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'?"
Dr. Emmett Brown: No no no, this sucker's electrical, but it requires a nuclear reaction to generate the 1.21 gigawatts of electricity I need.
So... what the article is saying is that Dr. Brown used the electricity from the lightning strike, instead of plutonium, to generate the nuclear reaction to generate the electricity to power the fluxcapacitor?
It all makes sense now?
We really shouldn't spare any resources researching and developing fusion power. It has the potential to solve many of our environmental and energy-scarcity problems in one fell swoop.
The development of fusion is more important than just about any other scientific project, as the abundance of cheap energy would enable other projects. And yet how much are governments/energy companies devoting to it? Less than what we spend securing a limited oil supply in an unstable part of the world. I wish we had more far-sighted, responsible leaders who are interested in more than lining their own pockets or winning the next election (pretty much the same thing).
And my answer for you, Zonk, as it frequently is for giant world-changing questions like these, is, "How the hell should I know? I'm a freakin' sysadmin."
Causation can cause correlation
(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