they're up to high power now. Can't wait to see results!

Regarding VC money:

Tri-Alpha (you can Google them) received ~$40M from a Paul Allen VC fund, for developement of CBFR (colliding beam fusion reactor) technology, which like IEC is a nonthermal device, a year or two ago. They claimed to be "more than 5, but less than 15" years from commercial tech. Drs. Rostoker and Monkhorst are in the lead, if memory serves.

Here's an interesting (very technical) argument they had with Nevins and Carlson about CBFR feasibility.

http://science-mag.aaas.org/cgi/content/full/281/5375/307a

Tri-Alpha's got the biggest VC funding I'm aware of. From their name, I bet you can guess which fusion reaction they're aiming for!

The far-off fusion race

Tim Emery Quanah,TX — Sat, 03 May 2008 20:00:20 GMT

This makes sense to me. With graduate courses in chemistry and physics, from New Mexico Tech, Socorro,NM, I understand the broad generality andleave it up to the experts to develop this technology.

I feel that the current oil,gas and coal industries have not invested in this research because they all derivetheir income from fossil fuels.

With the advent of nuclear fusion, you could have electric-powered transportation and fuel for our homes without contributing to global warming.

Thissoundspromising to power our earth for my children and all future generations.

The far-off fusion race

bob ierley — Sat, 03 May 2008 21:46:49 GMT

why no mention of the Princeton Plasma Physics Lab which has had a Tokamak for many years? Anything current going on there?

The far-off fusion race

Michael Walsh, traveling — Sat, 03 May 2008 22:33:22 GMT

Lovely comments.

AND.

The future will look so entirely unexpected that even the most dire realistic projections are weak.

I will offer but two examples.

Blast furnaces and concrete plants both use enormous amounts of fossil fuel. Your future will not include them.

Oxygen. Model A Fords have to be re-jetted to run on today's oxygen-depleted air. For all the talk of CO2 increase, we have yet to even contemplate from where we get that O2! For every carbon molecule, TWO of oxygen are being "used."

"Naturally-occurring" energy resources? Without steel, what turbine tower will you build? Without all that concrete, what Hoover Damn will you build? Without the steel and metals in the system, how will you distribute energy?

I hate to say this, but by 2100, I don't expect even our best tech can "succeed" without astounding die-off of the Earth's human population(s). And even that will be based on what was created back when fossil-fueling was extant.

I know this will never be, but I'd love to see ALL such talk defined in "our generation" or one hundred years, at least. The bare difference between those two is more radical than our immediate foresee-able changes. We won't even see this other stuff, we'll be overwhelmed by the bare economic consequences of the mere beginning of the changes . . .

The far-off fusion race

Delmar Fairchild, Barron, WI — Sat, 03 May 2008 22:40:20 GMT

Somewhere in the confines of the web, I read an article, I think,by a guy the name of Ruddy?, who suggested we declare war on oil. Not the countries, not the companies, but just the energy source. That would be a start to getting a clean alternative fuel.
All we need is someone like John McCain on board when he becomes POTUS to get us there. He is radical enough for all democrats, independants and those of us republicans that want to save the Earth from our own destruction. Remember the ZPG of the early 70s. It won't be long now that we will have double our Earth's population. It is about time we start or forever remember the holocaust mankind had set upon himself. I certainly won't be around to see it, but I fear for my children and grandchildren.

The far-off fusion race

Anonymous — Sun, 04 May 2008 00:04:10 GMT

I have previously written in a letter in 2006:

"The Manhattanizing of the search for fusion power.

I now would like to mention some different approaches for the search for fusion power, these are: different Tokamak fusion reactoors for controlled thermonuclear fusion in U.S., the U.K. Culham Laboratory, Russia, Japan, the Sherwood Project at LANL, direct fusion at LANL, Magnetized Target Fusion (MTF) at LANL, Inertial Confinement Fusion (ICF) at LANL, National Ignition Facility (NIF) at LLNL, magnetic fusion, laser fusion, bubble fusion, cold fusion, research by SNL, research by General Atomics, crystal fusion at UCLA, research at UC Berkeley, collaboration between ORNL and Princeton University, research at Harvard University, research at MIT, Fusion Science Centers at University of Maryland, UCLA, and University of Rochester, Evidence for Nuclear Emissions During Acoustic Cavitation, and the current ITER Project under construction, where also Department of Energy participate.

This list almost alone shows the lack of true scientific leadership, that are the lack of Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer and Gen. Leslie R. Groves, or in shorter words, the need to Manhattanize the search for fusion power."

(My answer was a response to this: "I do not belive that "Manhattanizing" the search for controlled thermonuclear fusion would be productive. The Manhattan project was very special in that it responded to a serious threat to U.S. security. Our country has never been able to translate that type of urgency to energy matters - regardless of how important these may be to our future well being and security.")

The far-off fusion race

Dennis Horning Laramie, WY — Sun, 04 May 2008 00:21:17 GMT

Is this physics pork barrel funding? Fusion happens continually within the depths of stars where the hydrostatic pressure is adequate to at least briefly press two ion/molecules very close together. Here on earth we imitate that process sort of randomly with intermittent very high speed collisions of those particles in one very narrow path. This process lacks the pressure tensor confinement for particles that exists within stars. As things heat up from a miniscule amount of fusion (in a lab) the likelihood of knowing where anything is decreases. Collisions are necessary to make this work but the situation is far different than shooting a missile out of the sky with a guided missile. Can a lab/collider produce enough intermittent collisions to put out the heat of a power plant? So far these colliders consume huge amounts of power at night to produce an occasional collision. This project sounds like "test your dreams"--Where is the statistical 3-d computer collision model to put an upper and lower bound on the likelyhood of such dreams ever working/ succeeding?

The far-off fusion race

Dennis Horning, Larmie, WY. — Sun, 04 May 2008 00:27:24 GMT

Is this physics pork barrel funding? Fusion happens continually within the depths of stars where the hydrostatic pressure is adequate to at least briefly press two ion/molecules very close together. Here on earth we imitate that process sort of randomly with intermittent very high speed collisions of those particles in one very narrow path. This process lacks the pressure tensor confinement for particles that exists within stars. As things heat up from a miniscule amount of fusion (in a lab) the likelihood of knowing where anything is decreases. Collisions are necessary to make this work but the situation is far different than shooting a missile out of the sky with a guided missile. Can a lab/collider produce enough intermittent collisions to put out the heat of a power plant? So far these colliders get huge amounts of power at night to produce an occasional collision. This project sounds like “test your dreams”. Where is the statistical 3-D collision model to put an upper and lower bound on the likelihood of these dreams ever succeeding/working?

