Viewing profile — mrterry

ICF is intrinsically pulsed (magnetic confinement like ITER is completely different). You use a laser to spherically compress a 1 mm diameter spherical capsule. The capsule implode…

it is unlikely that fusion energy will be cheaper than current tech. however, it does not emit CO2, is not a proliferation risk, and cannot have a nuclear meltdown.

"50-100 more energy out than in to make up for inefficiencies in electricity generation using this kind of scheme." Completely true. Theoretically, the NIF target has enough fuel t…

I've worked in ICF for a nearly a decade. I think NIF research is a necessary step to a ICF based power source. If NIF demonstrates ignition, it can be used to validate our physics…

This is true. The reactor work is very low priority, and the LLNL's reactor project "LIFE" has more fairy dust than I prefer. However, fusion and other NIF experiments are importan…

I haven't seen enough details to have a good opinion, but I'm skeptical (but would happily eat my hat if it works). We abandoned mirror fusion in the 80's because confinement is re…

Lasers gets fired at the inner surface of a cylinder (called a hohlraum). The laser heat the surface of the hohlraum which then emits x-rays. The x-rays then deposit energy on the …

I can think of two off the top of my head. Low temperature plasma processing (used in semiconductor fab) got it start as the-mess-created-when-a-plasma-confinement-experiment-fails…

Just a couple quibbles from a former NIF scientist. NIF is much higher on the priority list than that. LLNL is already in the doghouse due to NIF failing to ignite on schedule. As …

The showers continue. Budget pressures have NIF down to shooting three days a week. To make matters worse, DoE has decided to cut funding for high energy density physics, ie the fi…