Is Fusion Power Possible?

I think Dr. R. Bussard's IEC Polywell is a very,very good candidate.

You Wrote:"Do you think fusion power is going to work?"

Well, considering it's what powers the Sun, I'd say yes.

Why stop at that question, I've got more:

1. Is it possible to remove the salt from salt-water?
2. Is it possible to mine the moon?
3. Can uninformed yet controversial questions be used to provoke discussion?

Sigh

Roger "The Hammer" Pink kills another one.

I think it's part of the penguinal conspiracy

Dang Garthh, you're everywhere , oh, and ALICE KOOPER RULES!

I saw the movie Troy in the theatre when it came out some years back. Troy is loosely based upon the Iliad. In other words, Hollywood took an epic poem that the classical Greeks, Romans, and in general western cultures consider one of the finest works of art ever produced and decided that the story wasn't compelling enough. They kept the shell of the story but rewrote events and sequences.

The movie was a smash success, making over 300,000,000 dollars in profit. I helped by buying that stupid movie ticket. Roger Ebert hated the movie (thank god for you Roger Ebert)

Somewhere there is a guy who thinks he was smart to make the decision that one of the masterpieces of all time needed a rewrite.

On the opposite end of the spectrum:

I like to watch the show Big Bang Theory. It's a sitcom about geeky physicists. It's very funny, and that's why I like it, but I love it because in the beginning they decided "even though 99% of our audience won't know any better, lets hire a good Physicist from a local university to make sure all the physics we reference and display is plausible". So in the background of scenes there are whiteboards of real equations, and when they talk about their research, it's actually possible research (the show isn't perfect, but they are honestly trying). They didn't need to do this, but they did it anyway. Sort of the Anti-Troy.

So whats my point?

I guess my point is that this blog topic was like the movie Troy to me, it will probably be successful, I contributed to that perceived success by posting, and it was definitely appealing to the lowest common denominator. I would have preferred a blog posting like "Big Bang Theory", or at the very least "The Office".

Oh admit it, you like watching Kaley Cuoco.

How about a couple of links to some of Rogers more infamous rants on the subject in no particular order

1

2

3

4

rate your favorite

Geez Roger don't hold back tell us how you really feel

We all rushed over here hoping for the big bang & didn't even get troy...

If I could have three things happen in my lifetime, they would be:

1. Fusion Power
2. Eradication of the Penguin Threat
3. ****not CR4 appropriate****

Chipmunks are the greater threat. Just think of the likes of Alvin Simon and Theodore. Or worse yet is a 16 week old German Shepard pup. I forgot that I had "Tupperware". It keeps on turning up and I am still trying to find out where it is coming from. She can open doors.

Chipmunks MMMMMMMMM

MELVIN!!!!!!!!

ACTUALLY, in fact chipmunks can be quite dangerous, "deadly even", if you are not smart enough to leave the sickly little critters alone, and this goes for ground squirrels marmots and prairie dogs as well. Bubonic plague has been eradicated in much of the world, but the fleas that harbor and spread this deadly decease are alive and well in the high sierras, and this is well publicized around the National Parks located in that region.

Regarding the Fusion issue, of course it will become a reality, all we have to do is to throw enough billions of dollars/euros/etc. at it, and create laws to force it into the system to make it profitable at some future time. It isn't really much different than burying a million or more miles of NG pipe line under ground where maintenance is very expensive,"eventually". The providers will simply work the power addition into the existing system and raise the cost to the consumer accordingly, and likely add a surcharge to cover the additional cost.

Speaking to the surcharge issue, I wonder just how much fuel is used by the power producers before they stick it to us with this "SURCHARGE". My bill shows the cost to me for the first 1000 watts used and then the increased price for the additional watts used at a higher price, then next it shows me the fuel surcharge for the first 1000 watts and the next line shows the fuel surcharge for the overage. However "ALL" fuel consumed seems to be wrapped up in this surcharge rip off, with none being assigned to general usage/losses. I pause to wonder just how much of this fuel goes into the maintenance vehicles and complimentary vehicles driven by the CE O's and other lucky folks. "I would like to know if they are double dipping by charging off this fuel as an expense for tax credit, and getting paid by the consumer as well."

"MY", understanding of the surcharge issue is that because the price of oil/asst fuels, and the cost to transport said fuels to the power producers was destabilized by OPEC and others a surcharge was allowed to be added to the energy use invoice to cover this fluctuating price. Some how though, even though the market for these fuels some times falls when the universal demand is reduced and the prices that are reflected at the "PUMP" fall accordingly, "THE FUEL SURCHARGE NEVER SEEMS TO REFLECT A LOWER PRICE TO THE CONSUMER." The power producers will tell you that they contract for a given amount of fuel at what ever maybe the current price, but no one believes that they don't use their leverage as a big user to get a price adjustment accordingly. It is simply good business! Show me the condiments, I already know where the beef is!

