Fusion Power, A Dream Deferred

Unfortunately about the only serious tech funding comes for military applications, this has been the case for centuries.

More thoughts on fusion power:

http://www.ofes.fusion.doe.gov/More_HTML/Artsimovich/PKKawPaper.html

Steve,

That's a fantastic link, thanks. Everyone should take the time to read it. If anyone here reads it, keep in mind it was written in 1992. Also, notice that the price of gas back then was .82 per gallon. Man, those were the days. Nothing like filling a car up for less than 10 bucks.

Thanks.

Yes, unfortunately the military does dictate what technologies get funded. What I wish people would see is that if instead of cutting taxes to stimulate business growth, with energy costs that can range from 10% to 30% of costs for a business, developing cheap plentiful energy would be like introducing a massive tax cut for businesses (without devaluing our currency due to deficit spending). It would spur a giant bull market.

Steve

Great link. Agree with Roger, everyone should read it. The fact that he saw the issues so clearly in 1992 makes it more special. The world's response - turn food crops into liquid fuel and subsidise it. We must be smoking something.

I read the presentation on fusion versus other sources of mass power from a paper presented at a meeting held in Germany on the topic of plasma/fusion etc in Wurtzburg 1992 CE..So indeed the values of oil/coal based feedstocks has changed..The market goes where the strongest salesmanship takes it...Larger concerns have larger salesmanship and hence generally greater market penetration..If fusion is really the better option it must be sold to the market.I attended a talk byBill Atkinson in Guelph in late September of 2008 CE on the subject of Nanotechnology..Bill A. is a science writer of note and recently finished a book on nano-technology..A brief summary from my brief notes(i still do this out of habit and actually go back to them if i've managed to keep them available)..Mitsubishi a rather large corporate behemoth plans 300 years ahead..1 goal is to be the leader in Nanotechnology...Lipids are important to life...We all have ideas but if you don't have a product to sell they are just ideas.. Bill A believes "innovation is who we (humans) are..It is in our genes..Big firms(Mitsubishi,GE,Siemens,etc)are paranoid when it comes to information sharing.....especially innovation as it can affect income quickly if a successful innovation is shared around.

.Now i slip to my own rant much like the Beat days of Alan Ginsberg and his famous "Howl"longer poem....from the beatnik era..

To quote Nietsche.."Knowledge is power"..

The threat to established large salesforces(producers of products/services/religions etc..)is really going to come from internet type communications where ideas and sometimes real tried factual examples of the ideas are shared freely..Free-er energy will eventuate when power/money over a system based on the belief that there isn't enough of either to go around slips into the quagmire of history replaced not by socialism which still requires power strucutres to avoid anarchy but by an all encompassing joy of sharing the knowledge of all that is of which there is a great deal indeed.... Regards,Marty Wolf one who is hopeful that the future will be even better than the present

You wrote: "The market goes where the strongest salesmanship takes it...Larger concerns have larger salesmanship and hence generally greater market penetration..If fusion is really the better option it must be sold to the market."

How do you sell Fusion to a society that has essentially turned its back on science? People in this country take pride in their misconceptions. This is a country that has leaders that question Evolution! A country where the business leaders form a consortium that makes $200 dollar laptops for sub-saharan Africa. There is no common sense or informed discussion. There is no one to sell.

Another great thread.

Unfortunately there seems to be little interest

The problem is more than marketing.

Organizations stay in their comfort zones.

Look at health care. Futilely holding on to paper records, because it's the way they've always done it. Most other industries have @ least reluctantly embraced Information technology, seeing how it could lower costs.

The bottom line.

How to sell a technology that will, cause seismic shifts in most industries.

How are the good ol' boys gonna get paid?

On top of the point you made about 50yrs not yielding any breakthrough!

The $700 billion that is getting pissed away bailing out greedy bankers & braindead borrowers, would go a long way. But noo! Bullshit wars against tactics, not enemies, take precedence. But look haliburton & blackwater got paid so it must make sense to devalue the entire world economy. [I'm frothing now so I'll stop]

Success yields success, implies failure yielding failure. Momentum takes over.

Energy is never going to be as cheap as it was. This is the glimmer of hope for the future of fusion.

Fusion is the hydrogen economy we should be pursuing.

The $700 billion that is getting pissed away bailing out greedy bankers.............

With this I agree entirely however you all are looking at this from a "Western" viewpoint, completely forgetting, or totally ignorant off, the great interest China is taking in Fusion Power, both in China and in participation in Europe.

China's foreign trade reserves make this $700 billion look like chicken feed and as of last month stood at $1.9 trillion, so accordingly China is spending money like it is going out of fashion on such things as High Speed Trains 300km/h +, Space Technology - curently a mapping satellite around the moon and the recent Space Walk, with a view to their own Space Station and Moon Colony - AND FUSION POWER.

China already has had a sustained Fusion Power reaction lasting 1000 seconds and will be progressing further soon.

China is determined to be the first World Power to have a sustained Fusion Reactor power plant.

China will then be in a position to be independent entirely from Oil and coal and gas power, for all industrial and domestic electricity needs - this on top of their existing extensive, and growing larger each year, Hydroelectric installations with 500kv distribution system and large Wind Farms.

Money for research for these sorts of fields is well funded, because China's leaders fully appreciate the urgent necessity for it, but also look very far into the future - after all Chinese Society has extended so far over more the 5000 years and the Chinese people see no reason why it should not extend for another 5000 years

I am neither ignorant nor forgetting that China is heavily invested in Fusion. I have spoken of it in many threads:

http://cr4.globalspec.com/thread/2283

http://cr4.globalspec.com/thread/2670

I'm not interested in waiting for other countries to lead. I'm an American and I want America to lead. We have the most money and the best institutions in the world, though Europe may overtake us if we don't get our act together. If anyone is gonna do it, it should be us.

If the Chinese do it, more power to them, I just try not to get too hyped up about China and India, lets see how they are doing when the world is in recession.

I do not know about India, but from my observations in China and seeing at first hand the way Beijing is taking the initiative in just about ANY field from MIND GAMES - chess et alia - to International Relations in ALL its variations - to Sustainable Energy, to Greening the Wilderness, to "Banishing Poverty" to whatever, all this while America and the rest of the world writhe in agony as financial markets, built soley on Greed and Debt, collapse around their ears - all this, while China sails relatively calmly on buoyed in the demonstrable knowledge that its economy is not suffering from this peculialy Western financial disease known as Recession, or even Depression, and that it has enough financial resources to probably bail out the West, not that I expect that it would do more that what the Central Government sees as being in China's Best Interests in both the short term - 6 months or so - and the LONG TERM, measured in 10's of years or even centuries.

No one in America at the moment can plan any further ahead than the November elections, much less be able to plan for ten or twenty years from now, with any realistic hope of achieving their goals.

By which time China will have total control of the Fusion Power market and the West will be thinking sadly of "What might have been" if only............

Ha, we'll see.

Ha, we'll see.

Yesterday. October 26, China Central Government announced the provision of 2 trillion yuan (approximately US$300 billion) for new railway construction to be completed by 2010.

This new work will increase the Chinese rail system from its present length of about 75,000 km to about 90,000 km.

Most of this new track will be twin track and ELECTRIFIED.

Can you wait until year 2020?

Then with the 2020 clarity of hindsight you will see further evidence.

China even now is "laying" the ground work for it's ultimate dependency upon electricity derived entirely form Fusion Power assoxciated with Renewable sources such as Hydropower and Windpower.

You Wrote "Yesterday. October 26, China Central Government announced the provision of 2 trillion yuan (approximately US$300 billion) for new railway construction to be completed by 2010."

Wow, remember when the United States did that? Back in 1870s and 1880s. Man president Grant was on his game back then. This means China is on track to have an Interprovince Highway System within the next 75 years. Man, they are really catching up.

Sorry, I couldn't resist. Look all sarcasm aside, they say they want to do everything, but they can't afford to do everything. They want a space program, they have a giant military, they are investing in infrastructure, they are investing in pollution controls, they are investing in every kind of energy imaginable, etc. etc. Look at it this way, if you knew a guy who had been out of work for 20 years and has finally managed to get a job and hold if for say 2 years. Would you believe him when he told you about how he was going to buy a car, a house, a boat, etc, or would you say, "lets just see if you can hold on to the job for a few more years before you start going crazy with the money". Are you seeing my point yet?