The far-off fusion race

J. Quinlan — Sun, 04 May 2008 00:31:22 GMT

Fusion power is a source of energy that we desperately need to keep this planet viable for life. I am sure that with the proper resources, the scientists will find the answers. The only really big problem that I see down the road is the fact that the Electric Transmission and Distribution systems in this country are in as bad shape, or worse, than the roads and bridges. You can have all the available, cheap electric power you could possibly produce but the system to transmit it is in pretty poor condition! That is a fact of which I am personally aware of after working in the Electric Utility business for almost 35 years. I own a generator. What does that tell you.

The far-off fusion race

DKB Venice, Florida — Sun, 04 May 2008 01:11:38 GMT

Ah yes...energy.
So far I've not seen or heard anyone get 'it' right.
Seems the brightest minds are stuck in the stone age. Blindness? Lack of imagination?
All forms of combustion cause carbonation of one form or another. Within that mix is the problem of conversion, better known as efficiency. Average so far NADA...yup, not many of these ancient ideas work very well.
If anyone might be interested, there are several ways to 'capture' energy for just about any use.
All of those too far out Sci Fi applications do have some relevance here... Real? No less than the anomolies noted by those who fathered electronics but who refused to accept their own findings.
Too bad that the governments are too busy looking for better weapons and killing those who have made viable alternatives real. Oh yeah! Several have been blatantly murdered by those who are baught by present energy concerns!
Then the other problem of wondering if present humanity is worth the trouble of saving, hmmm?
NASA was offered some new technology and the result was a tirade from the director...imagine that?
So here it is: I'm offering technology that is very advanced in comparison to the present. It will require a load of money, bullet proof people and lab, and a place chosen by me.
Interested parties can get my email address from this site.
This is IF anyone out there would be interested in real space travel, exploration, and viabilities.
The craft is such that it is primarily solid state, requires no fuel imput, and has Star Trek capabilities. Same as I offered NASA.
So all you geniuses think it over and any rich ones get in touch.
Enjoy

The far-off fusion race

Creighton Anderson, Wilmington, DE — Sun, 04 May 2008 01:17:27 GMT

I think China will eventually reclaim it's title as the greatest economy and civilization, partly because of how it handles research into "far-off" life-altering technologies such as fusion power. Once they are in Americas position in terms of GDP, they will dedicate 10 times as much money to fusion, robotics, and drug/genetics research. They've learned what happens when a civilization falls behind in technology, given that the past 2 centuries they've been at the mercy of the West. I would be surprised if the Chinese don't have a secret, well-funded fusion program underway. The benefits in terms of a fusion torch, abundant autonomous energy, and a compact energy source for space vehicles will entice Chinese government leaders. We've already seen how willing they are to construct the mega hydroelectric dam at the three Gorges River for a huge sum of money and effort. Too bad America isn't spending more on fusion. We spend 50 times more money on soda beverages compared to fusion research. So sad.

The far-off fusion race

Ed Joyce — Sun, 04 May 2008 02:45:33 GMT

I seem to recall reading an article by Isaac Asimov about energy and the promise of fusion power in "Boys Life". I was 14 years old at the time and the year was 1973 and America was going through our first energy crisis. Certainly fusion sounded great -- clean, radiation free energy from an unlimited source of fuel. We only had work on it (and fund it) for 25 years for it to come true. Then when 1998 rolled around we were told, more money, more work and maybe 25 years from now and all our problems will be solved. Now it's 2008 and we're told we need more funds and more time and maybe in 2038 fusion energy will be a reality. Isn't it time to try a new tack?

The far-off fusion race

John — Sun, 04 May 2008 03:01:08 GMT

I support the research, but this was "far off" when I first read about it 15-20 years ago, so I am not going to make any plans or get excited just yet.

The far-off fusion race

Anonymous — Sun, 04 May 2008 05:17:17 GMT

Dr. Ruggero Maria Santilli of Institute for Basic Research at Palm Harbor, FL writes in //arxiv.org/abs/physics/0602125:

Title: The Novel "Controlled Intermediate Nuclear Fusion" and its Possible Industrial Realization as Predicted by Hadronic Mechanics and Chemistry

Authors: Ruggero Maria Santilli
Submitted on 17 Feb 2006

Abstract: In this note, we propose, apparrently for the first time, a new type of controlled nuclear fusion called "intermediate" because occuring at energies intermediate between those of the "cold" and "hot" fusions, and propose a specific industrial realization. For this purpose: 1) We show that known limitations of quantum mechanics, quantum chemistry and special relativity cause excessive departures from the conditions occuring for all controlled fusions; 2) We outline the covering hadronic mechanics, hadronic chemistry and isorelativity specifically conceived, constructed and verified during the past two decades for new cleans energies and fuels; 3) We identify seven physical laws predicted by the latter disciplines that have to be verified by all controlled nuclear fusions to occur; 4) We review the industrial research conducted to date in the selection of the most promising engineering realization as well as optimization of said seven laws; and 5) We propose with construction details a specific hadronic reactor (patented and international patents pending), consisting of actual equipment specifically intended for the possible industrial production of the clean energy released by representative cases of controlled intermediate fusions for independent scrutinity by interested colleagues.

Comments: 32 pages, 5 figures. Journal of Applied Sciences, in press
Subjects: General Physics (physics.gen-ph)
Report number: IBR-TP-09-05
Cite as: arXiv:physics/0602125v1 [physics.gen-ph]

/---/

Santilli´s laws for Controlled Nuclear Fusions, in short summary:

LAW 1: CNF [Controlled Nuclear Fusions] must verify the conservation of the energy.

LAW 2: The most probable CNF are those occuring under the conservation of the angular momentum.

LAW 3: CNF only occur for nuclei with compatible spins given by the "planar singlet coupling" or the "axial triplet coupling" of Figure 3.

LAW 4: The most probable CNF are those occuring at threshold energies (namely, at the minimum value of the energies of the constituents needed to verify LAW 1).

LAW 5: The most probable CNF are those without the release of massive particles (such as protons, neutrons and electrons).

LAW 6: A necessary condition for CNF to occur is to control the peripheral atomic electrons in such a way to allow nuclei to be exposed.

LAW 7: CNF cannot occur without a trigger (that is, an external mechanism forcing exposed nuclei through the hadronic horizon).

