Slashdot Mirror
Thermonuclear Reactor To Use Coconut Shells
destinyland writes "A key component of a $10 billion nuclear fusion plant is vintage 2002 Indonesian coconut-shell charcoal. After a 20-year search, German researchers discovered that the coconut-shell charcoal is the best medium for 'adsorbing' waste byproducts sucked out of the thermonuclear reactor's vacuum chamber. In what will be the first fusion power facility that's commercially viable, magnetic fields will heat hydrogen isotopes to over 150 million degrees Centigrade. (Essentially, the super-hot plasma creates artificial stars.) As the article points out, 'It's not quite a Starship warp drive, but it does harness the power of the sun.'"
That's not a horse, you're just bangin' two coconuts together!
Has the old saint in his forest not yet heard of it? That God is dead?
The head of the project, a former professor, was heard mumbling "Gilligan won't mess it up this time."
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.
...is the bamboo bicycle used to remove the atmosphere of the vacuum chamber.
I remember this one. The professor made the Thermonuclear reactor with a bunch of coconuts, financed, of course, by the Howell's... but then Gilligan saw Ginger...got all flustered and tripped over the whole thing causing a meltdown and the Skipper's hair to glow... yeah, that's a classic episode indeed
Karma: Excellent. 15 moderator points expire sometime.
Laden or unladen?
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
My vintage Casio calculator harnessed the power of the sun. This, not so much.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Heavily laden hopefully.
I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it!
It says the fuel is deuterium and tritium, how hazardous are those?
Oh, EXTREMELY hazardous. Both substances have similar properties to a highly volatile chemical that has in past resulted in some spectacular explosions. OH THE HUMANITY! ;)
If fate makes you a motorcycle, you become a motorcycle.
Fusion reactor? You've got two empty halves of a coconut and you're bangin' em together!
Boooooooring!
So they found the best activated carbon for their particular use comes from coconut shells. Why is this news?
Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
Cool is, perhaps, the wrong word.
A slashdotter who didn't build his own computer is like a Jedi who didn't build his own lightsaber.
For those of you who dont want to read the article..this is what I got out of it....
[wind]
[clop clop]
ARTHUR: Whoa there!
[clop clop]
GUARD #1: Halt! Who goes there?
ARTHUR: It is I, Christian Day, Scientist, from theKarlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany. King of the physicist, defeator of the Saxons, sovereign
of all Germany!
GUARD #1: Pull the other one!
ARTHUR: I am. And this my trusty servant Lovelock.
We have ridden the length and breadth of the land in search of knights
who will join me in my court of Camelot. I must speak with your lord
and master.
GUARD #1: What, ridden on a horse?
ARTHUR: Yes!
GUARD #1: You're using coconuts!
ARTHUR: What?
GUARD #1: You've got two empty halves of coconut and you're bangin'
'em together.
ARTHUR: So? We have ridden since the snows of winter covered this
land, through the kingdom of Mercea, through--
GUARD #1: Where'd you get the coconut?
ARTHUR: We found them.
GUARD #1: Found them? In Mercea? The coconut's tropical!
ARTHUR: What do you mean?
GUARD #1: Well, this is a temperate zone.
ARTHUR: The swallow may fly south with the sun or the house martin
or the plumber may seek warmer climes in winter yet these are not
strangers to our land.
GUARD #1: Are you suggesting coconuts migrate?
ARTHUR: Not at all, they could be carried.
GUARD #1: What -- a swallow carrying a coconut?
ARTHUR: It could grip it by the husk!
GUARD #1: It's not a question of where he grips it! It's a simple
question of weight ratios! A five ounce bird could not carry a 1 pound
coconut.
ARTHUR: Well, it doesn't matter. Will you go and tell your master
that Christian Day of Germany is here!
GUARD #1: Listen, in order to maintain air-speed velocity, a swallow
needs to beat its wings 43 times every second, right?
ARTHUR: Please!
GUARD #1: Am I right?
ARTHUR: I'm not interested!
GUARD #2: It could be carried by an African swallow!
GUARD #1: Oh, yeah, an African swallow maybe, but not a European
swallow, that's my point.
GUARD #2: Oh, yeah, I agree with that...
ARTHUR: Will you ask your master if he wants to join my court
at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany?!
GUARD #1: But then of course African swallows are not migratory.
GUARD #2: Oh, yeah...
GUARD #1: So they couldn't bring a coconut back anyway...
[clop clop]
GUARD #2: Wait a minute -- supposing two swallows carried it together?
GUARD #1: No, they'd have to have it on a line.
GUARD #2: Well, simple! They'd just use a standard creeper!
GUARD #1: What, held under the dorsal guiding feathers?
GUARD #2: Well, why not?
Since the by-product is helium, a reactor leak would only mean that any nearby residents would talk like Mickey Mouse for a little while. Which is better than radiation sickness.
Until you get sued by Disney for trademark infringement...
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
You'd like that, wouldn't you? No chance, buddy. You're going to get at least 50 identical "absorb != adsorb" replies, each one more original than the last.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
You put the superheated hydrogen particles in the coconut, and adsorb it all up.
I don't know if fusion has radioactive waste since it deals with light elements, but, I found a business (watertorch.com) that says its product neutralizes radioactive waste. Why would we want to turn Hydrogen into Helium anyway, we can't remake it because it takes too high of temperatures. Therefore, we should stick with fission and neutralize the radioactive waste with the Water Torch.
Well, at least TSA isn't letting you carry it through security anymore...
MCSE? No, sir...I don't do Windows. Yes, I am an idealist. What's your point?