Of course china is affected by global financial conditions, they can't afford to have their export markets collapsing. Most their of current prosperity is financed by the huge transfer of wealth, exports provide. china's huge population requires this influx of assets to continue raising their standard of living. China's zero population growth policies will escalate their need for growth to care for the aging population. Less & less people of working age, having to provide for more & more aged citizens.

Excellent points Garthh, especially the massive older generation that will have to be cared for.

The point of course is that China's growth, while impressive, and GDP, while growing, is miniscule compared to the U.S. or European Union. Consider the following:

I'm afraid many have mistaken big headlines for reality. As you can see above, China isn't nearly the economic power they are so often presented as. I swear, these minor players get so uppity as soon as they start getting some press. Someone should let them know they're a fad.

Also, while we're on the subject of small countries out of their league, I think Abu Dhabi should stop spending all their income on Cristal, Bentley's, Sky Scrapers, and Artificial Islands. They are gonna regret all of this when the price of oil comes down.

These are 2005 figures - China 5%.

2007 - China 7.7% - figures published this week by China Bureau of Statistics.

No mention of what USA has fallen to, but China still no 4 in World GDP - figures for 2008 to September show % still above 7%

Are you kidding me? Fine, here is a list of 2007 GDP by country. You'll see that China's contribution to world GDP was only 5.8% in 2007. Not nearly the 7.7% you're claiming. As I have said before, China's delusions of grandeur aside, it's the U.S. and Europe that account for 56% of world GDP who are important. China is only of consequence due to their effect on displacement from economic equilibrium. The economic equilibrium of the U.S. and Europe.

You'll see the following:

Total World GDP - 54.6 Trillion

European Union - 16.9 Trillion (30.9%)
U.S. - 13.8 Trillion (25.3%)
Japan - 4.3 Trillion (7.8%)
Germany - 3.3 Trillion (6%)
China - 3.2 Trillion (5.8%)
U.K. - 2.8 Trillion (5.1%)
France - 2.6 Trillion (4.8%)
Italy - 2.1 Trillion (3.8%)
Spain -1.4 Trillion (2.6%)
Canada - 1.4 Trillion (2.6%)
Brazil - 1.3 Trillion (2.4%)
Russia - 1.3 Trillion (2.4%)

So you see, if there is going to be innovation and development in science, it's going to have to come from the U.S. or Europe as they hold over 50% of the worlds resources.

One other thing, not as a response to you, but to anyone else reading this post. Take a good hard look at those numbers and then consider that the U.S. and Europe have only 16% of the world population. Think about that, 56% of the worlds GDP by only 16% of the world. The next you feel superior to anyone outside of Europe or U.S. for any reason, you think real long and hard about the implicit advantage you had being born in one of those places. The truth is, if the wealth of the world was distributed more equitably, the world would be a less violent place, unless of course you believe that peace and prosperity don't go hand in hand, but equitable division of wealth isn't human nature is it? 80/20 rule and all (power law distributions for those of you with a clue). Just something to think about if you catch yourself feeling superior. There is nothing superior about winning the lottery, it's just luck. To be clear, I don't think that dividing wealth equally is practical, as I said, it isn't human nature, still, we don't need to act all Marie Antoinette either, do we? For instance selling $200 dollar laptops to people who don't have drinking water and calling it charity, even with the best of intentions, is still unbelievably clueless.

Be that as it may, #4 position is not too bad considering 50 years ago China was just about bottom on the scale, but since this discussion was supposed to be about Fusion Power development, it is very interesting to note that today, October 28, the Chinese Government released an Official Policy on the subject of Climate Change.

This Policy calls for increased emphasis and action on the TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENT OF RENEWABLE ENERGY (read Hydro Power, wind power etc) and SUSTAINABLE ENERGY (read Fusion Power).

This places Fusion Power development firmly on the official agenda in China.

hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm!

I guess you've already forgotten the links I posted earlier in this thread where I pointed to posts of discussions from over a year ago regarding China's fusion program.

Yes China's economic growth has been impressive, and yes they have announced a ton of programs, including a space program, a fusion program, an infrastructure program, etc. However they assume a 10% annual growth rate for the next several decades in order to produce the cash necessary to fund these programs. This is completely unrealistic and when that becomes clear to the central government, they will be forced to make all kinds of budget cuts.

Anyone can "say" they'll do something, but whether or not they have or will have the means to do that something is another story.

Hopefully I'm wrong. Hopefully the Chinese develope Fusion power and share the technology with the rest of the world spurring a huge growth in the world economy. Still, I'd feel a lot better if the U.S. would bother to invest in this important technology.

"... it's going to have to come from the U.S. or Europe as they hold over 50% of the worlds resources."

Don't confuse GDP with resources. Funds spent gambling in Las Vegas, or for shyster lawyers, or for presidential campaigns all count as GDP, but there is nothing resourceful or "wealth" about them. The "$700 Billion bail-out" will create nothing of value (nothing you can eat, drink, wear, drive, live in, or build fusion facilities out of) but will lead to about $14 Trillion (roughly $140,000 per American family) in new credit, further fueling inflation. More fiat money is not a "resource".

I apologize, I should have used the term "wealth".

Look up wealth in wikipedia and you will find the following:

"Adam Smith, in his seminal work The Wealth of Nations, described wealth as "the annual produce of the land and labour of the society"

Look up GDP in wikipedia and you find the following:

"GDP is defined as the total market value of all final goods and services produced within the country in a given period of time"

Hopefully that clears things up for you. GDP is measuring the wealth of a nation, not resources. I used the term resources too loosely since it has an entirely different meaning in economics, however within the context of what was written above I think you can see I meant wealth. If not, now you know.

"GDP is measuring the wealth of a nation, not resources. I used the term resources too loosely since it has an entirely different meaning in economics, however within the context of what was written above I think you can see I meant wealth."

OK, let's use wealth, "the annual produce of the land and labour of the society."

What "produce" does shuffling money produce? Doubling the money supply, and doubling the GDP, does not produce more (land and labour do that). You cannot consume what has not been produced, and you cannot feed fusion scientists and build superconducting magnets with paper money. The bail-out will increase GDP, but it won't increase wealth, unless someone will take the money in exchange for productive labor. Presumably China does not spend its dollars on parties and party girls and vaporous "assets", as Wall St. does; they build things, produce.

Yes indeed - the Chinese produce, and usually produce on time or better - yesterday it was announced that all the major construction work on the Three Gorges dam, is complete - ONE year ahead of schedule and all Generators ar producing at full capacity - nearly all at 750Mw with transmission at 500kv - DC to Shanghai and some other places, and AC to the southern regions.

The one major work yet to complete is the Ship Lift, I think, scheduled for 2012.

All this and more, like the 30km ocean bridge, etc.

I will never cease to be amazed by the amount of false information continually spread as fact. Here is a link on three gorges dam, as you can seem, much of your claims are exaggerated or false.

And wasn't there a massive recall of Chinese toys? And wasn't there a major outbreak of poisoning in China from milk?

Seriously people, the chinese have done remarkable things and I have no doubt that their country will eventually develop into an economic powerhouse, but it will take time. Stop regurgitating what you see on t.v. and do some reading.

So now Wikipedia and eye witness accounts from Engineers associated with Three Gorges, plus Bureau of Statistics of power generated and delivered are all crap?

None so Blind as those who cannot see.

Roger

On my copy the link for the 3 gorges dam didn't come through.

Will you pls repost it?

