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Destroying Nuclear Weapons with High-Energy Neutrinos
TheMatt writes "As reported by PhysicsWeb, physicists are proposing a "futuristic but not necessarily impossible" method of destroying nuclear weapons via high-energy neutrinos sent through the earth. Based on
current planned efforts, this 'vast extrapolation' of current technology would use 1000 TeV beams. This would require a 1000-km diameter storage ring using magnets orders-of-magnitude stronger than currently available. The cost would be around $100 million-plus and it'd use 50 GW of energy, the UK's current consumption. (And the slight problem that the process might set off the nukes, instead of just melting them...)"
This would require a 1000-km diameter storage ring
Oh, is that all? A mere 1000km storage ring. For you US folks out there, that is approx 600 miles.
On a serious note, what happens if you miss with this thing? It is quite interesting scientifically, however interesting never implies practicality.
The problem is that this technique is so grossly, extravagantly, embarrassingly inefficient. A neutrino beam can (and will, in this scheme) pass through a good fraction of the Earth without blinking. Astronomers build neutrino detectors on Earth at great cost and inconvenience because (among other reasons) most neutrinos from fusion the Sun's core travel directly to Earth without interacting with any of the matter in between.
This device would be so horrifically expensive because the vast majority (ninety-nine point several nines percent) of neutrinos are lost to space, out the other side of the Earth. To block a significant fraction of the neutrino beam would require a shield with tremendous density or thickness. We're talking several kilometres of neutron star material (at a density of tons per teaspoon) or light years of lead. Neither solution is particularly practical. Maybe a few decades down the road you could construct artificial black holes, and place them beneath your nuclear stockpile.
As we understand neutrino interactions, they essentially cannot be stopped (they won't pass through the black holes mentioned above--but we can't build those yet.) Your best bets for defense are to keep your nukes well hidded--so your adversaries can't target them--or launching a first strike--use your nukes to destroy this large, obvious, easy-to-hit neutrino generation facility. (An accelerator ring 1000 km across can't be concealed--heck, it won't fit in most countries, let alone be paid for--and it can't be moved to a place of safety.)
~Idarubicin
Park it at L1 or L2. Space is roomy, so building big things is easier. Aiming is easier - you do have to be more accurate and have a better collimated beam, but you only have to track it across a degree or two to cover the whole earth, and you could aim by tracking the whole ring, so you'd need less powerful deflector magnets. You can power it with solar energy. And, the vacuum is free!
There is the little problem of getting there, setting up shop, and building a 1000 km structure, of course...
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"I do not know with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones." -Albert Einstein
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