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A Step Closer To Cheap Nuclear Fusion
ewsnow writes "The Focus Fusion Society reports that the scientists and engineers at Lawrenceville Plasma Physics have finally built an operational Dense Plasma Focus device. While still at less than half power, they were able to achieve a pinch on their device. The small company that Eric Lerner started recently gathered enough funding to start a two-year study on the validity of his theory regarding fusion-inducing plasmoids. If the theory holds, the device will produce more electricity than it consumes. In contrast to the billions of dollars spent on Tokamak fusion (think ITER), LPP is conducting their research on a budget around a million dollars. Yet, if it works, it will provide nuclear fusion with much simpler equipment and much less cost. Eric Lerner and Focus Fusion have been discussed on Slashdot before."
Isn't that what they use on the sun!? I don't want that sort of thing in my backyard! what if the reaction gets out of control and it annihilates the entire solar system!? What are we going to do with all of the nucular waste?
Folks, can we pretty please think of another name for this stuff? 50 years worth of misinformation is, I fear, holding us back. People here the word "nuclear" and immediately start shitting their pants with fear.
I vote we call it "Hydrogen Energy". After all, hydrogen is 2/3 of the ingredients in water!
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This is great news! If this works, I'll be able to install a Mr. Fusion device on my DeLorean, which should be able to generate the 1.21 Gigawatts of electricity that I need to run my flux capacitor! I'll no longer need to steal Plutonium from the Iranians! ;-)
I hear Fusion has moved from "Always being 10 years away" to "Always being 5 years away." Great progress!
Earth has moved one step nearer to the Sun?
Your post is the fusion of moron.
get it?
But wait, you're producing helium? Think about the environmental impact! Millions of adults walking around talking like chipmunks all the time! Won't someone think of the children!?!
:-D
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Nuclear magnetic resonance? God man don't you know how dangerous that is, it's got nuclear right in the name. You can only guess how many extra limbs you'd get from that. Now if you'll excuse me I have to get ready for my MRI tomorrow:)
Did you know 80 to 90% of the moderators on slashdot wouldn't recognize a troll even if one dragged them under a bridge.
I'm concerned about the idea of 'endless growth in a finite world' that cheap food and energy seem to sustain. If the world population was the same now as it was before the green revolution (2 billion or so) everything would be rosy. That is is now 6.8 billion, set for 7 billion in 2012 and utterly dependent on fossil-fuel centered food production is a worry for me.
With cheap energy and cheap food we could hand the poor a bag lunch and then shoot them into space. I'm thinking massive rail gun.
Got any other little problems you want solved?
As my boss was fond of saying, before I strangled him, "Don't bring me a problem unless you're bringing a solution with it."
So, get to work on a solution! I'm thinking massive rail gun...
Wow. Thats one scientific quip there. Not one star in the sky is toroidal, but not one star in the sky can be kept in a building in the south of France...
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
Does it please you to believe I am guessing that a new nlp ai has been given mod points?
"it leaks something radioactive so it must be very dangerous" - well, except it's not, as you will be irradiated more by decaying potassium-40 in the body of a girl you're sleeping with than by most tritium leaks
Those of us not sleeping with a girl take exception to that comparison.
Could you please put that in time of CRT exposure? Or some other more comprehensible metric?
I always thought that KDE had a tendency towards including a bit too much in the desktop environment but this is extreme. Come on Kdevs, leave the fusion to physicists.
So if this is the future...where's my jet pack?
If a Ford is better car than a Chevvy, that doesnt make it a good car!
There ya go!
This means fusion is now 9.5 years away?
Understanding the scope of the problem is the first step on the path to true panic.
If you hit a moron atom with high-speed nerdtron you get two hilarions.
Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
Plus, with all that Helium being produced, the cost of party balloons will fall dramatically.
Finally had enough. Come see us over at https://soylentnews.org/