Regards

Wikipedia has a well balanced entry on the Three Gorges

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Gorges_Dam

Here are some excerpts from the link above:

"The dam was expected to be fully operational in 2009, but due to additional projects such as the underground power plant with 6 additional generators, and due to the complexity of the ship lift, the dam is not expected to become fully operational until about 2011.^[8]The dam will raise the water level the third time to its designed maximum water level (175 m above sea level) by the end of 2008."

http://www.chinadam.com/dam/facts.htm

Here is an excerpt from the link above:

Cost: The project is thought to have cost more than any other single construction project in history, with unofficial estimates as high as US$75 billion or more. Supporters reported, however, that the plan is within its US$25 billion budget and insisted early on that the project would pay for itself through electricity generation. To some, this seems unlikely given that there is no current market for the electricity produced by Gezhouba dam, which is supposed to partially finance the project, as a result of a glut of electricity from the closure of many state-owned enterprises (SOEs).

You should remember who it is that's telling us the costs came in "under budget".

Well we can all read and i guess see that this thread is shifting to the power of wills and getting to the level of cat fights,which generaly are only hissing and screaming,from what i've observed over the years..Much ado about nothing so to speak..Money,Roger et al,appears to this observer of reality to be a means to an end...not an end to itself..The Chinese may be lying through their collective teeth or not..It doesn't matter ..At the end of the day there will be a dam and there are those that will miss the beauty/tranquillity of that part of planet earths local terrain/biome/geomorphology whatever..... well too damn bad...Maybe this is the crux of this thread...Is it the cost of fusion or the end result and its ultimate unknowable cost...Where money enters relationships be it interfamilial or at a distance trust seems to disapear quickly..We feel like someone is picking our back pockets and how dare they..WE need collective power and capacity to transmit(share) it as a species struggling to continue our joint development or we could go the other way and build unique fortified eneregy/food/fun filled islands (some would equate the all inclusive resorts dotting the shorelines of just about anywhere).Can we pay for it ?....Again money is like mathematics..an ambiguous filament of joint thought that has by convention some inherant utility to all of humanity provided we stick to the same base or else it becomes a babylonian mish-mash where we no longer understand each other and drift in to our indivdual rants. Regards,Marty Wolf

Don't do that please, don't soapbox on the relevance of my side discussion with cirreb217, characterizing our discussion and points as petty as a way of introducing your own take on the issue.

My point is that the U.S. and Europe account for 55% of the wealth of the world (at least), so if we want fusion, a massively expensive research and development project, to ever get off the ground, it's up to us to do it. I'm also pointing out that its nice that China has a fusion program, but if money tightens up for them in the future and they have to choose between feeding their people or fusion research, well, goodbye fusion research. China has a lot of catching up to do, it's a little to early for them to lead, though I respect their ambition, I'm just trying to be realistic here. Chinese students go to the U.S. and Europe to get Ph.D.s, the U.S. and Europeans don't go to China, this is just how it is right now. I know several Chinese people, I have a great deal of respect for them, this is not a reflection on them or their country. This is just how it is at the moment (this century).

Hello Roger Pink

I fully believe that fusion power is the future that the world should be striving to achieve at whatever the cost. I understand the extraordinary obstacles that need to be overcome if this dream is ever to be realized. The way things are going, we may have the ability to warp space/time before we achieve a sustained fusion reaction. I wholly hope that is Not the case.

As far as China beating us to the punch, it is fully possible that they may be able to accomplish this task ahead of us. This is simply due to the fact that a totally socialistic government that basically owns Everything may have the monetary resources to throw large piles of money at it.

Unfortunately, until our western governments wise up and decide that fusion is the way to go and lead the way by alloting large monetary grants to private enterprises, (instead of cutting back as is the current case), we may be taking a back seat.

We're having a hard enough time just convincing Our powers that be that there is an actual problem known as "global warming". Too much money greasing the palms of our elected officials to look the other way so we can keep filling the pockets of the large oil companies who aren't in Any hurry to change the status quo.

This is just my take on the situation as it now stands.

I certainly hope that things will change for the better on our part but, I'm not holding my breathe in anticipation. Who knows, maybe this will change with the next group taking control after our U.S. elections today. One can only hope.

Roger and any one else that is following this thread i am not pettifying anything...Just making an observation that was received negatively .I appreciate the insight gained from viewing your discussion (our discussion)...and remind you that earlier in the thread JET and ITER were thrown in to the broader picture and both projects receive funding from a global base including the USA and China and others with a desire to find the truth..Money is an obstacle as the technology requires inputs from many domains both of science and industry...Working together indicated an aknowledgement by the respective governments that this is truly a global effort making borders a bit less necessary as time passes..That is it.....

Marty Wolf...an irritant i guess

Marty Wolf (not an irritant ),

I appreciate your participation in this discussion. Maybe I can better explain my frustration with the current U.S. policy on Fusion by providing the following history of the U.S. contributions and commitments to ITER, the large Tokamak fusion generator in Europe. Below is only a subsection which can be found on the link. I hope anyone here truly eager to educate themselves regarding the true state of Fusion Research in this country will read the link completely. The link is to the webpage of David Pace, a graduate student in Plasma Physics at UCLA. It really is well done. Below is his comments on the funding of ITER by the U.S..

Cutting Funding Then and Now

The U.S. does not have a good track record in terms of support for ITER. In the late 1990's the U.S. joined ITER only to have withdrawn before 2000. While there were public statements about support for ITER, the Congress prevented any financial contributions when it came time to pay. When we left the project back then it endangered the entire program. The NewScientist published an article noting the poor economic state of the other member nations and predicted that the lack of U.S. funds would doom the project. The project did not die, however, probably because most other nations have more expensive electricity than the U.S. and are therefore more inclined to invest in fusion technology. In 2005, Japan's household electricity is reported to be approximately twice as expensive as that in the United States.

The U.S. rejoined the ITER project in 2003. Initially, it seemed that we would be more careful in making a commitment. Congressperson Sherwood Boehlert (R-NY) pushed an amendment through the House that called for the U.S. to delay the signing of any specific agreement until a plan for successfully completing the financial contribution was determined. During his speech to the House to argue his case, Representative Boehlert said,

"But ITER is expensive. The U.S. contribution is expected to exceed $1 billion. And I want to make sure that before we commit a dime to ITER that we have a consensus on how we will find that money."
"I am very, very tired of the U.S. signing on to international science agreements that we later come to regret. We're then left with the Hobson's choice – the Chairman will excuse the expression – the Hobson's choice of either reneging on our international agreement or funneling money into a project we don't actually need."

Unfortunately, this amendment only required a delay in the signing of an agreement. The extra time appears not to have made any difference because we rejoined the project and once again find ourselves withholding our contribution.

Congress is behind our failure to meet our commitment. Strangely enough, Boehlert predicted exactly what would happen with his quote above. He mentions the awful choice of either "reneging" on our agreement or spending the money on something that is unnecessary. When President Bush signed the bill that removed all money for ITER part of his statement included the following,

"I am disappointed in the way the Congress compiled this legislation, including abandoning the goal I set early this year to reduce the number and cost of earmarks by half. Instead, the Congress dropped into the bill nearly 9,800 earmarks that total more than $10 billion."

Instead of honoring our international promises we have decided, through congressional action, to leave our partners millions of dollars short. If we truly leave ITER completely, then we will keep over one billion dollars from the project. It should be noted that Boehlert was not talking about earmarks and pork-barrel projects in his speech, he actually suggested that ITER might be the unnecessary project. Still, even though not all earmarks have to be wasteful just a small percentage of the $10 billion set aside for these projects could have fulfilled our role in something to which we have already agreed. In fact, in an era where the U.S. does not always engender a favorable image in the international community we could have taken a slightly larger portion of this pot and over-contributed to the project as a sign of our desire to participate in cooperative endeavors. This is an election year, however, so no one should expect a politician to willingly divert funds away from their local districts.

The combined effects of a downward moving economy, incredible financial burden of multiple military exercises, and the coming election leaves it incredibly unlikely that ITER will be funded. Congress is ending our involvement in the project as they did previously.

The Dam is fullu operational NOW - as I said before - ONE YEAR ahead of schedule.

All construction work on the DAM is complete, and the water level is at it's designed height, as of October, 2008.

The Ship Lift, which is of secondary importance to Yangtze shipping, being mainly intended to enable the use of much larger vessels, will be completed by 2012.

The navigational lock system has been fully operational for many years and Yangtze shipping has increased considerably from previous levels.

