Slashdot Mirror
Lightning Fusion And Other Hot News
DumbSwede writes "PhysOrg.com reports that according to calculations by B.M. Kuzhevsky, the head of the neutron research lab at Moscow State University, neutron levels far above normal background levels exist during lightning strikes. While only a small percentage of rainwater contains atoms of deuterium, the lightning still provides enough energy to create fusion events. Frequent Slashdot readers no doubt remember recent articles on Fusion induced by sonic compression and more recently by pyroelectric effect. Perhaps more controversially, and yet to be discussed on Slashdot, the NIF has possible plans for a hybrid fusion approach that uses not only deuterium and tritium, but uranium and plutonium as well in what amounts to a miniaturized version of how thermonuclear weapons achieve fusion. Fears are that this could lead directly to micro-H-bombs. This year has also seen the final selection of France for the ITER experimental Fusion Reactor site. With all the recent discoveries and developments in fusion research, my question for Slashdotters - are we on the verge of something big that will make fusion a practical reality in a much shorter time frame than the often quoted '30 years away, and always will be'?"
There are always a decent number of promising looking new strains of scientific research, in every field. The trouble is that all of these have a huge washout rate. Each will be developed into usable products over thirty years, if we can discover how to apply what we've learned today in a practical way. The trouble is that the application will always require a whole host of other discoveries, and plenty of tedious implementation research - and if anything goes wrong along the way, the idea will wash out.
All the past discoveries looked just as promising as anything you see today. They didn't pan out yet. Today's look good today. They're worth following up on. But nobody can just tell you if these things will be workable in the end - that's what the years of research are for.
Think about it - we're (the U.S.) spending $1 Billion a week to sustain our troops in Iraq. On top of that we spending a fortune here on the 'home front' (LOL) and in other places around the world where we are busy meddling around. Now, take that $52 Billion ++ and spend it on cold fusion research - voila! Five years later nobody needs to be dying for foreign oil anymore.
I know it sounds so crazy - it could actually work! But hey, all those GWB cronies wouldn't be able to buy Hummers for their 18 year old daughters anymore... Looks like we'll have to wait until after we invaded every oil exporting country on the planet... sigh...
(How's that for a trollish Subject line!!)
The theory goes like this:
Environmental lobyists successfully made nuclear power unpopular. They did this by beating up the dangers of accidents, and the difficulties of storing the waste products until we work out what to do with them. 200 years at the outside, not the x million year half-life. By so doing, they stifled the development that would have lead to much safer, more efficient systems. As an example, the pebble bed systems being developed in China.
With nuclear power out of the equation, we had to turn to other areas. This meant the only viable scheme for baseload power generation: Fossil fuels. Mainly coal. No, do not talk about renewables. Solar is far too expensive and inefficient, wind would require so many turbines it would cause climate change, and, while hydro power has proved succesfull in countries that are geographically suitable, just you try damming a river these days!
Replacing nuclear with coal was thought to be a win, as it would be a decade or so before they gathered enough evidence to prove the Greenhouse Effect. So, we continue to mine, ship and burn coal, a procedure which, incidentally, kills Chernobles of miners every year. (maybe I exagerate: figures, anyone?)
So we reach today. CO2 being pumped into the atmosphere by the gigatonne, the temperature inexorably rising, and the nuclear solution still a dirty word. Well done, Greenpeace!!
Prediction for end of Universe #42: Fencepost error in Quantum_bogosort.cpp
NZ doesnt need fission reactors if the lake levels are managed correctly. Theres room for more wind turbines, and more exploitation of the geothermal fields.
Even the ITER people are willing to admit commercial fusion power is at least fifty (not thirty) years away, and companies just don't operate in those kinds of timeframes. As a shareholder, why would I care about profits that wont come until I'm long dead?
In terms of government funded research, you really have diminishing returns at some point. You fund the most promising research with your first dollar, and you move on to less and less promising research as the budget increases. At some point you're just wasting money, and it's not clear to me we haven't reached that point already under current budgets. How many high energy physicists out there had original ideas this year that didn't get funded?
It's a sorry state of affairs, I know, but until governments wake up and smell the crude oil we're fucked.
This is kind of a silly statement to make in a democracy - governments are a reflection of the electorate. The US government will have whatever energy policy the people demand. One of the things fusion researchers have done really poorly in recent years is sell a comelling vision to the public, and Until that happens there won't be many policy changes. What have you done lately to change the status quo?