This "Controlled Intermediate Nuclear Fusion," as outlined by Dr Santilli, achieving any momentum today, May 2008?

The far-off fusion race

Dave, Dayton, OH — Sun, 04 May 2008 05:20:34 GMT

Wow...nothing like a topic on future energy to get the crackpots coming out of the woodwork.

The far-off fusion race

Elizabeth Hensley <>< 8-) — Sun, 04 May 2008 06:19:33 GMT

Fusion no doubt will be needed when (not if) we go to the stars.But we desperately need solutions NOW not in the future. The new way of making solar panels has made it cheaper than coal. I read they are so cheap it is even economically feasible to use solar power in England. Yes! England! For the time being we need to take most of the fusion research money and spend it on putting REAL solar panels on REAL people's roofs, until we don't need any more mercury spewing coal power plants. (Autism rates are already much too high), or nuclear power plants which would only be safe if we were a more moral and less angry species with no interest in making dirty bombs from nuclear waste. We need to get the price of electricity down NOW, not ten or so years in the future, so real people aren't really hurting. This will help the economy recover. Once we aren't hurting so badly, there will be much more resources to spend on all sorts of absolutely wonderful research to make the future an even more wonderful place, including fusion research. Because we can't use solar power out in deep outer space, we will need fusion, but lets use what we already have, now.

The far-off fusion race

John Drake, Los Angeles, CA — Sun, 04 May 2008 06:29:46 GMT

Fusion power is another one of those pipe dreams we're asked to dump endless billions of dollars of taxpayer money into, with no returns.

We know what conditions fusion occurs under naturally - in stars like our sun. Instead of wasting more money trying to replicate those conditions here on earth (good luck!), we should be spending that money on harnessing the power of our sun. We already have a great big fusion reactor.

If the government had spent as much money on solar power research and development as it has wasted on fusion power, we'd already be deriving 25% or more of our electrical power from the sun.

If you want to spend taxpayer dollars on speculative research, spend it developing carbon nanotube-based structures. If we could make carbon nanotube ribbons we could build space elevators and haul enough solar panels into orbit to provide 100% of our power needs.

The far-off fusion race

Joe Shmoe — Sun, 04 May 2008 08:45:02 GMT

This looks like just one more techno-money-pit to me.

The far-off fusion race

Jason Isaacs, Carlsbad, CA — Sun, 04 May 2008 10:06:31 GMT

(for a little levity)

I'm still hoping we get the "Mr. Fusion" device in the next few years. You know... the thing that powered Dr. Emmett Smith's flying-car-time-machine from 2015 in the "Back to the Future" movies.

(levity aside)
In a layman's seriousness (honest wondering with no data)... If we take currenly cold matter on Earth (Hydrogen, Deuterium, Helium, etc...) and turn it into heat/energy are we not then contributing to overall warming? Is the efficiency of fussion enough to offset the warming caused by carbon emissions? Or am I totally off base? Again, I'm just wondering, not challenging anyone to a debate.

The far-off fusion race

Jeff — Sun, 04 May 2008 10:07:52 GMT

JD, my thoughts exactly, they could set up a solar collector in space and beam the energy down using a laser.

But, cheap solar power on the ground is where we, the common man, would like things to go. I want a solar panel that would take me off grid...forever, NANOSolar claims they are close to making solar cheap, $1/watt cheap. I can afford $3000 for a solar panel.

Why are we not embracing Solar power fully? Because you can not control the masses with it.

The far-off fusion race

e=vpe — Sun, 04 May 2008 15:56:28 GMT

We need too think outside the enevolope..

The Casimir effect is one of several phenomena that provide convincing evidence for the reality of the quantum vacuum – the equivalent in quantum mechanics of what, in classical physics, would be described as empty space. It has been linked to the possibility of faster-than-light travel.

According to modern physics, a vacuum is full of fluctuating electromagnetic waves of all possible wavelengths which imbue it with a vast amount of energy, normally invisible to us. Casimir realized that between two plates, only those unseen electromagnetic waves whose wavelengths fit a whole number of times into the gap should be counted when calculating the vacuum energy. As the gap between the plates is narrowed, fewer waves can contribute to the vacuum energy and so the energy density between the plates falls below the energy density of the surrounding space. The result is a tiny force trying to pull the plates together – a force that has been measured and thus provides proof of the existence of the quantum vacuum.

Casimir effect and propulsion

This may be relevant to space travel because the region inside a Casimir cavity has negative energy density. Zero energy density, by definition, is the energy density of normal " empty space." Since the energy density between the conductors of a Casimir cavity is less than normal, it must be negative. Regions of negative energy density are thought to be essential to a number of hypothetical faster-than-light propulsion schemes, including stable wormholes and the Alcubierre warp drive.

There is another interesting possibility for breaking the light-barrier by an extension of the Casimir effect. Light in normal empty space is " slowed" by interactions with the unseen waves or particles with which the quantum vacuum seethes. But within the energy-depleted region of a Casimir cavity, light should travel slightly faster because there are fewer obstacles. A few years ago, K. Scharnhorst of the Alexander von Humboldt University in Berlin published calculations4 showing that, under the right conditions, light can be induced to break the usual light-speed barrier. Under normal laboratory conditions this increase in speed is incredibly small, but future technology may afford ways of producing a much greater Casimir effect in which light can travel much faster. If so, it might be possible to surround a space vehicle with a " bubble" of highly energy-depleted vacuum, in which the spacecraft could travel at FTL velocities, carrying the bubble along with it.

The far-off fusion race

Thomas Ashby, Calgary — Sun, 04 May 2008 17:01:25 GMT

Solar cell energy production is well illustrated here in terms of research. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:PVeff%28rev110707%29d.jpg

Whats going to happen in the next 20-30 years as they struggle with fusion research? We have got to just use less energy. We have got to sit down and take a real inventory of what we really need. This gluttonous attitude to energy consumption has to stop.

The far-off fusion race

Tomas King, Boston, MA — Sun, 04 May 2008 17:51:57 GMT

Didn't anyone see Spiderman 2? Fusion power is mentioned in that movie. They start up a reaction and it turns people into psychotic killers (the octopus guy in the movie). Why would we build such a device??? Can't we spend more money building electric plug-in cars? Then we wouldn't need to use anymore gas, we'd just plug our cars into the wall and get all the energy we need from the power company! It's a lot cheaper too, electricity only costs about 60 cents per gallon of energy.