ALL 750MW generators are installed and running, as well as the somewhat smaller ones.

Three Gorges electricity production was originally planned to be about 5% of China total electricity comsumption, but due to increased comsumption levels, this figure has fallen to about 3.5%

Additional Upstream Dams will significantly increase this proportion of Total Consumption, to an estimated 10%, as well as contribute to a significant reduction in silt intake to the main dam.

These upstream dams are expected to be all on-line by 2020, by when significant progress is expected to have been made in the development of Fusion Power.

All funding has been in cash, not Debt, so the "Wealth" increase is real, not fictitious.

I see. So it won't be finished for another 3 to 4 years because they are installing an additional 6 generators, which are going to cost additional money, yet it is done ahead of time and under cost.

I understand they are saying that it was done on time and under cost, but if you pay more money for it and it takes 4 more years to complete........I mean, 2008 wasn't the date for "phase 1" to be completed, the dam was supposed to be done by now. I'm not asking you to suspend belief here, just actually think about it for a second, does it make any sense that something is done ahead of schedule, yet won't be done till 2011, yet was scheduled to finish in 2008? Or have they changed the goal to make it come in on time (from "fully completed" to "functional").

The process used by the Chinese is a simple one and very common in bureaucracies.

If a program isn't up to scatch, change the definition of success so it is a success.

A few years ago, the NSW (Australian State) government were receiving a lot of flack because the Sydney suburban trains were usually late.

With much fanfare, they announced that the problem had been fixed. What they actually did was change the definition of a late train to "within 15 minutes of the advertised time". Suddenly less than 1% of the trains were late.

I suspect the Chinese have done a similar thing here. Part of the project was incomplete so they excluded it from the project and made it an addition which then enabled them to say the project was completed ahead of schedule.

To the Chinese government, appearance is paramount, irrespective of performance.

Having said this, the entire 3 Gorges project is a very impressive engineering undertaking and they have done well to have got as close to their target budget and time as they have (even if it is about 3x the original budget). It was a massive project.

Oh, I agree, the project was/is impressive. Their space program is impressive. The olympic opening ceremonies were impressive. They do a lot of impressive stuff.

I'm just trying to make the point that the Chinese are human beings, just like us. If you ask two human beings to 'build a car', but you give one of them 10,000 dollars and the other 500 dollars, chances are it will be the guy with 10,000 dollars who gets the job done faster and better. This doesn't mean the other guy is incapable of doing it just as well, but given such a financial disadvantage, it's going to take him longer and he isn't going to have as good of parts to work with.

I see the Honorable Gentleman still is unable to read plain English - ALL CONSTRUCTIONAL WORK on the dam has been completed by October, 2008.

The cranes, machines, gantrys, ALL MACHINERY, has been removed and the DAM WALL is complete and at operational level.

This is quite clearly to be seen in recent, (October), video footage of the dam wall.

THE SHIP LIFT is to be completed by 2012. Delayed by one year.

ALL GENERATORS are operational at full capacity. NOW.

The additional six generators referred to ARE INSTALLED AND OPERATIONAL.

Can it be said any more clearly than this?

This blind determination to ignore fact casts servere doubt on the Honorable Gentleman's other utterances.

My Dearest CR4

Colleague Cirreb217,

This quote is directly from the first paragraph of the Wikipedia artcle on the Three Gorges Dam:

Except the ship lift, all the original plan of the project was completed on Oct. 30, 2008, when the 26th generator was brought to commerical operation.^[1] Six additional generators in the underground power plant are being installed, with the dam thus not expected to become fully operational until about 2012. The total electric generating capacity of the dam will reach 22,500 MW.

I'm not sure where the confusion is, it seems quite clear that it won't be done till 2012. I suspect you just missed this when you read up on this on wikipedia. No big deal.

-Sincerely,

The Honorable Gentleman from New York

(On a side note, although you meant is sarcastically, that whole "honorable gentleman" stuff really took the sting out of your comments. I wonder how much more reasonable our discussions could be if we just used the term with each other)

This reply bears little correlation with your reply in Post #38 - you now seem to be able to read correctly, both Wikipedia and my post - congratulations, over and out!

You're just messing with me now, right?

I mean what you're saying doesn't make any sense. You're telling me that the quote below (taken from the comment you're replying to):"Six additional generators in the underground power plant are being installed, with the dam thus not expected to become fully operational until about 2012."

Somehow contradicts my statement from #38 (given below)? How?

"I see. So it won't be finished for another 3 to 4 years because they are installing an additional 6 generators, which are going to cost additional money, yet it is done ahead of time and under cost.

I understand they are saying that it was done on time and under cost, but if you pay more money for it and it takes 4 more years to complete........I mean, 2008 wasn't the date for "phase 1" to be completed, the dam was supposed to be done by now. I'm not asking you to suspend belief here, just actually think about it for a second, does it make any sense that something is done ahead of schedule, yet won't be done till 2011, yet was scheduled to finish in 2008? Or have they changed the goal to make it come in on time (from "fully completed" to "functional")."

You Wrote:"Presumably China does not spend its dollars on parties and party girls and vaporous "assets", as Wall St. does; they build things, produce."

You presume too much. Do some research into China's problems with local corruption. They are no better or worse than us when it comes to excess. Again, they are responsible for 5% or world GDP, you are a victim of hype. Your mistaking growth in wealth for wealth.

"You'll see that China's contribution to world GDP was only 5.8% in 2007. Not nearly the 7.7% you're claiming"

I lost faith in such figures when I discovered that under the rules of accounting you could legitimately arrive at 16 million different profits from the same set of accounts!

The difference between 5.8% and 7.7% is almost certainly due to the way figures were analyzed.

It doesn't affect your point that china is small compared to US/Europe. Either figure still has China a small player, despite what the press tells us.

In the government office where I work we are changing over to electronic records. Due to progams from the lowest bidder the computers often do not work properly. C D's take up less space than paper files and the records are stored on hard drives. Doesn't help much if the computer doesn't work. It also takes more time between sessions to use the computer and do all the paperwork. It was quicker when we used tapes and handwritten notes.

The problems with fusion power are still with radioactivity, just not with the fuel. It is the structure which becomes hot. Fusion power is going to be expensive too. Governments need to get out of the way and get the NIMBY types out of the way so that private industry can do it. Profit is what drives the economy.

By the Constitution and the nature of national governments it is the job of the government to operate the military. The military then asks for things which will do what they want and gets money to invent and develop those things and then contracts out the whole process to private industry. They usually do that very well.

"Wouldn't your logic dictate that a robust private industry would arise to defend the U.S." Private armies run by mercenary companies? No, no, no! The military has to be run by the government and pray that they stay inefficient at it or we will all be slaves to the government. Yes, to stopping waste and redundancy, ending turf battles between the services and such as best possible, but remember too that each branch of the military is also a counterweight to the others, if needed.

Private industry may develop and make the weapons, but only the government, the military, should use them. But keep the politicians out of the decisions. In WW II Messerschmitt had the Me262 jets in 1943, but the politician Hitler said no, he wanted more propeller planes. The U. S. and other countries have had similar cases where the politicians tried to dictate what weapons were to be built instead of letting the military and industry decide what would work.

So get the government and other roadblocks out of the way and let private industry develop fusion power. The government can encourage it by contracting to buy the electric power to run government installations, guaranteeing loans, giving tax credits, but best of all keeping the politicians from controlling it.

Roger....Thank you for the link to Eisenhowers termination speech..Powerful indeed..I've taken the liberty of sending it to an american friend in need of cheering up as the candidate of choice finished second..While not an American citizen I am a citizen of the world which to this day is dependenant on the capacity of the USA to ensure peaceful progress and pushing for all humankinds capacity to live free..

Regards,Marty Wolf

Thanks Martywolf,

What I find most intriguing in the speech is the logic for the necessity of a large government funded military and large government funded Scientific research is essentially the same, the modern world demands it.

Why then are people so willing to fund the military yet so unwilling to fund science? When compared to the budget of the military, research and development money from the government is a trickle (less than 1/50th). This doesn't make any sense. Is it any wonder we don't have fusion, solar cells, moon colonies, etc.

