Posted by
michael
on from the now-I'll-never-get-a-mr.-fusion dept.
Chuck1318 writes "The US is halting its national nuclear fusion energy project, FIRE, and pinning its hopes on the internation fusion research program ITER. However, ITER is stalled over a dispute on where to locate the facility. The dream of fusion power is getting no closer..."
Good news in a way
by
pt99par
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
I think that this may get fusion closer becouse now the US can put more money into the international project instead of its own. One good project instead of two half good projects.
Re:Good news in a way
by
Dr.+Hok
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
Maybe they found out that it wouldn't be good for national security if the US were in control?
-- Say out loud: I'm an Aspie and I'm somewhat proud, I guess. Uh. Can I write an email in all caps instead? Hm...
Re:Good news in a way
by
Daniel+Dvorkin
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
We could easily fund FIRE, our share of ITER, and a couple of other programs as well. Which is what we should be doing, because there's no guarantee that any one approach is the right one. Why do people always think there's going to be one magic bullet?
They're talking about $5 billion, total, to build ITER. That's miniscule money compared to what we're throwing away on fighting in a certain country known for its oil...
-- The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
The fact that they are having one giant argument about where to put this thing, to the extent that it halted the process, is pathetic and shows how petty the countries involved are. It is obvious that they are not interested in the science and simply want to be able to say "look what we have".
Fusion has been "15-20 years away" for something like 30 years now, hasn't it? If it's not something, it's something else. Meanwhile, we have a massive fusion plant in the center of the solar system that's been operating maintenance free for eons and we're barely even exploiting it.
-- You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
Re:Vested Interests
by
sql*kitten
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
It seems to me that fusion research in the US is never going to get decent levels of funding all the time that the Whitehouse is full of people with millions of dollars invested in oil companies.
You might be right, but remember there's really no such thing as an oil company. There are only energy companies. The smart ones recognize that, the dumb ones think it's all about oil. No-one wants oil. What they want is motive power.
Also remember that not much oil goes into power stations - mostly they're natural gas, coal nuclear, hydro, etc. Oil ends up in automobiles of one sort or another. Pitch it to Bush that Texas can provide all the oil the US needs and fusion will supply the rest and he can get the US out of the Middle East for good (barring support for Israel of course), and he'll jump at the chance, I reckon.
Solar power is still vastly underutilized
by
MarkEst1973
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
I was recently reading about hybrid cars that would be able to sell their excess electricity back to the power grid. Likewise for solar panels on homes. The energy generated would be used to heat water and whatnot, then the rest feeds back into the grid, causing the power meter to run backwards a bit and reduce your bill.
Like distributed computing, I think distributed power generation would work amazingly well. If there were millions and millions of homes generating power alongside our power plants (nukes, not dirty fossil fuel plants), we could achieve energy independence from foreign nations, reduce fossil fuel dependence, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions from oil/coal buring powerplants.
The challenges are difficult to overcome, however.
The big oil and gas companies, of course, would lobby against any distributed power generation. I'm sure they don't want millions of solar powered homes. There is no money in it for them.
Solar panels are, I think, relatively inefficient and expensive. Their efficacy would need to be boosted and the price would have to go down.
I can see a day, though, when everyone is generating everyone's power through distributed generation. It's cheaper, greener, and it just makes sense... which is probably why it will never happen.
Re:Shut up liberal.
by
meadowsp
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
The people of Iraq declared war on you on September 11th 2001?
References please.
Re:Shut up liberal.
by
WhiteWolf666
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
Don't be so dense.
Iraq != Taliban, or Al-Qaeda.
I agree with the war in Iraq, however, for entire different reasons.
Get your shit straight, and then it will make more sense.
U.S. has maintained a virtual occupation (containment) of Iraq since Desert Storm 1. We had no exit strategy.