The far-off fusion race

a p garcia — Sun, 04 May 2008 18:23:12 GMT

I knew that the US would loose it lead when the "Supercolider" was to in Europe instead of the US. To add insult to injury Europe lobbied the US legislators to put it in Europe and the greatest insult of all is US legislators listened!

The far-off fusion race

Frank Glover rochester, NY — Sun, 04 May 2008 18:26:25 GMT

To John:
"Is a He3 electrostatic fusion reaction aneutronic?"

Yes and no. There will be some side Deuterium-Deuterium reactions. And it's not the preferred (though it would be the easier) reaction, anyway:

http://www.fusor.net/newbie/files/Ligon-QED-IE.pdf

To John C.:
"I'm not sure it's a worthy goal. Spending a lot of dollars on fusion research dosn't make a lot of sense to me.
If we learn to use resources more wisely and make full use of the naturally occurring energy sources around us, I'm sure we can live perfectly comfortable and happy lives."

The problem is, some of the 'naturally occuring energy sources' (that is, fossil fuels) are also CO2 sources. And when we try to get away from those, as we eventually must, even if only because they're finite, is when things get difficult.

To Dave:
"Wow...nothing like a topic on future energy to get the crackpots coming out of the woodwork."

(shrug) There's room for crackpotism in any subject. That doesn't make them any less worthy of disucussion...

To Delmar:
"...who suggested we declare war on oil. Not the countries, not the companies, but just the energy source. That would be a start to getting a clean alternative fuel."

The 'war' (for example, Nixon's 'War on Cancer,' Johnson's 'War on Poverty') metaphor is overly used, and doesn't apply well. For one thing, how do you even define winning? And in some issues (like energy) there are counter interests (from those who would protect the status quo as long as possible, to those who want resources diverted to *their* alternative instead) that you have to contend with, that don't usually (but not always) exist in a literal war.

To John D:
"We know what conditions fusion occurs under naturally - in stars like our sun. Instead of wasting more money trying to replicate those conditions here on earth (good luck!), we should be spending that money on harnessing the power of our sun. We already have a great big fusion reactor."

And by the time it crosses 93 million miles to get here and is filtered by our atmosphere (for which we can be thankful, BTW, and even then, watch your exposure!) it's very diffuse light. A respectable amount of real estate has to be taken out of other possible service to capture it, and then there's the effencicy with which you can do so. Conventional and nuclear (including fusion) power plants don't care about weather, either. Places with the most sun (deserts) tend not to be where the users of power are.

Understand, I'm all for making the best use of solar. Indeed, I'm very big on photovoltaics. But I know the limits, too. Which leads me to...

"If you want to spend taxpayer dollars on speculative research, spend it developing carbon nanotube-based structures. If we could make carbon nanotube ribbons we could build space elevators and haul enough solar panels into orbit to provide 100% of our power needs."

I'm not convinced of the practicality of that. Think of a space elevator as an *extremely* long version of the tunnel beneath the English Channel, with only *one* set of tracks. Yes it could be very efficent (just as seel wheels on steel rails are), but how much material can you actually move on it in a given period of time? What about downmass? How do cars pass? On railroads, there tend to be many stops and sidings. A space elevator isn't yery useful for anything but the surface and the center point at geostationary orbit. Getting off anywhere else leaves you at something less than orbital velocity for that altitude. (what if the first US transcontinental railroad could have only one train at a time, anywhere between Kansas City and the Pacific coast?) With all that, how long will it take to pay for itself?

And then there's orbital debris issues...

Still, because there are *many* interests in developing nanotube materials other than that application (espically for *any* kind of flying machine, from private planes to spaceships where structural weight always matters) expect a lot of money to be spent on that research and development, anyway.

But if we want powersats, and if they're practical (the real estate and weather issues I referred to, are not issues in space), expect them to be launched on re-useable rocket systems. (for which there are *also* many other uses and markets)

The far-off fusion race

Vladimir Enlow, Nashville, TN, USA — Sun, 04 May 2008 20:31:01 GMT

To Ed Joyce:

The problem is that by and large people WEREN'T working on it and WEREN'T funding, not at the levels necessary to make it happen within the projected time frame--and they still aren't, even as fusion promises to be our best hedge against depletion of the world's petroleum reserves.

As Rick from Simi Valley intimated earlier, funding for scientific research is down across the board, not merely in physics, but in biology and medicine as well.

The visual neuroscientist I worked for until recently --my position was lost due to budget cuts, incidentally--has told me that federal funding for scientific research is at its lowest relative level since WWII.

I hesitate to politicize the issue--we're all sick of seeing worthwhile discussions like this hijacked by crazed apparatschiks of one persuasion or the other--but it's worth noting that much of the funding that might otherwise build up projects like this is going You Know Where...

The far-off fusion race

Mike, Eugene, Oregon — Mon, 05 May 2008 00:25:00 GMT

It is interesting that so much money is being "dumped" into "Hot" Fusion when there is no way we will ever utilize this technology. in 30 years time, we will have clean safe energy sources abundant. Radiant and advanced solar technologies are already on the horizon. by the time they perfect the Hot fusion tech, it will not be needed. every house in the world will be on some kind of advanced solar or radiant technology. Cold Electricity is already abundant on the earth. there is a massive push worldwide to tap this resource. while the US and other countries are "Wasting" tax payer money on obsolete technologies, private companies are making Huge advances in Cold, Clean and safe electricity. within 5-10 years, Energy will be Free and All that wasted money will be down the drain. trying to make Hot Fusion stable is a waste of valuable brain power and money. Shows a major widespread error in thinking.

The far-off fusion race

Chris Reeve, San Francisco, CA — Mon, 05 May 2008 02:07:41 GMT

One of the most ill-conceived decisions of the 90's was to put MIT's hot fusion group in charge of evaluating cold fusion. Oh my god. What a ruinous disaster!

And yet, to this day, the public is largely ignorant of the fact that the MIT dataset has been explicitly demonstrated by an insider to have been asymmetrically skewed (Roger Mallove, who has since been murdered was in fact nominated for a Pulitzer Prize for his amazing investigation of the subject). He was perhaps the only person who could have known that it was so, and he clearly demonstrates as much in his MIT Cold Fusion Report.

We Americans have this innate religious-like trust of our scientists ... so much faith that we never even imagined that a group that was already concerned about cuts to their funding might feel threatened by the arrival of a competitor. In America, scientists take on superhuman personae. We might want to rethink this attitude.