At some point and I'm not sure when, someone decided to pretty much stop funding science in any significant way. We've got to fix that, otherwise we will find ourselves regressing.

"... provide for the common defense ..." is a duty of the federal government. State militias were also run by governments. In time of war the small national military was to delay the enemy until the militia could get there, but that was in the time of horses and sailing ships, when every able bodied person with a gun was considered militia, if they volunteered.

Modern warfare has changed the balance and providing for the common defence has become a federal responsibility rather than that of the various states as they feel like it. It is not entirely a good thing, but it is a necessity. The federal government has increasingly set the standards for uniforms, training and weapons for the state militias so that in time of emergency they can all work together.

The problems which occurred with the increase in the needed size of the military and modern sophisticated weaponry need to be dealt with by law. That way the meddling of politicians could be lessened. Read that as not being able to direct military procurement money to home districts, to lobbying companies or as favors to cronies.

The military should be able to request development of weapons as well as to request the purchase of those demonstrated as effective when developed by industry. Because there is so much money exchanged there is always a possibility for corruption and greed. I certainly think that should be prevented as much as possible.

Private industry tries to make the best product, the one that will sell and make them a profit. Too often the government gets in the way or allows others to get in the way. Too often politicians make decisions that benefit them, their districts, without regard to what is good for the country or the taxpayer. Which is why I think private industry will develop fusion power when it is profitable and a viable source of power, providing they are not blocked by political decisions, environmental extremists [the anti-technology types].

My views may be influenced by the belief that people are basically good and law-abiding, including businessmen, capitalist entrepreneurs, investors and the rich. I do not agree that people get rich only by oppressing the poor and stealing from them nor that taking money from the rich and redistributing it to the poor, minus a cut for the politicians, will cure poverty. Fusion power will be financed by investors with money when they believe they will get a fair return on their investment. Government meddling reduces that investment value. Government "investment" has all too often turned out to simply be a waste of money and a way for some to get rich the wrong way.

Please do not think that because we disagree on some things that I do not demand openness and honesty from everyone in government and in the private sector. I despise lies told for political advantage.

Taganan...as always i write in a hurry...I think if you look at Roger Pinks reply/statement that included a link to the speech that DDEisenhower,president of the United States gave as his farewell to the nation and really the rest of humanity as the leader of indeed till to-day and the near future wealthiest/most powerfull nation on earth then you will understand Roger Pinks continuous excoriation of his government to spend more on R&D for the common good of not just the USA but in the end the entire planet..Private research/business/tinkerers are all able but selfish driven in the end..Look at the financial quagmire besetting the highly skilled moneylenders of to-day..The governments of the world have to help clean up their mess and guess where that money is coming from.....Eisenhowers speech set out the reality of the day(1960 prior to handing over the keys to the Whitehouse ) in proverbial tone..Roger Pink i believe is like Jeremiah of the Hebrew scriptures emploring action at the highest level to allow humanity to proceed to its ultimate shared future on this bit of matter called earth hurtling through our galaxy and the cosmos at increasing velocity....Regards....Marty Wolf

I spent most of my productive life involved in government sponsoired R&D. I saw "researchers" who spent decades working a problem, carefully avoiding a solution, lest they be out of a job. I saw good work ignored and junk science promoted for political purposes. I have seen $Billions squandered for reasons not evident to a results oriented person but logical to a politican who is more interested in his career than he is in the welfare of his country. I find it difficult to think of government projects which have been successful -- the war on drugs? The war on poverty? The war on ignorance? I could rant on, but my point is this: science and engineering are too important to be directed by scientifically illiterate but ambitious politicians (which includes generals). As long as fusion research is exclusively a government project, it may be centuries before anything happens.

The development of rocketry.

The development of the nuclear bomb

Space Shuttle for Satellite Depolyment- Or do you think your cell phone works by magic?

The Internet (oh, you didn't know this was developed by CERN?)

Governments are inefficient. Get over it. The world is hard, you do the best you can. Believe me, private industry isn't any less corrupt. The problem is us people. We are inefficient, however one thing is for sure, the more money you throw at a scientific problem, the quicker it gets solved. That's just how it is. Personally, I'd rather throw 100 billion at fusion than AIG, but hey, that's just me.

Hi Roger

There seems to be a divide as to where Government backing is effective and where private enterprise works best.

1. If the goal is basic research with no short term payback, it needs to be funded by government.

Fusion research and virtually all nuclear physics research falls into this category, as does the majority of space exploration.

2. A point is reached in public research when it becomes viable for private industry to start research aimed at practical development of the fundamentals discovered by the public research.

If we starve the public research, there is no base for the private sector to work from for future development. This appears to be happening in the US to fusion research.

If publicly funded research is kept secret or made difficult to access, only the privileged few get to use it and future innovation is stifled, a loss to the entire community.

Government has generally shown itself to be poor at developing technology beyond a certain point. Practical research is generally better done by the private sector.

Of course all of this is a generalization and there are doubtless many examples that contradict it, but the overall picture still remains.

It is interesting that even in space, private industry is starting to have a presence.

As far as China's push into fusion research is concerned, it is likely that they will gain a lead in the fundamental research stage, but the more free wheeling and innovative West will probably take the lead once it gets into the development phase.

It is sad to see the West generally starving this area, through a lack of vision. They will regret it later when they have a big lead to make up.

Enough rambling

Cheers

Rambling? I don't think that is rambling, I feel the same way. I completely and absolutely agree with you regarding everything you said in that post except for one thing. China simply does not have the money or resources to have a significant impact in advancing science. If anyone is going to make an impact in fundamental research besides us, it will be Europe, not China.

Otherwise I completely agree. The U.S. government needs to fund fundamental research. Once the research gets to a certain point, hand it off to private industry and watch the money pile up.

Roger

I agree China lacks the resources to do the job properly, but they are capable of deciding to let their people starve if means advancing their research agenda.

When they developed nuclear weapons the assessment made was that x millions would starve if they diverted the money to nuclear, and that was the decision they took. I believe their assessment of deaths was about right.

They are capable of doing it again if they think it will give them a big enough lead on the world.

I don't think anything about you. People disagree with me all the time, I'm used to it.

Your point is exactly the point I'm trying to make. I agree that modern times require a standing federal army.

Modern times also requires a robust scientific research and developement program (Just as Eisenhower indicated in his speech, except he thought this would be self evident like the standing military). Tokamaks Fusion plants required for research require billions of dollars to build with no hope of profit in the short term. Private industry simply doesn't have the means to do this. Super colliders requires billions of dollars to build and run with no hope of profit beyond whatever can be exploited by their experiments. Space telescopes require billions of dollars for launch and maintainance with no obvious benefit (at least immediately).

The point is that you can't just wave your hands and say "private industry will handle it" when the model can't be supported by private industry. It doesn't work for defending a country and it doesn't work for advancing our understanding of science.

Hear me on this. We are becoming a weak country and its because we are turning our back on science.

Modern times also requires a robust scientific research and development program.....

Agreed, and China has just that - from soil to space and in just about every aspect of things in between.

As someone said in an earlier post, US "Money Managers" have reduced the worlds financial system to a tottering wreck.

Esteemed US president Great Woolly Bush threw $700 billion at it, of taxpayers money, with the main result seeming to be continued wrangling in Congress and Ho Hum from the rest of the world.

China Central Government approved on Monday, November 10 2008, a 700 trillion yuan program for the Domestic economy to stimulate and maintain continued growth in GDP (2009 projected 10.1%).

Asia stock markets rose 7% - the world said "Great Stuff, G20 said "Wow, this is what we have been talking about" - and all this, while US GDP shrinks more, unemployment rises more, Detroit posts "Greater than expected Q3 losses" and the World waits aghast for the next round of American "Good News".

China's domestic financial package specifically mentions "greater effort and spending" to be directed at Technological and Environmental areas.

The technological area will of course include domestic Fusion Research, which will put China further ahead in the push for Fusion Power.

So the betting is China will be there first.

