Re: OT Why No Fusion Powerplants?
- From: "bjw@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" <bjw@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2008 20:23:14 -0800 (PST)
On Jan 22, 4:14 pm, William Asher <gcn...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Tom Kunich wrote:
http://www.emc2fusion.org/2007-3-5%20DefenseNews.pdf
Seems like Robert Bussard discovered the trick but this has been
buried so that we wouldn't obtain cheap reliable power.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aneutronic_fusion
This is like asking if Michelin is suppressing antigravity
to maintain their tire monopoly. (RBR readers will now
point out that Michelin doesn't actually even _have_ a
tire monopoly.)
From Tom's link:"We've solved the physics; now it's time for engineering
development." That's what everyone always says. 19 years
ago, I saw a fusion talk at Livermore where the mantra was
"We see no show-stoppers." The basic physics was
understood, so after that it would be just engineering.
"Just" engineering. The thing is, I'm not sure they were
lying, misguided or even wrong. Problem is the engineering
is hard. Magnetic or inertial confinement of a billion degree
plasma is extremely difficult, even on Livermore's budget.
As for Bussard, his supposedly working apparatus wasn't
even tested with proton-boron fusion, he was using deuterium,
which requires 10 times lower energy. The article says,
no problem, we'll just build it bigger! If it was that simple,
we'd all own rocketships. Uh, I don't believe he managed
table top deuterium fusion either. But I wasn't there; his
acolytes should publish the results, and then they won't
have to worry about not getting their phone calls returned.
Ben
If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is.
I'll take one of those Michelin antigravity bicycles though.
.
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