In order to use nuclear power in a widespread fashion, we'd relaly have to have fast breeder reactors, to extend the lifetime of our supply of fissionable materials.
The problem is that fast breeder reactors are perfect for making weapons-grade Plutonium too.
So although I very much lament how poorly most people understand nuclear power and how they don't understand how much cleaner it is than any alternative (except solar), there are other impediments too.
I have to say I found it hilarious that North Korea demanded the US build them a light-water reactor. We suck at power reactors. They should ask the French to help them build one of their reactor types instead. Better yet, get the French to make you a pebble-bed reactor.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
you'd realize how lucky we've been there haven't been numerous meltdowns.
We've had one meltdown in the commercial reactors in the US that was due to not following procedure and about ~30 something things going wrong simultaniously. Radiation released to the public was about the amount you'd get on a couple cross country flights. We don't have a problem with this in the US.
There is no way for us to generate more plutoniam or uranium. Once it's gone.. that's it.
Only because Carter banned breeder reactors in the US. With them, we could refine and reuse what is currently defined as "nuclear waste".
But it was simple economics that stalled the nuclear power program.
Along with all the anti-nuclear bias floating around in the US that has been promoted.
Nuclear plants can be built more safely now than in the 50s and 60s, but up until just now they haven't been economically competitive with natural gas-fired plants. Industry makes its investments where it can make the best return.
See above. Idiot protesters can shut down/delay/hassle a program to make it un-economical as easily as anything else. Why should they try (although one group is trying to build one), when protest groups will delay it into oblivion. Industry will try best return with the least hassle. Natural gas just doesn't have the hassle that nuclear does, even though it produces CO2 and nuclear doesn't.
Yes, there could have been more nuclear plants built meanwhile, if nobody had cared about safety (which is expensive to build in), either in terms of potential catastrophe or radioactive releases.
Again, look at 3 mile island and all that led up to its problem. We have built them safley and 3 mile island is about the worst that can happen.
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
Think of capitalist complaints against communism. They complain that a communist society offers no incentive for innovation. With advances in robotics and food technology, there would be no incentive for innovation if the world had free power, except innovation for its own sake. What could you possibly offer someone who can already control an army of robots to make anything he wants?
I'm not paranoid enough to claim that current governments and corporations realize the radical implications of free energy and are trying to suppress it.[1] But this is something they will come to think about once the technology begins to blossom. And they will suppress it until they figure out how to sustain the current socioeconomic paradigm.
And they will do it by attempting to control the flow of information. Expect to see a flurry of laws limiting robotics technology to corporations for "public safety." Expect to see more DMCA style laws to protect "intellectual property." This is a sham. The concept of intellectual property requires material scarcity in order to be relevant. Indeed, aside from praise, why should an artist/engineer/designer be given anything if every material need and desire is satisfied? And what would be the value of anything we give if it cost us nothing?
Sadly, I think few will have the foresight to work for such a future.
[1]Though with obvious possibility of cheap nuclear power, I have my doubts. Waste can easily be disposed by launching rockets to the sun and we'd still save money on energy.
After all, I am strangely colored.
: Is it worthwhile to limit the advances of potentially destructive sciences like this one or is it an inevitability?
The problem with limiting study of subjects such as this (or stem cells, or anything else) is that there will always be someone or a group of someones who will not obey they limits.
I.e. Congress may pass laws to forbid US researchers from studying stem cells but foreign powers have no such problems and will push their scientists to pursue the goals. Net result is that the foreign powers have the potentially very powerful technology and the US does not. But we've held the moral ground, by golly!
In the case of fusion from anything, you can bet every nation on the planet with any kind of military force -and probably many private companies- will be looking very carefully at this, if it seems like it will work.
If a group of nations stands back and says they won't allow the research, there will surely be plenty of nations which will allow it, and the research will still go on no matter what.
In the case of stem cells, we have already seen dozens of countries jump in on this. There is far too much to be gained, and honestly, what the US says or does is of decreasing concern to many countries.
Yeah, I'm probably going to blow my karma saying that. It's not anti-American to state the facts as they are. Oh well.
Sig for hire.
Keep in mind that the destructive potential of nuclear fusion has largely been already realized. Most of what we have left to learn is how to create controlled fusion.
>>you'd realize how lucky we've been there haven't been numerous meltdowns.
>
>We've had one meltdown in the commercial reactors in the US that was due to not following procedure and about ~30 >something things going wrong simultaniously. [...]
What part of "we've been lucky" are you too stupid to understand?