Regarding China's stimulus package, it's not 700 trillion yuan, it's 4 trillion yuan, which amounts to about 600 billion U.S. Dollars. China doesn't have anywhere near the necessary amount of money needed to advance science like we could. They have over a billion people, if you look at their GDP per capita they are basically barely above third world. I wish people would understand this.

The 4 trillion comes from the Central Government and already is being implemented - the remaining three trillion comes from provincial Governments and Private Capital and it also is being implemented.

Honorable Gentleman's president's US$700 billion is still be "talked" about and recent comment, as of yesterday, seems to suggest it will never get off the ground.

May well be that China's per capita is third world level at present - compared to what it was even 10 years ago, as far as the Chinese people are concerned, their standard of living is steadily increasing year by year - compared to 50 years ago it is light years in front.

The Chinese people are very happy with the way things are going - some Government employees, this month, received pay increases of up to 50% with retrospectivity giving them almost one years extra pay - how many First World Government employees received increases of such magnitude?

None would be a fair guess.

To go from virtually nowhere to now being welcomed as the Saviour of the Worlds financial system, so thoroughly wrecked by Americas greed and financial chicanery (derivatives upon derivatives upon....etc), is no mean feat, to be so glibly sneered at, whilst at the same time actively pursuing long term Goals such as Fusion Power and Moon Colonisation.

If China is such a crummy Third World economy, why are so many First World economies so dependant upon it and applauding this Financial Package?

First of all, it was everyone's greed, not just Americas that caused this.

Second of all, I assure you, China's economy is broken right now, just like everyone elses, you just don't know it yet.

Thirdly the US has actually pumped 3.5 trillion dollars into its economy through federal loans and bailouts. 700 billion? You don't know what your talking about.

Finally and here me clearly on this, The United States is the most powerful country on this planet and we are growing. We have a huge generation that will come of age (25) in 5 years. If you foolishly want to believe the fickle headlines of the press, go ahead, just don't be shocked if in a year from now the press is talking about how China is falling apart. The press is like that, one day they are your friend, the next day they are your enemy. Your naivety regarding the financial situation of the world is understandable as 99 out of 100 people I talk to seem to have your misconceptions but I assure you you are wrong.

Luckily you don't need to take my word for it, we need to only wait. Oh, by the way, Chinas growth rate of 11% last year is projected to fall to 5.8% this last quarter. I guess China isn't so hot when they don't have us "greedy americans" to sell their half poisonous crap to.

Oh yeah, one other thing, Nietzsche was a jerk. I defy anyone to read The Antichrist and then still want to quote him, ever. You should especially enjoy his section on how religon is against mans nature because it makes him care for the weak which is unnatural. He argues mans natural condition is to destroy the weak.

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/travis_denneson/antichrist.html

No one quite misunderstood evolution like Nietzsche.

Hitler loved his philosophy.

http://www.history.ucsb.edu/faculty/marcuse/classes/133p/133p04papers/MKalishNietzNazi046.htm

When you don't bother to know who you quote, you don't really know what you're quoting.

Nietzsche was a man trying to make sense of his being..Probably troubled more than most in trying to find meaning..I haven't read his "The Antichrist" and probably never will but thanks for the direction...I have read his "The Will to Power "in a translation by Walter Kaufmann and RJ Hollingdale but that was a long time a go in human lifespan years..Much thought from other sources has been energetically inputted by the use of my eye/brain/thought interconnections since and i must admit to having read favorite viewpoints over the years and suspect they cumulate into me today much as you and everyone else is a result of a Calculain summation of inputs over time..If we lived forever we would have a chance at understanding but we don't.I chose roughly Aug12 of 2008 CE to spend 1 year finding a free-er energy alternative for purely selfish reason's...To save money ..In the interval since I came across Global-Spec and these ancillary blog opportunities ..I have to date found the threads that i've followed fascinating/stimulating/sometimes trite and offensive/often uprorously funny and decided to pop in on occasion as an active participant....Thanks for the advice

Regards,Marty Wolf

You Wrote "Nietzsche was a man trying to make sense of his being"

You've just described every man on this planet. Replace "his" with "her" and "man" with "woman" and you've described every woman on this planet. Searching for answers is a noble endeavor, but it does not make the bitter, racist, intolerant rantings of Nietzsche worth quoting.

To be clear, a lot of people quote Nietzsche, just as a lot of people quote or mention the book Flatland. The problem is, if you reach Ecce Homo or The Antichrist or you read Flatland you find a lot of sexism, racism, and bigotry. In no way am I condemning you personally, I doubt you were fully aware of his philosophy, I just think that it's dangerous when we quote people because it can sometimes imply more meaning or different meaning than we intended.

You Wrote "Thanks for the advice"

You're welcome.

Marty - As you said - "I chose roughly Aug12 of 2008 CE to spend 1 year finding a free-er energy alternative for purely selfish reason's...To save money ." Saving money is what drives efficiency and the use of cheaper alternative power sources. We could save a lot of money by living like the people in 1808, but I doubt we would enjoy it. The whole idea is to live as well or better than we do now at the same or lower cost.

I agree that the government should support basic research using performance based criteria, but it should be kept out of the sticky fingers of the politicians. Corporations are set up to make a profit for the owners, the thousands of stockholders and they often do not do enough basic research. Companies that do spend billions on basic research are all too often excoriated for making a profit on the products developed, for example the drug companies.

If developing fusion power was seen as a critical need though, private industry would put more into it. At the end of WW II the German aircraft industry had stealth fighters, air-to-air missiles and a swept-wing jet fighter plane and they were not put into production because of politics. They were developed by engineers. Both the Mig-15 and the Sabrejet were based on that design and the original design was taken to Argentina and built for their air force.

There is a fine balance in government research between producing results and going slow to stay employed. Private research is usually tied to near-term profits. But when your country is about to go down the tubes people get very inventive very quickly, but it can cost a lot. If the Islamic world ever gets together and simply turns off the oil, you will see alternative energy sources of all kinds.

I too tried chat rooms and such, finding them filled with mindless chatter, foul speech and hate. At least most here on CR4 are intelligent, not hate-filled and can write in understandable English, even when it is not their native speech, which helps in discussion. That does not mean everyone is right, but it certainly helps to clarify your own thoughts when discussing subjects with someone who sees things from a different angle.

All of the talk about new/old/nuclear/wind/solar/etc, alternative energy talk is about to go away. I filled up my tank today for $2.15 a gallon. It's going down even more, and soon will be about $1.98, where I think it will level off, for a while. The public will be lulled back to sleep. Government subsidies will dry up. Wind-gen manufacturers will fold. Pellet/wood/coal stove company's will be laying off. History has repeated itself, once again. I've been putting up with this crap since 1973. It's deja-vu all over again. It's safe to go out and buy a Hemi again. Long live the Hemi!

Bricktop...Well thats way too easy...but i must admit i too have less pain from my back pocket when filling my controlled explosive device that is designed to allow me forward and backward motion inside a climate controlled cage with the ability to do arcs allowing a great degree of freedom in my mobility at speeds exceeding other life forms on earth..But is this really the end of discussion or pursuit of other forms of tapable energy sources/devices...The pursuit of knowing all there is and then applying that knowledge for the betterment of civilization and in the end the planet as a whole seems to this observer to be a positive direction to go..Falling back to sensual satisfaction,gorging on whatever,stimulating nerve endings for the ultimate relief of the itch etc seems somehow simple...We have minds that crave to be engaged..Falling back to steady state torpor because of falling costs allowing us breathing room to buy other stuff ...well how much do we need..So i disagree...The oil tension of today has led to much interest/experimentation/actualization of other approches to fuel our collective need for tapable at a whim energy sources..Nuclear is still the most abundantly available in an almost infinite bank whether fission or fusion capable of providing a large head of energy to distribute to many at once..Others will appear ..utilizing the tapable energetics available across the entire EM spectrum. Regards Marty Wolf

Too true.

OK, we seem to agree that basic and applied research are good. The question is: how do we most efficiently conduct that research?