We could have either a) left the area, pulled out our planes, and let Saddam did as he wanted, b) invaded, and force regime change, or c) maintain the SQ, shooting SAM sites, and occasionally have a plane shot down by Saddam's troops.
My opinion, B) was the best idea.
Unfortunately, we didn't consult the international community, we decided to pin it on WMD, we didn't bother to try and force Saddam out of power, and we still maintain that regime change was a fiction necessitated by WMD.
Saddam was a complete asshole, but our diplomatic efforts surrounding his removal were beyond terrible.
Anyways, these people (Iraqs) did not declare war on us. Infact, they never declared war on anyways.
Their autocratic fascist dictator declared war on Kuwait, and we only just now decided to end his rule.
A Comedy of Errors.
-- WhiteWolf666 an exBush supporter. All you new-school,compassionate,save the children Republicans can rot in hell
Slashdot Mirror
I think that this may get fusion closer becouse now the US can put more money into the international project instead of its own. One good project instead of two half good projects.
The fact that they are having one giant argument about where to put this thing, to the extent that it halted the process, is pathetic and shows how petty the countries involved are. It is obvious that they are not interested in the science and simply want to be able to say "look what we have".
Fusion has been "15-20 years away" for something like 30 years now, hasn't it? If it's not something, it's something else. Meanwhile, we have a massive fusion plant in the center of the solar system that's been operating maintenance free for eons and we're barely even exploiting it.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
It seems to me that fusion research in the US is never going to get decent levels of funding all the time that the Whitehouse is full of people with millions of dollars invested in oil companies.
You might be right, but remember there's really no such thing as an oil company. There are only energy companies. The smart ones recognize that, the dumb ones think it's all about oil. No-one wants oil. What they want is motive power.
Also remember that not much oil goes into power stations - mostly they're natural gas, coal nuclear, hydro, etc. Oil ends up in automobiles of one sort or another. Pitch it to Bush that Texas can provide all the oil the US needs and fusion will supply the rest and he can get the US out of the Middle East for good (barring support for Israel of course), and he'll jump at the chance, I reckon.
Like distributed computing, I think distributed power generation would work amazingly well. If there were millions and millions of homes generating power alongside our power plants (nukes, not dirty fossil fuel plants), we could achieve energy independence from foreign nations, reduce fossil fuel dependence, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions from oil/coal buring powerplants.
The challenges are difficult to overcome, however.
The big oil and gas companies, of course, would lobby against any distributed power generation. I'm sure they don't want millions of solar powered homes. There is no money in it for them.
Solar panels are, I think, relatively inefficient and expensive. Their efficacy would need to be boosted and the price would have to go down.
I can see a day, though, when everyone is generating everyone's power through distributed generation. It's cheaper, greener, and it just makes sense... which is probably why it will never happen.
The people of Iraq declared war on you on September 11th 2001?
References please.
Don't be so dense.
Iraq != Taliban, or Al-Qaeda.
I agree with the war in Iraq, however, for entire different reasons.
Get your shit straight, and then it will make more sense.
U.S. has maintained a virtual occupation (containment) of Iraq since Desert Storm 1. We had no exit strategy.
We could have either a) left the area, pulled out our planes, and let Saddam did as he wanted, b) invaded, and force regime change, or c) maintain the SQ, shooting SAM sites, and occasionally have a plane shot down by Saddam's troops.
My opinion, B) was the best idea.
Unfortunately, we didn't consult the international community, we decided to pin it on WMD, we didn't bother to try and force Saddam out of power, and we still maintain that regime change was a fiction necessitated by WMD.
Saddam was a complete asshole, but our diplomatic efforts surrounding his removal were beyond terrible.
Anyways, these people (Iraqs) did not declare war on us. Infact, they never declared war on anyways.
Their autocratic fascist dictator declared war on Kuwait, and we only just now decided to end his rule.
A Comedy of Errors.
WhiteWolf666 an exBush supporter. All you new-school,compassionate,save the children Republicans can rot in hell