Think about this. Many concepts in stellar physics theory are in fact contradicted by direct observation or grounded in unsubstantiated speculation and assumption. We know many things about the Sun, but many fundamental observations remain mysterious. For instance, the fact that the Sun's atmosphere, it's corona, is 100x hotter than its surface. Much effort is spent trying to explain that these days.

But, it gets worse. One of the most perplexing and serious discrepencies is the fact that the solar wind fails to appreciably slow down as it passes by the planetary orbits. Taken as a whole, this structure is called the heliospheric current sheet, and it extends out beyond the planets. Now, the simple and very serious problem of not understanding how this structure organizes itself is the fact that it's the largest structure of our solar system. Effectively, we're claiming that we have great certainty about how the Sun works, and yet there is no accepted theory at the moment for how the structure that the Sun exists within -- the largest structure of our solar system, which all of the planets are embedded within -- organizes itself. Oops.

The public does not realize something though. The astrophysicists are content to keep on working enigmas like this into our conventional theories. What they typically refuse to do, however, is to question consensus. Off the table are discussions about conceptual or theoretical mistakes that might have led to the observational contradictions in the first place. The public does not see any of this, but our educational institutions have become quite rigid in their theory. And this is an incredibly important realization for the fusion research situation. Cold fusion has no basis in theory at the moment. So, it was just far too easy to dismiss the early data suggesting it. It would seem to contradict many domains of science, including astrophysics. What the public is not told is that astrophysics is largely speculative compared to other disciplines. We teach our astrophysicists the dominant paradigm as part of their education; they are not exactly encouraged to investigate alternative models. Scientists will create numerous theories, for instance, based upon supernova explosions -- and yet, the textbook entries on what happens in a supernova explosion are in fact just best guesses. This is the dirty little secret of stellar and fusion research. We are sold on the idea that fusion is a self-sustaining reaction. The fact that it has not been demonstrated to be so in the lab should mean something for the theory. Scientists are acting as though it doesn't. It's a problem. Have we created an institution which is unable to doubt itself?

Meanwhile, cold fusion researchers -- of which there are literally thousands worldwide -- now claim that they only need another $100 million to finalize their research. Although you wouldn't know it from his obituary, Arthur C Clarke was so impressed by cold fusion research that he actively helped them to publicize their research. The researchers themselves will calmly explain that the days of sensitive calorimetry tests are long gone, and that they're now trying to create enough free energy from cold fusion to run a car or generator.

Are they right? I don't know, but perhaps we should take a second look at the unfortunate sequence of events that led the public to mistrust them. I'm quite sure that you will be surprised by what you find. Most people do not realize that a federal crime appears to have been committed by MIT's hot fusion group ...

http://www.infinite-energy.com/images/pdfs/mitcfreport.pdf

The far-off fusion race

Tundraman — Mon, 05 May 2008 03:42:56 GMT

I am not a scientist nor an engineer, but I get very angry when I see and read comments of don't bother and doom and gloom for an outlook. I am a master tech certified automechanic and my night job I'm a mechanic that makes sure when you get a surgery our stuff will work as planned and you will be up just fine depending on your cercumstance of the surgery. And I can tell you all that things that were thought of just seven years ago couldn't even be the least bit imagined! Anti-lock brakes were imagined 60 years ago. They infact made in first in aircraft. Fuel injection was atempted in the early sixties corvettes. The tech in the Appolo missions is only a joke today as we have come so far! I remember a proud and endearing nation that pushed the envelope and got the job done. Look how some foolish people talk of cutting the space program they don't for a minute understand the gains made. I know we had stuff on a shuttle flight and many in managemant were very happy with the results, why? I don't know but they must have learned something that was very important. And this and things like this are why we must push ahead.After all its our technoligy that has kept this nation aware and safe too this point, would you rather someone else came up with the stealth fighters / bombers? Where and how do you think the tech came from for that (give ya a little hint) it was designed in the 50's and wasn't known to the world until the 80's and what we learned was invaluable! The Blackbird; yep it costs 1 mil everytime it goes up but too date NOOONE knows how fast it truly can go nor what it has truly been used for every mission as all is clasified too date!

The far-off fusion race

Tundraman — Mon, 05 May 2008 04:05:06 GMT

Thomas King sorry buddy but movies life reality lot different bud. Couple of simple facts 1 When you "plug in" you are infact setting up an amp draw. A typical house in the twentys could have gotten away with an extension cord. Ya you coulda probably even ran a large neighborhood with 100 amps.All they had back then was lights. You see refrigeration wasn't even out for "all" to "afford and use" neither was it dependable. But fast forward to GE / Westighouse / Cutler and Hammer and the year 1955. The farmer has pumps on the farm moms got a washer machine and this company called Sears and montgomery Ward got new fangled power tools and electric gadgets galour. Refrigeration / Air condition in stores!! And if you wanna be the first on the block a B/W Television set! Fast forward again to say about 1998 most electrical codes are updated to suggest and push through that a typical new construction home needs a 20 amp circuit JUST FOR THE MODERN BATHROOM. Why because the hairdryer alone is drawing upwards of 14/1600 watts! Most American homes will actually LOSE value if they don't have a 200 Amp service. Just imagine you and 25 million others at between 3:30pm eastcoast to west coast to 8:00pm plug in our cars for the night on the grid!Ask anyone doing it now what it costs, we are not talking about plugging in a cell phone for the night here. I don't know about your area but its 22 cents a killowatt hour (and climbing again next month) my bill is three times what it was just 8 years ago so I'm not sure what your talking about because everyone is stealing from each other on the grid right now as no one wants too spend on more generating plants. And by the way when everyone does do this and thinks there're all warm and fuzzy inside well don't forget that a guy at the "dirty six" is just throwing litteraly maggatons more dirty coal to fill the need for more meaggawatts! This is the facts.Create a need must put on more energy = coal burning = coal emits radioactive emmissions unknown to most but a fact,.... besides the dirty micro particules etc............

