Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Nuclear fusion milestone passed at US lab

bbc.co.uk

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 222 posts

Re: Nuclear fusion milestone passed at US lab

#51

Post by hetman »

gizmo686 wrote: post #28
knappador wrote: post #14

Producing net-energy is a different story than collecting net-energy. NIF just blows up a canister with a pellet and takes forever to reload a shot. On the other hand, an at-least-as-promising technology like Dense Plasma Focus ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dense_plasma_focus ) is still receiving minuscule funding. I'm hoping to be able to meaningfully support DPF and other fusion technologies soon. DPF has my atten…

What does producing energy mean if not collecting it? The conservation of Energy tells us that we are not actually producing any energy, rather we are converting energy from the mass of the reactants (hopefully into electricity). If you consider the energy converted from mass to be produced, then it is impossible to do nuclear fusion without producing net-energy (as long as you stay on this side of lead).

Yes but in the real world there are inefficiencies. We can't even transfer energy efficiently enough into the reaction yet to get a net energy gain from the fusion reaction. And once you reach that milestone, you still have to make transfer of the yield energy into useful work efficient enough to make the whole thing productive. Efficient energy transfer is hard!

Re: Nuclear fusion milestone passed at US lab

#52

Post by mrterry »

nether wrote: post #33
mrterry wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 goes the 5 giga-buck NIF, so goes LLNL (and the management knows it). Technologically, I'd put inertial and magnetic fusion about the same place. Even if the physics works, neither has a chamber first wall material that can stand up to the…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_beta_fusion_reactor What do you think of this?

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 really hard if you have open field lines [1]. I do think high beta confinement concepts ([2], [3]) are very cool and could drive power plants small enough for power companies to be interested.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror_Fusion_Test_Facility [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spheromak [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spherical_tokamak

Re: Nuclear fusion milestone passed at US lab

#53

Post by kcbanner »

angersock wrote: post #6
Jormundir wrote: post #5

I think Nuclear Fusion is the single most exciting up-and-coming technology. I can't believe we're not throwing a hundred billion dollars at it. Make fusion, not war.

Right, but what's its viral coefficient? How can we get it as a mobile app?

no

Re: Nuclear fusion milestone passed at US lab

#54

Post by kansface »

gizmo686 wrote: post #28
knappador wrote: post #14

Producing net-energy is a different story than collecting net-energy. NIF just blows up a canister with a pellet and takes forever to reload a shot. On the other hand, an at-least-as-promising technology like Dense Plasma Focus ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dense_plasma_focus ) is still receiving minuscule funding. I'm hoping to be able to meaningfully support DPF and other fusion technologies soon. DPF has my atten…

What does producing energy mean if not collecting it? The conservation of Energy tells us that we are not actually producing any energy, rather we are converting energy from the mass of the reactants (hopefully into electricity). If you consider the energy converted from mass to be produced, then it is impossible to do nuclear fusion without producing net-energy (as long as you stay on this side of lead).

Producing does not imply the ability to do useful work (power steam turbines).

Re: Nuclear fusion milestone passed at US lab

#55

Post by mrterry »

guimarin wrote: post #50
mrterry wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 goes the 5 giga-buck NIF, so goes LLNL (and the management knows it). Technologically, I'd put inertial and magnetic fusion about the same place. Even if the physics works, neither has a chamber first wall material that can stand up to the…

Don't get me wrong I think that LLNL and the NIF are doing great work. I just think the work is more weapons based and less energy than we are all lead to believe in the press. and I meant that the Fusion Reactor business is a low priority compared to testing the nuclear stockpile, etc., not NIF in general. The chamber first wall material keeps me up at night. I think money spent in that area would be really well spe…

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 important.

Re: Nuclear fusion milestone passed at US lab

#56

Post by drakeandrews »

hetman wrote: post #39
Raticide wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It has the word "nuclear" in it, so the crazies will hate it no matter what it is.

Just take the word "nuclear" out, like they did with Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Imaging. No one will ever suspect a thing ;)

Functional Fusion Reacters! Strategic Functional Warheads! Functional Containment Disasters[1]!

This is fun.

[1] This is tongue in cheek.

Re: Nuclear fusion milestone passed at US lab

#59

Post by jlgreco »

unreal37 wrote: post #40

If reliable fusion technology were developed, would the government share it with the public or would it be kept hidden away? Sadly I'm not joking. I think there's a 50-50 chance that any cool science that gets development by the U.S. government just becomes a classified DoD missile project.

The development of fission technology seems like a fine case to consider. I doubt we are more paranoid and militaristic now than we were during the height of the cold war. Maybe we are, but I really don't see it.
Post reply on HN