There are government laboratories. Los Alamos and others invented and built the atomic bomb in less time than it would now take to file the environmental impact statement. The Manhattan Project probably cannot be duplicated in today's environment, but perhaps I'm wrong on that. Can anyone suggest how to structure a government effort to develop fusion? It should be visible and minimize waste. As I noted earlier, I have seen, and worked for, government labs which existed simply to be there and employ people, with no product required. Such are a waste of money and talent.

There are universities. Traditionally, they funded research. One thinks of Marie Curie discovering radium while in search of a PhD. Can we imagine a fusion project based on universities? I don't suppose simply employing graduate students to think about fusion would get very far. So then it begins to look like a government lab run by a university, but, again, how do we keep it from just churning without producing.

Personally, I spent years dealing with companies which did contracted research and also worked on their own initiative, more or less. (The Small Business Innovative Reaserch, SBIR, program seemed to work for modest efforts, but I doubt a small business will find a breakthrough for fusion) Hughes Aircraft, which no longer exists, came up with wondrous inventions in spacecraft, lasers, radars, etc., much of it based on their own "basic" research and most of it funded, one way or another, with government money. Hughes was, perhaps, unique, and I don't see (the fault of my limited vision) such entrepreneurial latent very often now. (I assume it's there, somewhere.) It seems to me, a personal perception only, that we squander $billions on contracted projects which never seem to work out. I am reminded that our air traffic control system has changed very little, even though vast sums (not vast enough?) have been spent to replace it with something better. I know we have generously funded battery research with taxpayer money, but the electric car is still tomorrow's technology. I assume that politics or incompetence have spent money without a proper feedback mechanism to straighten out the bureaucrats. It seems to be human nature to carry on in spite of failure, try, try again instead of try something else. (No bureaucrat wants to admit he backed the wrong horse) I am reminded that, for the first four years of World War One, the command stucture of the allied armies could imagine no reason to reconsider the traditional wisdom that, if a cavalry or infantry assault failed in the face of barbed wire and machine guns, then the fault lay in not using more horses and men. I used to joke that my boss was pushing a project to turn seawater into oil but, realizing that was risky, he had a "risk reduction" plan to turn sand into coal. Given that those who hand out government money are "only human", how do we keep them scientifically honest and prevent them spending vast amounts unproductively?

Can anyone suggest a "something else" to try?

Agreed roger pink

There are alot of creative ways around it. A coherent magnetic field without seperated flux lines would be nice and can surely be done be utilizing some crazy quantum effects. And yes there all these other fusion methods that may be more feasible. IF you are into Muon Catalyzed Fusion and have enough knowledge in the field I suggest you work with those people whose job it is to make these presentations to the governement and make a big point of (It may take 40 Billion, but is will fuel jobs and whatever and our projection says the net profit of funding this research could be 2 trillion) and also make it easily understandable to those politicians who think this is voodoo. Thats probably harder than making the thing work. To help, you should also consider using a contractor to calculate the projection of profit for your research that the government is aware of and believes is unbaised. That will add cost, but if they see the projection was performed along side the same people that project their Oil research or whatnot they'll probably listen more.

Also, there is no way funding fusion power will be permanently deferred. Its soo dang awsome even if it disappears for 30 years it will pop its head up when the time is right.

True, "30 years" of course being the tragic part of that sentence.

No. No I won't do any of that.

I've done my part. My part is to spend countless hours learning math, biology, and physics to become a highly trained, extremely adept critical thinker. My job is to do science, not sell science. I understand in this day and age it is generally accepted that it is a scientists job to sell science, that doesn't make it right. In fact, that is a very symptom of the problem we have today.

If any politician would like my opinion to shape policy, I'll give it freely, though truly they should speak to my betters. But I won't go hat in hand to the government. They need me, not the other way around. If they don't want to fund fusion, that's fine, I'll make my money by doing what they fund, just like everyone else, or I'll get a job in private industry.

What it comes down to is simple, I'm the talent, just like an NFL player or an MLB player or an Actor, or a good Artist. I've made many sacrifices to get to the level where I'm at and there are a limited number of people who can do what I do. I will always have a job. If the government wants that job to be most beneficial to society, well, then its up to them to fund it. If they don't, it's on them, not me.

Not all brilliance goes respected, but just know that you're research will assist and interest others (looked at the links and read one of the papers) and at some point truly be appreciated. Not all artists got respected till after they die, same for athletes, same goes for scientists. Just don't cut off your ear. If you want to live forever, just keep doing what your doing and hopefully you'll be recognized or finally do something uber-amazing with or without funding. If you've had enough and want to liberate yourself of the burden of being a scientist you're welcome to. Just like those NFL athletes, not all go respected (Good Linemen mostly), some finally leave even though they could still be productive to seek out more in life (Tiki Barber), and some just can't leave until they've finally given it their all (Brett Favre). Also, they must go hat in hand to their coaches or team owners or they won't get to do anything. Terrell Owens and others like him are exceptions because even without hat and hand, his ridiculous personality and talent were enough to keep him funded with jersey sales (independant funding). You sound like you got tons of gas left. Maybe when you're 105 and senile or something you should quit. If you're gonna go the independant route, it sounds pretty dang tough. Like a lone cowboy and what not.

A current goal sounds like you should collaborate more with China for now. Maybe give them all you can, maybe when they visit the U.S. meet up with them/give them a place to stay/show them the sights, and come to the point where you can be on par with them every step along their research and then help them by participating in brainstorming sessions. Emails are slow, video conferences sound better but I've never used one before.

I got my money that the US will start funding fusion substantially at most 10 years from now (It's just a prediction, but it's in my bones). Until then stay in the game.

I hope your prediction is right. China isn't the leader in Fusion, Europe is.

I am actually working on molecular and solid state modeling, not fusion. Fusion is just something I believe in deeply as a solution to many of our problems. My work involves using quantum mechanics to predict the behavior of biological molecules and solid state systems. For instance, for my thesis, which I will defend in June, I am working on what happens when you dope Manganese with Silicon. Basically I create a giant Hamiltonian and solve it variationally.

I'm not sure if you have taken quantum mechanics, but if you have, and I suspect you have, then you know you can solve for the wave-functions and energies of the hydrogen atom exactly. Well for larger systems you can't solve for the wave-functions and energies exactly, but you can use some approximations and variational principle to minimize energies to get close. That's what I do.

The next century will be marked, as I suspect you may already know, by our mastering the art of designing materials to generate specific desirable traits (superconductivity, ferromagnetism, etc.).

Ideally it'd be nice to put all the funding towards science but when you got people hurting now you can't just abandon them. You have to fund schools, you have to fund job formers (countries strengths, sadly the US's being the Military), you have to fund infrastructure improvement. You can't always farm and sometimes have to feed. Advance is good, but sometimes too much advance too quickly can collapse nations. A balance is needed and even though some areas go underfunded and others go overfunded, throwing all money towards science projects would quickly lead to a "Player Piano" scenerio. As long as there is currency and competing nations you have to take it slow. Eventually/Hopefully we can all get along and have fun, but it takes awhile. The US Military Industrial Complex isn't just a miraculous invention by evil politicians either, but is a manifestation of many things that have happened globally. One being many goods manufacturing being taken overseas. The only thing many manufacturers can do with their manufacturing equipment to survive is produce high tolerance components (that due to their high costs) only make sense to use in non-consumer products such as Military and Aerospace. The military industrial complex is one of a few crucial economic components that are all the seperate the US from becoming a 40% unemployed mess. It stinks, but the entire picture complicates things. If you want it changed, work towards a product or service that the US can do that will confidently employ people. Many people are doing research to accomplish this, and just complaining accomplishes nothing. Ethanol from Corn is one idea being that agriculture is a major US strength. Come on people... be creative and eventually we won't need a military industrial complex.

What use is this hypothetical argument? Throwing all money at "Science Project" you said. We don't throw any real money at science unless it's from the pentagon. We just loaned out, bailed out, or otherwise handed out 3.5 trillion dollars to banks because they "couldn't fail". I understand people are suffering, but what I'm asking for is a little foresight. Science, when funded, introduces advancements that spur economies. Railroads, Radio, T.V., Plastics, Computers, Internet, all of these things lead to boom times. To suggest that science should be set aside during difficult times is wrong headed.