The far-off fusion race

T. MacP — Mon, 05 May 2008 08:30:09 GMT

Working on the fringe of the oil industry, things out here are getting more and more expensive (and the oil isn't running out, but is getting harder to find and more expensive to get out too). Coal can be a stop-gap, if it is run on a cleaner coal burning tech plant, but yes: we need to start looking to the next generation of power. Electric distribution in this country is almost totally overloaded and is getting antiquated. Things have to be looked at more closely. (The first thing is overpopulation, but that is a different question that is way outside of this argument.) Even if we switch to electric everything, Nuclear is expensive (to build and properly maintain), Solar/Wind/Wave power is not able to produce what we expect (not to mention some of the polution issues we recently found out about some of the solar panels they are making), even clean coal tech isn't exactly clean (especially if we produce as much as we are using), Hydro/Geo would be great (if we could save the fish spawning and had more thermal vents to work with); but it all comes down to better balancing what we have and even cutting down on some of the waste. (Ever see a satelitte image of the US at night? Do we really need to light every building in every town, all night every where?) I'm no tree hugger, but lets at least look at the technology for fusion, and any other power source we can find. Then look at how you can use it. (Even if it means we have to do some radical rebuilding of our infrastracture: Electric trains/trams/trolleys, new sail-ships tech, more efficient equipment in our houses or even better insulation for that matter, even self sustaining farms: power from methane that would be wasted anyway?) Yes, we need to update a lot, but at the same time we still need to look ahead to explore outward too. And finally, we do need to find a balance of how many people we have and even where they are living (I still can't stand the idea of people living in the middle of a desert crying about their starving kids. Why do they have so many if they are starving in the first place? Duh!) Lots of questions and I'm always willing to listen to solutions. Hope our leaders (here in the US, as well in the UN and everywhere) are able to listen and get to work too.

The far-off fusion race

John K — Mon, 05 May 2008 11:02:25 GMT

I think the political climate is central to how we approach this entire problem. We have ample evidence to gauge how ineffective the current political scheme has become. Even in small municipal settings throughout this country changes in local politics results in accompanying changes that waste all the time, money and effort expended by a previous regime. This is very wasteful and dramatically slows the pace of progress. In the U.S. at the federal level the relationship between government and the private sector alters with the party in power, rearranging the furniture time after time so that investment in objective goals is continuously compromised.

We sorely need to evolve a comprehensive plan that examines both short term needs and solutions and also provides for the long term investment that is undeniably required. Right now our political leaders can't even agree upon the broad parameters for such a plan. For the most part our political leaders are themselves unable to make objective decisons about these things and are influenced in their decison making by various constituent groups residing in different technological and economic camps. I think it crucial that these conflicts be resolved if we wish to have any real progress. Having the scientific pendulum swinging wildly back and forth as a function of politics easily doubles the time horizon we have to get where it is we need to go. We simply don't have the luxury of permitting this glaring inefficiency be a part of the technological development that inarguably must occur.

The far-off fusion race

r king, clinton, in — Mon, 05 May 2008 13:30:54 GMT

every one is talking about having less energy and resources. lets talk about having less people!

The far-off fusion race

Glen — Mon, 05 May 2008 13:41:18 GMT

This work is the future of power, one way or the other.

The first thing that must happen to make this research even more efficient, while maintaining a cost effective energy solution, would be to produce 3-10 nuclear power stations in each state over the next 15 years. All the same, exactly the same, from training to spare parts, using the French model as a starting point. Initial design should take no more then 18 months, Scientists will have to choose stability and safety over efficiency until new technologies become mainstream. The cost of producing these plants will become much more in line with standard energy production facilities as the numbers progress. This will also create tens of thousands of jobs, all across the globe.

It is by no means the answer, but it is a required step in the evolution of energy production and consumption the world over.

The far-off fusion race

Glen — Mon, 05 May 2008 14:02:50 GMT

I had to mention that I still believe that these alternative energy sources are not in use or researched effectively for one reason, and only one reason. Capitalism.

We all know by now that capitalism does not lend itself to innovation and productivity as we were taught in school. If you cannot make a killing on it, and now, it has no room in our board meetings. Kind of like a disease that only kills 10,000 people a year. We may find a treatment, and keep you on pills the rest of your life, but there is no money in curing your disease, so don't count on it.

Fortunately, energy is such a large issue that eventually the people will demand the changes to the extent the very wealthy, and very powerful will no longer be able to stave off the attacks. Only then will any real change occur.

The far-off fusion race

BenST1, Albany, NY — Mon, 05 May 2008 14:23:17 GMT

I think we should spend the money on wind turbines and plug-in electric cars. The wind turbines can be the standard tall 3-blade GE machines, smaller ones for those places where the bigger machines would not be practical, or airborne wind turbines.

The film "Who Killed the Electric Car" proved that GM, Ford and Crysler are keeping the electric car off the market; while Texaco and Chrysler are keeping the battery that makes it practical from the consumer.

The world should build wind turbines and plug-in electric cars. Nuclear fusion is only practical for hydrogen bombs. Nuclear fusion research has taken a lot of money and a lot of human power and has almost nothing to show for it in return. What a waste.

The far-off fusion race

john overstreet, tex. — Mon, 05 May 2008 15:08:22 GMT

so...go to the moon and start mining it for He-3? how much material would you need to get the appx. 40 tons of He-3 needed to 'power the entire US' for a year? according to the American Geophysical Union, He-3 concentrations are somewhere between 8-17 ppb in lunar soil. you have to consider that the processes used to extract the He-3 at least in the beginning, will suffer from inefficiencies. so fast forward a bit, and you have earthlings removing tens of millions of tons of material from the moon annually. the problem with that is, as the overall mass of the moon decreases, the distance between the earth and the moon will increase faster than it already is, due to the decreased gravitational attraction between the two. everyone knows that the moon effects the earth in very profound ways, so incidentally altering its orbit by taking large chunks of material over long periods of time could lead to another man-made climatalogical crisis that we are completely unable to resolve.

The far-off fusion race

Mon, 05 May 2008 15:26:14 GMT

fusion is easy with a pair of magical earings. fusion-ha!

The far-off fusion race

James Stepp, Orlando FL — Mon, 05 May 2008 15:58:24 GMT

The real reason we're funding this project in the first place is to achieve what are known as pure fusion weapons, thousands of times more powerful than our current nukes but without any radioactive fallout. Nukes take out cities, pure fusion weapons wipe whole continents clean. Even talking about using this to generate power is to try to run before we can walk as it is so far ahead of us as to be practically useless.

I believe a far better use of our resources is to have a massive project to learn to store electrical energy more efficiently. This is practical, important and could be accomplished based on what we know today.

The reason we are still using oil is that we can't store and release electricity efficiently and that is the only thing stopping us from having electric cars with 500 mile ranges and minimal recharge times. We spend roughly 500 billion dollars a year just for gas to drive our cars, money that could be far better spent. This is almost half our yearly budget and a major component of our foreign trade imbalance and debt.