TMF

Yes, I understand exactly what you mean. The Trojans discovered fusion power , built the Sun and Hollywood is coming out with, Troy Trey: Now It's Personal, in 3D. Caution, may contain Ben Afleck and/or peanuts.

Awesome!

by the way, Love your writing.

Yeah, Hollywood doesn't make historical dramas anymore, they make adaptations of historical fiction comics. That's right 300, I'm going after you now.

During 300 I kept hoping 300 real spartans would just show up marching in lockstep, silent as death marching in perfect order, looking like regular guys and cut the fake comic book Spartans down, but it never happened. Instead I was treated to 2 hours of bluster, plot holes, and pecs.

The very worst Hollywood interpretation of a book I have ever seen, was The Naked and The Dead, originally by Norman Mailer.

Still a movie, is a different thing than a poem, a book or a play.

Kubrick's movie The Shinning is a work of art superior to the book.

Zeferrilli's Romeo and Juliet illustrates another directorial triumph for really two sword fights would have been unwieldy.

- I personally feel Shakespeare would have approved.

Some say that you are better to make a movie from a Short Story than from a Novel, for in the case of a Short Story you are expanding the story, instead of cutting and editing.

Some also say that the writer director, is typically not as good as the editor director, as writers tend to want to keep everything.

As far as CR4 Threads, well, some are just for fun, and intended as diversions while wandering around thinking of something else, more important, and possibly secret.

As far as what I have learned from this thread, Fusion is not so much the problem, as control of it.

Roger, my answers to your 3 questions would be:

1. Been doing it for years.......Noah probably had a solar de-sal unit on the ark.......unless he had some very large water tanks????

2. Would we need double hull tankers to transport oil.......in case of collisions.

3. Why not! Nothing like someone stirring the pot.......anything for a good laugh!!!

You Wrote:"3. Why not! Nothing like someone stirring the pot.......anything for a good laugh!!!"

Sure, why not. Here's a new question to "stir the pot".

4. Australia was originally a penal colony and since convicts tend to score lower on IQ tests and intelligence is to some degree inherited, is it safe to say all the people of Australia are dumber than the rest of the world?

Now we both know there's a thousand holes in my argument above, but I bet if I posted this as a thread I'd get tons of responses, so why shouldn't I? Because some idiots might actually believe the terribly flawed logic used above and go away with the mistaken belief that Australians are generally dumb (when in fact they are generally awesome), and that makes it an amoral means of getting an audience.

That's why I feel people shouldn't ask fact-less controversial questions to stir a debate. There's plenty of real things to debate.

That is not quite correct Roger.........South Australia was never a convict settlement and that's probably why we are always lagging behind the other states..........they must have sent all the smart convicts out here to N.S.W., Victoria, Tasmania, etc.

...........hmmmm!......maybe not........they were the ones who got caught stealing a loaf of bread or something similar.

........and that makes it an amoral means of getting an audience.

It often works though.

You Wrote:"It often works though."

Yes but is getting an audience really all that matters? A person can study their whole life learning the piano to get an audience, or they can simply take off their clothes, are those two people equal in peoples eyes?

Bang on

It will eventually happen. In my life time? Unknown.

Do you think fusion power is going to work?

As Roger pointed out, we know it works..look at the Sun. Perhaps a better question might be:

Do you think a practical and economically feasible application of fusion power will be available in 10, 20, 50 years?

As Roger pointed out, we know it works..look at the Sun.

Can I stop looking at the Sun now, I think my retinas are on fire?

What? It's 10:36PM, the Sun went down hours ago, oh, never mind.

We know that fusion power exists, since that is what powers the sun. If the billions that have been spent on attempting to harness fusion power on earth were spent on improving photovoltaic cells and replacing current energy forms, we would have no energy generation "problem".

Making it work commercially has the scientific community totally baffled. Fusion machines that reguire zillions of joules in for a trickle out are a joke. But for certain we need a working machine now .. not a hundred years in the future.

Yes, who would think that a technology we aren't investing in isn't making any progress. It's as if it takes money to do research.

I'd be interested in you "centuries" estimate. Does that mean Muon catalyzed fusion is hopeless?

Of course it is possible. We just haven't found out how, yet.

I'm not convinced that the "throw more power at it" approach is going to be directly productive, but it will tell us a lot more about the process.

Whatever happened to the "Fusor"? It looked promising, but then seemed to get swamped by bigger and bigger magnetic confinement machines, and later the inertial confinement method.

The electrostatic approach could well be worth revisiting.

Of course reasonable research funding would help.

I doubt that it will be a hundred years before fusion is a practical reality, maybe more like 50 or less, but I'm no prophet.

If we were desperate enough there is a "dirty" approach that could be used now.

Explode a fusion bomb underground. Reclaim the heat stored in the rocks by steam (preferably a closed circuit to prevent radiation contamination) and there is a fusion power plant.

I'm not sure we are desperate enough to go this route, and I certainly wouldn't recommend it, but it could be made to work.