Look, there is always an excuse not to fund science. Always. The point is you have to fund it so that the country can advance. Otherwise we will go the way of the Ottoman Turks.

Also, try to read my posts correctly please. I didn't say I was against the military industrial complex. What I said is that Eisenhower predicted TWO complexes, a military industrial complex and a Scientific Industrial complex. Eisenhower took BOTH of these complexes for granted. In other worlds he believed the existence of both, the need for both, to be self evident. What I'm saying is that everyone understands why the military industrial complex is important, but no one seems to understand why we also need a Scientific Industrial complex, and that's scary.

We spent close to 750 billion on the military last year. We spent less than 25 times less on science. These are supposed to be on par. We have lost our way and it will cost us if we don't act quickly to restore science as a priority in this country.

I agree that these advances spur economies, but too much too fast and they will choke. With each of those advancements, many people became obsolete and were unemployed. T.V. killed the radio star. If you do all these at once, people will be unemployed every 5 years and it takes time for things to fall back together. Also, too fast and you get bubbles. Remember the Internet boom and collapse? If you go too fast people will have really good times, but the bad times will be soo bad that they may never recover. Its a balance and you are aware of that, you are simply more brave than I am.

Please don't mistake the prosperity associated with technological advancements with the frenzied stock speculation that comes from under regulating our free markets. There is a difference. After all, there was no scientific technological advancement that spurred the housing bubble, and that one is proving to be one of the worst of all. One could, based on this, argue that technological innovation and the subsequent wealth creation may mitigate the damage done by bubbles caused by under-regulation.

Economic Theories are just as complex as this science stuff, and if anything, THESE may go underfunded. Economic Theories --> contentness of masses --> psychology. Psychology is harder to deal with cause they sometimes don't have numbers due to lack of equipment (mapping the mind and being able to predict response to stimuli). Basically, being psychic. Its easy to say the entire system stinks, but I can't even start to fathom a solution that'll make things better. It definitely is science's turn to get the funding though, and this will probably be the case as can be seen in the US political shift.

Sucks that the government is slow, but they have ALOT on their hands. Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country and what not. Instead of relying on government soo much, all people interested in fusion research should form an independant group that can recieve independant funding in other ways. This is probably already the case, and then you realize why its soo difficult. Everybody in these groups needs to work together and even in a small independant funding group this is difficult. Just imagine what the government has to deal with.

Just try to keep continuing your work, but don't be too quick to yell at other people for their short comings. Things will eventually work out one way or another. If you want to sacrifice yourself and be the martyr/catalyst for your goal, you must first stop blaming others. It helps ALOT in speeding up logistics, mutual understanding, and conflict resolution.

P.S. I realized all this in a 24 hour, non-drug mediated meditation trip. Everybody should try to get a good non-drug assisted meditation in once and awhile.

OFF-TOPIC -10000

I agree we shouldn't blame others for our problems, however, we must be careful not to fall prey to the sweet romanticism of a noble defeat when a nondescript victory is possible. The goal is to get Fusion power, not to appear to try to get Fusion power.

Please don't mistake my realism for cynicism, I want these things to happen just like you, but if we aren't honest with ourselves about the challenges we face then we are really solving anything. We are just trying to solve something. There is a difference.

touche

Include that in a presentation to receive more funding from government for fusion research and it should have an impact. That sounds like a pretty good idea/economic theory.

If nobodies written a good paper on it yet, I can suggest some Econ. folk at OSU campus to maybe write one and it could be used. I'm sure some Harvard guy thought this up and compiled all the statistics and wrote a beautiful paper already, but it seems worth a literature search. Its just really good to have this idea verified by an unbaised person so when qouted in the presentation they can say "Isn't he one of us?".

I got a busy week ahead, but I'll try to find something on that. I wouldn't even know what to call it in a literature search engine though. There are enough people/connections in this forum alone to take part in making a presentation for the house of representatives or senate or however that works.

Never assume anyone can do it better than you. From what I can tell you are a thoughtfull, intellegent guy (or gal, I can't tell from your name). The point is that you can do this just as well as anyone else. It just takes effort.

The housing bubble can be blamed directly on the idiots in the US government, their regulations, not underregulation.

1. Congress passed the xxx Act (I forget the actual title) which mandated that banks lend to sub-prime borrowers (it's a matter of "social justice" and "nondiscrimination").

2. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (quasi-governmental entities) were happy to buy and repackage risky mortgages (supported by congress).

3. The Federal Reserve multiplied the money supply and kept interest rates low, incentivising risky behavior.

Now we are in recession (depression). $700 Billion to the banks will result in a $14 Trillion (!!) increase in M3 (checkbook credit), about $140,000 per taxpayer, which will be highly inflationary. When milk reaches $20/gal., the Agriculture Committee will pat themselves on the back and say how well the economy is doing for US farmers.

You don't know what your talking about. The problem isn't a 5% uptick in defaults in mortgages. It's that there is near 50 trillion dollars worth of interest bearing vehicles called Mortgage Backed Securities that are now worthless because nobody knows what they are worth because there is no exchange for them. Banks are ordinarily allowed to lend about 10 times the amount that they have in deposits and assets. The banks used a scheme where they took their loans, sold them to brokerages who mixed and matched them into pools and sold shares of those pools back to the banks which could then call them assets. This scheme allowed the banks to effectively loan out 40 times the amount they had in deposits and true assets.

When you are highly leveraged, a small change in default rates can be disastrous. That's the reason the law limited Banks to 10 times leverage after the great depression. People like you who don't have a clue blame the underlying small movement in defaults rather than the enormous leverage that occurred from not regulating mortgage backed securities. This is why people like yourself don't have any idea whats up and are part of the problem with your trite, uninformed and laughable analysis. Stop wasting our time.

So in essence the bankers/moneylenders/fund shifters achieved the illusion of doing something daily to the satisfaction of all including fund buyers(most of us in pension pools etc.) indicating a rather subtle use of recycling currency many times to the satisfaction of all..$40 trillion is rather a large amount isn't it...Perhaps instead of shooting GM/Chrysler/Ford who no doubt waste precious stockholders money as well but generate something concrete along the way your senate should berate these long term spinners of money who apparently have suddenly found themselves trapped in the web of their own making..The emperor has no clothes so to speak...Even 1 % of that web devoted to fusion research would have generated some real product at the end of the day...I read a bit in CR-4 nanotechnology section to-day that spinoffs from fusion research has lead to a possible magnetosphere blanketing device to protect a US venture to MArs in the near term from the suns regular but unpredictable flares that realeases a storm of energy outwards..Apparently Neil Armstrong and his ilk were fortunate that no flares came their way whilst away from earths benevolvent magnetosphere.So fusion research is generating spinoffs..Yelling even verbally accomplishes nothing..Logic/knowing there is a lot of everything and hoarding it(knowledge/money/power) for oneself seems to this mortal somewhat ludicrous and lonely in the year 2008 ACE...

Regards...Marty W.

The spinoffs may be great, but the goal is fusion power and no spinoff idea will be nearly as rewarding...not anywhere even close to as rewarding as sustainable fusion power.

My argument would be that US scientists and engineers are so great that we don't need any more funding to reach the balance. I'm not a hater of other countries, but there is a lot of hype that other countries (including china) have better scientists and engineers which flat out isn't true. If you want more science funding in this country, than the scientific community should just be stupid and require 5 people to do what one would take. By this feat you employ more people for one task making the scientific complex more job efficient. Basically, a scientific union that says "Hey, don't work too hard!".

I'm happy that China did pick up the weight for fusion research, but just think how tired US politicians of being asked for funding for Fusion and not getting the final gain. Your Muon Catalyzed Method, just sounds like another scheme that is doomed to fail or be halted by other limitations to these people. Even though the knowledge is gained we just want our dang fusion power already and its been 50 years! I personally feel that we should wait to see what we gain from CERN and use all that knowledge to gain even more foresight before continuing. Being fair to those politicians that don't understand the whole situation, it looks like a mess though. Put a new coat of lacquer on it with any data received from CERN (a highly publicized item) and they may be happier.

I'll read your links cause your research sounds cool.