Of course, we have a president tied to big oil and a ruthless VP tied to oil and defense contractors. Until our administration and campaign finance system changes we will be stuck with what we have now as it's not in their financial interests to change it. You cannot ask the people who are the problem to fix the problem, unless you are extremely naive. The issues we have in this scenario aren't technical but political.

The far-off fusion race

Tomas King, Boston, MA — Mon, 05 May 2008 16:54:45 GMT

Tundraman-

There are several plug-in cars being developed by major car companies. You can now buy a plug-in called the Tesla. So all the talk about AMPs ruining things, whatever AMPs are, isn’t going to happen. All you have to do is plug your car in and then it runs. As far as clean electricity, haven’t you seen the movie, “The Matrix.” That movie PROVES that clean energy can be created by using animal heat. An entire civilization of robots can survive using that technology. From our conversation here, it’s probably some sort of aneutronic –cqytronic-hadronic thermocouple that uses the Casimir effect and is small enough to FIT IN THE MODERN BATHROOM. Now I know what everyone is going to say. “We can’t use humans like they did in the Matrix.” But think about if we used insects instead! There are TONS of insects that could have their aneutronic hadronic energy heat pulled out of them in those pod capsules like in the Matrix. So plug-in cars should work just fine because we’ll have UNLIMITED energy from the electric company! Why does everyone like coal so much and those psychotic fusion generators? The research in Spiderman 2 shows that fusion is the wrong direction. Unless people WANT to make lots of EVIL OCTOPUS people like the fusion reaction did in Spiderman 2!!!

The far-off fusion race

Thomas Ashby, Calgary — Mon, 05 May 2008 17:08:10 GMT

Chris Reeve: You can bet if cold fusion was any kind of reality, China, Russia and Europe would be proving it.

The far-off fusion race

Creighton Anderson, Wilmington, DE — Mon, 05 May 2008 21:02:20 GMT

PLEASE READ THIS.

All exciting technology looks ridiculous when viewed far enough in the past. Skeptics 30 years ago would say that solar cell efficiencies greater than 40% were impossible. Now we have them. Where would we be now if we told our best scientists to STOP pursuing solar power because it was too difficult? We would have been robbing our top scientists of jobs and our children of solar power.
We already have "hot" fusion power, just not self-sustaining fusion. The reactors have steadily been getting closer to "breakeven" with the ITER planning to reach break even (same power into reactor as out). The ITER is a bargain. It costs less than $20 billion and that cost is spread over the major nations of the world. The US spends $20 billion in IRAQ in 50 days! Also, the cost for the ITER would be spread over 10+ YEARS. Are we going to rob our top scientists from the challenges that may keep America competitive in the future? Remember, Japan, France, China, and Russia are going forward with fusion research. Our discussion isn't about whether or not fusion research will happen, it's about whether the US will not be given the fusion research data from the ITER reactor. Those who study fusion know that it's primary pollutant, tritium has a VERY short period of radioactivity before it becomes harmless. Also the fuel for fusion, dueterium, is extremely common, 1 out of every 1000 molecules of water in the ocean is dueterium.
If we want to save money, take it away from how much we waste as a society on buying SUVs, iPod accessories, and sugar water drinks that are causing obesity in our children. Pepsi made $26 BILLION dollars revenue selling sugar water last year (ONE YEAR!). Don't take money away from fundamental research. How sad that we've given up on our scientists and future because we gave up on "hard science problems," when for a small fraction of what our society makes we could have investigated exciting research into a variety of energy sources. How sad. How very very sad.

The far-off fusion race

Chris Reeve, San Francisco, CA — Mon, 05 May 2008 22:07:31 GMT

> Chris Reeve: You can bet if cold fusion was
> any kind of reality, China, Russia and Europe
> would be proving it.

Actually, you are right in a way. The ridicule that researchers have faced here in the States has forced much of the research to move overseas.

I recommend the following article ... http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/6.11/coldfusion.html:

[quote]

# George Miley, who received the Edward Teller medal for innovative research in hot fusion and has edited Fusion Technology magazine for the American Nuclear Society for more than 15 years: "There's very strong evidence that low-energy nuclear reactions do occur. Numerous experiments have shown definitive results - as do my own."

# John Bockris, formerly a distinguished professor in physical chemistry at Texas A&M University and a cofounder of the International Society for Electrochemistry: "Nuclear reactions can occur without high temperatures. Low-energy nuclear transformations can - and do - exist."

# Michael McKubre, director of the Energy Research Center at SRI International: "I am absolutely certain there is unexplained heat, and the most likely explanation is that its origin is nuclear."

# Arthur C. Clarke, science fiction writer, futurist, and funder of Infinite Energy magazine: "It seems very promising to me that nuclear reactions may occur at room temperatures. I'm quite convinced there's something in this."

[end quote]

Nobody should assume that since it does not appear within conventional news media or even peer review journals that cold fusion is not real. At a minimum, before one makes up their mind on the phenomenon, there exists a burden to at least listen to the researchers who are studying it. Americans make this mistake time and time again when learning about controversial issues: they fail to listen to what the critics are saying and fill this void with their own self-manufactured logic about what *must* be the case based upon what they read in conventional news media. Those who possess the courage to investigate the fringe sciences today with an open mind will discover that the very meaning of fringe science is in transition right now. In many instances, fringe scientists -- like the Electric Universe theorists, Konstantin Meyl, David Thomson and Ralph Sansbury -- make extremely valid points about astrophysics, Relativity and the quantum particle domain. The entire "free energy" movement has been cast aside by professional scientists as absurd, and yet, they are only guilty of actually reading and believing Nikola Tesla's own publications, public remarks and patents (those who ridicule the free energy movement oftentimes fail to realize this or similarly ridicule Tesla himself). Things are not all that they seem within physics right now, but you will not realize it unless you are willing to spend the time to investigate it with an open mind.

The far-off fusion race

Starwindwalker; Phoenix, Arizona — Tue, 06 May 2008 02:45:06 GMT

Hopefully, many of you remember what happened when electric power was being researched and developed by Edison and Tesla independently. Even though Tesla proved electric power could be safe and free for all, it was Edison's system that was chosen by the Powers That Be for further development and implementation for two reasons; under his system, electric power could be metered and a price could be attached to it's generation and distribution; and, by doing so political power could be held over the population. And so The Grid was born.

Since then the Fossil Giants [giant fossils ?] have gained and held control over almost every aspect of modern life while squashing most attempts to research and develop safe and free energy alternatives. This, I believe, is why there is little or no government funding in fusion research.

