National Ignition Facility Changes the World

[hym 358]

The National Ignition Facility has become the first facility to demonstrate an experiment where the fuel produces more energy than it consumes.

 

It's not sustaining nuclear fusion, but it is a major step forward for the technology and will no doubt embolden researchers. 

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

That certainly is good news.  Unlimited energy solves a large number of problems including how to produce Hydrogen for automotive purposes.  Good luck to all.  I prefer the magnetic bottle approach at ITER, but whatever works...

[AkemiAzula 280]

Good luck to them.

[Fatherted 129]

*waits to plug reactor into house and never worry about energy again*

Luckily...energy prices will go WAY down with not paying for fuel and only for transmission of the energy.

[flatron 83]

That wont work in the near future. (I always wanted to say that concerning energy )

[Duke87 1,070]

That wont work in the near future.

 

Regardless, have a good look. In the not quite so near future, this could be the technology that gets us off of fossil fuels.

[LexusInfernus 908]

This is awesome! I do hope they can get this to work better and eventually turn it into something that can be used in a more practical way. Like powering houses or cars. 

[flatron 83]

I still prefer renewables over any kind of nuclear energy. Even though fusion does not produce highly radioactive waste, there is still a restrisiko(I stick to the german term here) that there might be an accident. Building a reactor into your private house is so 20th ctry. science fiction, by the way

[Cobraroll 138]

^Thing is, maintaining a fusion reaction also requires a high level of input power. If the facility were to "meltdown", the reaction would stop immediately as soon as the power supply was cut (or burned off). If you somehow blew up the facility while the reactor was running, the plasma or whatever it turns into would practically cease being radioactive before it blows over the perimeter fence. The half-life of unstable Hydrogen and Helium isotopes is measured in seconds or less, so they would "burn out" before posing a risk to even the closest neighbours.

 

Though, there would be some waste materials. And the reactor components, which would have to be replaced every few years, would require some decades of storage due to the extreme radiation they will be exposed to when the reaction is ongoing. So there is some risk connected to its operation.

[Terring 6,473]

That's a fantastic news. It's still need improvements, but I'm still happy about the progress for nuclear fusion. With this form of energy, we'll have no reason to burn fossils, oil and dead dinosaurs. Clean, powerful energy. And if we mix nuclear fusion with Nicola Tesla's visions about wireless transmission of electric energy, we'll be liberated from the tyranny of batteries and cables. Free energy for everybody!

And what's next? Cold fusion?
 

I'm sure that a few people will attack me because of it. I can't say that cold fusion is pseudoscience, even if I'm also unsure if this concept it's possible at all. But before attacking me, at least spend some minutes to read

this and this.

 

I prefer researching than accepting or attacking...

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Interesting commentary.  This whole business is in its infancy.  In order to get a fusion reactor going, physics requires temperatures of the order of the core of the sun.  It would be nice to be able to do this at a cooler level on the Kelvin scale and the magnetic bottle approach may be the answer. 

 

Much more work at the LHC and other facilities is needed at a staggering cost before we can get a handle on the two forces we really have no handle on: magnetism and gravity.  If it could be shown that both are the same kind of thing, we would be much closer to a Unified Field Theory, but this is one of nature's subtleties and I am not sure the brute force being used is gong to provide the answer. 

 

We can generate magnetic fields and use them without understanding them.  Wouldn't it be rather nice if we could do the same with gravity?

 

Generating an intense gravity field is fraught with the danger of creating more than a quantum black hole.  This research should be carried out in space.

[Ocram's Razr 963]

1. This looks promising. I hope that by the end of the cebtury, we see an end to energy scarcity in addition to the rnd of nutrition scarcity and poverty.

2. Renewable energy sources are not sustainable on a large scale.

3. Massive amounts of time, money, and research will still be needed to make energy production more sustainable and cleaner.

4. I really dislike the spread of FUD by certain Politicians, Eco-Terrorists, and "environmental activists" about Nuclear energy.

--Ocram

[Duke87 1,070]

^Thing is, maintaining a fusion reaction also requires a high level of input power. If the facility were to "meltdown", the reaction would stop immediately as soon as the power supply was cut (or burned off). If you somehow blew up the facility while the reactor was running, the plasma or whatever it turns into would practically cease being radioactive before it blows over the perimeter fence. The half-life of unstable Hydrogen and Helium isotopes is measured in seconds or less, so they would "burn out" before posing a risk to even the closest neighbours.

 

This. It would be impossible for a Fusion power plant to cause destruction like that seen at Pripyat or Fukushima. Yes, there is a risk that the plant itself could go kablooie if something went wrong, but the same is true of fossil fuel burning plants.

 

Fusion power, then, would have the same benefits that Nuclear (Fission) power has:

1) it is extremely inexpensive to operate since fuel costs are minimal and production is high (fossil fuels lack the former quality, renewables lack the latter)

2) the source is not intermittent (unlike wind and solar), so the plant can always be relied on to produce power

 

Item number 1 is something a lot of people don't appreciate but should: Nuclear power brings down the cost of electricity. Eliminate it and everyone has to pay more.

[AkemiAzula 280]

I am all for fusion. It seems to be in theory the superior power provision method.

 

Hopefully the governments/organisations who sponsor these research institutes shall remained in a semi-enlightened state enough so that this eventually attains a usable level of development.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

The work has probably been defunded in the U.S. government shutdown so far as this side of the pond is concerned.  Fortunately the European effort continues.