what is your opinion of, the possibility of 'hot fusion'?

[rfkrfk]

also known as plasma fusion.

opinions vary widely
I favor research,and hope it works.
The reason I am hopeful, is that the last, biggest machine made good progress.***
The whores ot the Sierra club oppose it,

http://www.sierraclub.ca/national/programs/atmosphere-energy/nuclear-free/campaign.shtml?x=313

not green enough,I guess


***{unlike fuel cells, which have been dead in the water for years}

[Fredda Weinberg]

1. My brother worked on that

and I remember the subject from my chemistry classes decades ago. It took more energy to make the fusion bottle than you got out of it, which kinda makes sense - you have to contain the reaction and nothing solid will survive.

[rfkrfk]

3. they were getting closed to breakeven with last machine

The ITER machine is expected to demostrate 'breakeven'

[Fredda Weinberg]

4. Yeah, but it's been twenty years

and break even doesn't begin to make it a viable alternative. My point - or more accurately - my brother's point (he's the PhD in physics) is that theoretically, the technology won't make a dent commercially. That's why he moved out of that field.

[rfkrfk]

6. I have to go for a trip in n my fuel cell car

I will post something later

[JohnWxy]

22. fusion research must continue. ONe day it will be made feasible

But as to how long that will take is anybody's guess. Could easily be 50 years .. or even longer.

[catnhatnh]

2. Yes...I believe it can happen...n/t

[punpirate]

5. Interesting way to preface a question...

... "the whores of the Sierra Club oppose it." If you're asking a question, that presumes you know little of the situation. Why begin in that way when you don't understand their position, or the technical questions at hand?

In fact, as for research in this country, the "last, biggest machine" made little progress at all--because money for that research was diverted, primarily by Sandia, to nuclear weapons computer modeling and the use of accelerator time for fusion weapons research. Hot fusion research in this country has been almost non-existent because the money's been spent, instead, on weapons research.

[rfkrfk]

11. the US is not the whole world

my understanding is the best machine is England,
and for one test, they loaded with real fuel,
the actually got some fusion, of coursen not break even.

billions of people don't have electricity,
the oceans are being destroyed,
but the Sierra Club - Canada, is concernerd with keeping ITER out.

Whatever their stated position would be, doubtful I would believe
what they say.
I really have to question their motive.
My guess is that they want money spent on
traditional money holes like solar and hydrogen.

[punpirate]

14. You blame people without...

... providing any links to further discussion, nor do you supply any reasoning of your own, on technical merits.

Let's take the points you've offered here. Yes, billions don't have electricity. Does ITER solve that problem? Can it, equally, be solved in other ways? Yes, the oceans are being destroyed. What does that have to do with ITER, as to opposed to other new means of producing electricity? Have you given us the reasons why Sierra Club opposes ITER, and have you offered reasons why their opposition is not warranted?

You say "whatever their stated position would be, doubtful I would believe what they say." That means you don't know what their stated position is, but you still choose to denigrate it. That's not logical. You say you have to "question their motive," but you don't know what their position is, and therefore don't know their motives for a position you can't describe and you have no knowledge of the technical merits or demerits of their position, because you admit you don't know their position or the grounds for their position, nor do you offer any reason for anyone to believe you on the basis of your specialized technical knowledge on the subject.

I would venture to say that you are either unwilling or unable to present any facts in defense of your argument, whatever that argument may be. It seems, from your original post, that you are mostly complaining about the Sierra Club about their stand on an issue you do not know anything about and cannot define for the rest of us, and, therefore, we cannot judge on the scientific and technical merits.

How about some links to other information so we can judge for ourselves?

[rfkrfk]

16. if the if the SC stuck to land conservation, saving the oceans,

and saving the Ivory-billed Woodpecker,
I would have a higher opinion of them.

try this link, the first paragraph is worth reading.
http://www.iter.org/Strategy.htm

I will post more links, if anyone is interested

I've seen a plasma confinement experiment in operation, by the way.
But that was in 1973, at least there is movement,

compare that to solar, same old nothing

[punpirate]

17. Umm, you didn't address any of my questions...

... and I'm not sure how the ivory-billed woodpecker has any relation to hot fusion. You might explain that. That seems to be a diversion, not an elucidation.

As well, plasma confinement is not the same thing as fusion, and fusion is what your argument has been about. (Fast neutrons make it all different, y'know.)

BTW, the first paragraph of the link you provided says nothing of value, except that the aim of current experiments is to obtain zero-sum results. That means no gain. Period.

I can compare that to solar. Solar is in current commercial production. It has output. DT tokamak is not and does not.

Look, I'm as willing to entertain current research as the next guy (I'm mostly a materials science guy, and that's where a lot of my hesitation comes in about DT tokamak), but you haven't provided any arguments, technical or otherwise, to support your views, and you haven't yet provided the reasons for your disagreements with the Sierra Club, notwithstanding sideways comments about woodpeckers. From what you have provided, we don't even know if they disagree. Geez, it's taken a couple of questions just to figure out what system you were talking about--you didn't explain yourself at all in your original post.

Data counts. Background counts. Pros. Cons. That's how the scientific method works, contrary to what you seem to believe.

Cheers.

[rfkrfk]

19. sideways comments, is the issue

this is my opinion, but since I am not a member,it does not mean so much

my preference would be for the SC et al, to be concerned with saving
the Stellar Sea Lion, conserving redwoods, and the like

when the SC opposes fusion power research, or thinks it gets to
decide the content of US gasoline down to the last molecule....
MTBE is bad, TAME in the future is good/bad, depending on who we support for political office -->

that is going beyond the Pale

..........
Tokamak does not use current for heating, or is it the other way?