I've been a fan of science and science fiction for almost all of my 50 years and have been thrilled by the technology actual science and engineering have brought to us from the seeds of imagination planted by creative geniuses like Asimov, Clarke, Roddenberry and many others. They have all come together to prove most of what we can dream is possible.

If this were a true Democracy, rather than a representative mockery of it, the People would logically support research and development of any promising technology offering efficient, safe, clean and free energy. Really... who gets excited every month to pay their electric bill? Who would rather breathe dirty, toxic air? Mark my words...if they can find a way to charge for this nasty, clumpy crap we still call air, they will. There is no doubt it will happen when we begin to colonize the Moon, Mars and wherever else we choose to go where ideal atmospheres do not exist or would take several generations to artificially enhance or create. Remember the lesson in "Total Recall"? Who controls the air, controls Mars.

While I don't think "Mr. Fusion", the transporter, or FTL drives are around the corner, it is VITAL we keep these dreams alive for the evolution and necessary expansion of humankind into the universe. In order to achieve these kind of goals we need to free our human spirit from the evil vampires who suck our life energy from us every moment of every day. Our spiritual advances must match our technological achievements or we continue along the same, ultimately destructive path we are on. Reducing or eliminating consumable energy demands removes one of several major barriers to true peace.

I support any research into fusion; cold, intermediate or hot; photovoltaics, and other technologies IF they offer possibilities to take every human off the grid and help us heal ourselves and our mother Earth.

The far-off fusion race

CM, Modesto, CA — Tue, 06 May 2008 06:45:35 GMT

Those researchers know physics, but their economics are more than a little shakey. Do they have a clue as to how much shipping a few pounds (never mind 40 tons) of He 3 from the moon to earth costs?

None of the fusion techniques have reached "breakeven", all take up more useful energy than they can produce. Each small step closer to breakeven is accompanied by a big increase in cost, and the trend line is clear - by the time they exceed breakeven and are able to produce useful amounts of energy, it will be far too expensive to be competitive, with a cost per watt or watthour higher than solar photovoltaics.

The far-off fusion race

Ron R., Elk PA — Wed, 07 May 2008 13:24:52 GMT

SHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! H3 fusion is the anuetronic answer! Don't tell anybody that's the real reason we need to go back to the moon.

The far-off fusion race

Rick — Fri, 09 May 2008 13:24:50 GMT

Something
subject.

You'll fall off. We can't fly. The moon is made of green cheese. It's too dangerous. You can't get there from here.

I don't think its going to be a large consortium of scientists that breaks this puzzle but a small lab working with alternative concepts. Many of the scientists working on fusion are locked into one direction and do not (cannot?) see other possibilities. That does not mean that they shouldn't try though (I could be wrong).

Maybe they (the scientists) need to consider a coupling of technologies, cold fusion and hot fusion, to achieve breakeven.

The far-off fusion race

cris p — Sun, 11 May 2008 07:27:48 GMT

ronnie. If all goes well within the following couple of months you`ll get aneutronic fusion without having to go to the moon. In fact if the polywell works, its by-products will be H3, no neutrons, & no green-house gasses. CLEAN!!

Check updates at http://www.talk-polywell.org

The far-off fusion race

Richard Powers, Wildomar, California, USA — Wed, 14 May 2008 00:42:36 GMT

Thomas K-
I must respectfully disagree with both of your statements. Yeah, plug-in car would be great if everyone used them- since automobiles account for a good percentage (I think half or so) of carbon emissions- but the other half comes from the energy companies. Their coal plants emit the other half of carbon. Besides for the fact that if everyone starts using that much power to charge up their cars (which requires so much power it's ridiculous) that power companies will have to struggle twice as hard to put out twice as much energy, leaving us back at square one.

So many people are afraid of radiation hazards when using nuclear fission technology for power generation- did you know that a coal plant emits more hazardous radiation than the limits allowed to nuclear plants?

Also, people investing the *BILLIONS* of dollars so far for all of this fusion power bs are just fooling themselves. Yeah solar could be made more efficient, and fusion could work, but why not invest in something that has already worked, and provides dirt cheap clean energy? Google the vacuum triode amplifier. Why not pour any money at all into a replication and/or refinement attempt? Because people are naturally cynical. Instead of asking how something could work they automatically dismiss good ideas as impossibilities.

Last let me remind you all who know ANYTHING about Einstein's Theory of Relativity. This simple equation he showed to the world has paved the way already for extraordinary things.

E=mc^2 (m times c(squared))

Now E is energy.
m is mass
c is the speed of light.

Therefore it can be proved that matter is condensed energy, and thus an infinitesimal amount of mass contains a tremendous amount of energy.
Cheap, clean energy does not have to be derived from the sun, from fossil fuels, or from mother nature. Energy exists all around us. In the coins in your pocket, the screen you are reading, and even the keyboard i used to type this out.

My final thought is that it is going to take more than just human innovation to change the outcome of the upcoming crisis. It is going to take a change of the way we work as a race. We are going to have to stop relying on cynics who dismiss good ideas and start thinking for ourselves.

Remember, it is better to suggest ridiculous ideas that have a chance of succeeding than be a cynic who shrugs them all of until the eleventh hour when it's too late.

The far-off fusion race

Robert Dinse, Shoreline, WA — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 02:36:43 GMT

Personally, I think the Bussard Polywell reactor has a lot of Merit and deserves to be well funded, on the other hand I think Dr. Nebel needs to be more forthcoming with information.

I don't understand why ITER went with a conventional Tokamak over a short aspect or spherical Tokamak which has shown nearly an of magnitude improvement in confinement and thus can achieve a burning plasma or break even conditions in a much smaller (and thus less expensive) machine.

All in all though, at current oil prices and import levels, the amount of money the US has committed to the ITER program over it's entire life is less than we spend on one day's worth of oil imports.

The far-off fusion race

nkycarbon — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 19:31:30 GMT

I hope that the new adminstartion will fully fund Polywell fusion which would require a small fraction of what is being spent on ITER which itself is a small fraction of the other recent bailouts.

A non-ITER fusion is our only shoot at getting fusion quickly (10 years). Polywell fusion may be able to deliver down to 100 MW which is much more modular than ITER. ITER should still be funded also. Even though the first commerical plant will not be until 2050 it still may help a great deal.

In the mean time we have to work on climate change as if fusion will not be there to help while spending money towards hoping it will.