[Strelnikov_]

7. "Whores Of The Sierra Club Oppose It"

What more can I say.

[EST]

8. As a camp follower, on the edges of science,

I have seen, and spoken with some of the researchers on, the problems with fusion as a reliable source of energy. The technology has always seemed to be "on the verge of a breakthrough," and, like a narcolept on a honeymoon, the breakthrough never happens. In my opinion, we are far from any sort of workable solution and, with the disregard for science endemic to the ruling junta, we are even farther, now, than we were five years ago.

WE have the biggest fusion reactor around already pouring its energy on the earth and harnessing that energy should be our first mission. Pretty much everything that moves is a user of this solar energy and we are far from capturing anything near a comfortable percentage of it.
I would like to see some money continue to flow toward fusion work, but the preponderance of support needs to be for things that work, right now.

[rfkrfk]

15. completely disagree

people need to give credit where credit is due.

plasma confinement research, has been going on for a long time

in the beginning, they had long road, ahead of them.
long time ago, 'progress' would be,
going from one-ten.thousanth of what is needed --> to ten times better, of
'confinement quality'.

repeating, long time ago, there was no 'fusion'.
nowadays, {from memory}, I think they're within one tenth, of what
is needed.

my point, there is movement in the right direction,
a long road with hopefully a big payoff

compare that to the empty rhetoric of solar

[EST]

18. O.K.-Now you HAVE called me out!

My familiarity with the TOKAMAK containment facilities and the personnel who ran them goes a bit beyond the fringes. Also the laser/compressed deuterium/tritium pellet "reactors" keep getting rediscovered every couple of years, since 1987. There is no evidence-repeat NO EVIDENCE-that any of these projects is in serious danger of producing usable power anytime soon.

Both Discover and Scientific American magazines have been conscientious about reporting any advances or even hopeful pronouncements in this field, due to, among other reasons, the desperate need for energy in the world and the accolades that would befall the scientific community in the event of any real success.
True enough, the current political wind blowing around hydrogen as a useful technology is just that--wind. Hydrogen, at best, is merely a way of transforming one sort of energy into another, more portable, sort, adding nothing by way of original power, with the enormous losses that inevitably accompany such transforms, plus a few of its own.

Every form of power you see around you, with the possible exception of nuclear, is, in one way or another, solar power. Yes, of course, it is stored, concentrated solar energy (ie. coal, oil, wood, biomass, ethanol, methanol, hemp oil and other oil seed extracts, etc) but it is solar energy, just the same.

RIGHT now, if we were to utilize all of the available spigots on solar energy, not just the anemic solar cell panels (although they have gotten much better, of late) that most think of when solar is mentioned, we would have adequate power available. I'm talking about proven technology, even crude technology, available right now. Wave power, wind power, solar heating/cooling and panels, as well as many others, are all off-the-shelf do-able, nothing new and startling required.

The internet is a useful tool for locating and consuming virtually all of the current papers on the latest tech as well as new designs, utilizing well understood tech for generating power. Most of these designs have no consumables (beyond lubricants and accumulated wear) and, therefore, are not huge, ongoing profit gouging enterprises, they just work, work well, and pretty efficiently.

Fusion may not be a total dead end, but it is currently airy-fairy, pie in the sky hope-for notions that have no concrete value.
I will not dig through my own library for citations, but a little goggling should wise up any but the most obdurate. Ah, yes, and by the way, an opening slam against an organization that is fighting to maintain and preserve something of a healthy environment and which many of us have fought along side of and made sacrifices to try to support is not a particularly endearing way to open an intellectual discussion.

[NNadir]

9. I think it's potential is over rated.

It doesn't offer very much of an advantage over fission power, although its highly energetic neutrons could be interesting from a transmutation perspective.

[rfkrfk]

12. no nuclear weapon issues, fisrt comes to mind n/t

[NNadir]

20. This is not really true either.

Fusion will always depend on a fission infrastructure. It is simply unworkable without one.

[Jim Lane]

10. Why the Sierra Club thought it wasn't green enough

If you trouble to read the position paper from the Sierra Club of Canada, you'll find some key points:
* The projected cost is about $12 billion (U.S.) dollars, with overruns eminently possible. Investment of that money in other alternative energy sources would have quite an impact and might well be a superior use of the funds.
* This project will produce radioactive waste. We aren't adequately dealing with the rad waste currently being produced.
* The project won't produce energy on a commercial scale for decades, if at all; the danger of global warming requires that we focus on energy sources that don't release greenhouse gasses and that can be brought on line in the short term.

You may disagree with these arguments but there's no basis for your "whores" comment. Is Sierra Club of Canada being secretly bankrolled by the oil industry to oppose alternative energy? I think that unlikely, to say the least. Unless you have evidence of such a thing, you shouldn't imply that SCC is taking a position on the issue for any reason other than a sincere belief concerning the merits.

[rfkrfk]

13. short term means, the 29th Century?

stort term, and alternate fuel, do not belong in the same paragraph.
solar, hydrogen, etc, have been studied for years and years and years.

as for the sincerity of the SCC,
I believe one reason they oppose ITER is,

They just don't like hope being raised in this matter,
because that would lessen their deadbeat message of the
same old solar and hydrogen fairy tale.

[Jim Lane]

23. More like 2029

In 2029, we'll almost certainly be getting a higher percentage of our energy from solar, geothermal, wind, etc. than we are now. No one expects fusion to be producing anything above its current zero percent by then.

[skids]

21. Big hot fusion -- not optimistic. Focus fusion -- can't help but hope.

If I had to lay my money down right now, I'd take a gamble on focus fusion as opposed to the large static confinement experiments. Sort of like betting on a new horse when you know the old horse has a poor track record.