Plasma Plaything Warms Up for Sun-Level Work on Fusion

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Fusion reactors—the near-mythic energy sources that have been on the horizon for half a century—may be coming one step closer. The U.S. Department of Energy’s Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory has begun building a machine called a compact stellarator to perfect the magnetic fields needed to control the thermonuclear activity involved. Inside are 18 of the most complex electromagnets ever designed. Engineers are creating 6000-pound coils in three shapes. When linked, the coils form a precisely shaped magnetic field that can manipulate superhot ionized gas, called plasma. No matter what is learned, fusion power plants remain decades, and billions of dollars, away from reality.

Critical Data

>> 100 million degrees Celsius: To get like-charged nuclei to bond, the plasma must be hotter than the sun’s core.

>> $74 million: Federal outlay, to date, to build the stellarator project.

>> 1000 Megawatts: The power a future fusion reactor could generate.

>> Late 2011: Year in which the National Compact Stellarator Experiment is due to start operations.

12. RE: Plasma Plaything Warms Up for Sun-Level Work on Fusion
The Focus Fusion option mentioned in #5 & #9 will cost 6¢/Watt. And 0.2¢/kwh delivered power. Nothing else is even close.

11. RE:How about a HYDROGN Car Run on 100% Water.???
The US has the Technology right this minute to have Cars run on 100% Plain Water , YES I said Water. It's called a Hydrogen Generator, look for yourself how it already works, of course EXXON Oil, as well as all the Oil & Gas Company in the world , for that matter, will do everything possible to try and stop the following from Happening. IMO http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hzJZJjo9MNA

10. RE: Plasma Plaything Warms Up for Sun-Level Work on Fusion
Photovoltaics, at a dollar a watt, became available a week before Christmas, 2007 for large utilities. I believe that price will fall below 25 cents a watt by 2013. 1 watt, 7 hours a day, is good for about 22 cents a year at my 8.5 cents a KWH rate. I find photovoltaics personally economically attractive at a dollar a watt. If we have 25 cent per watt photovoltaics by 2013, I don’t think there will be another coal fired or nuclear plant built after 2020. There will be no fusion, either, other than solar. Solar may be considered diffuse, but it is also 3.5 million horsepower per square mile. That’s 783 MW at 30% conversion and not a coal car in sight.

9. RE: Plasma Plaything Warms Up for Sun-Level Work on Fusion
Dr. Bussards work currently being carried on by Eric Lerner is apparently only 6yrs away. They have always been underfunded and still are, otherwise we would probably be using this wonderful clean cheap & safe energy now.

8. RE: Plasma Plaything Warms Up for Sun-Level Work on Fusion
Yeah... the estimated cost of the Iraq war to the American people is $1.6 trillion. With that amount of money, government could have sponsored a massive push to realize a hydrogen and alternative fuel economy by funding research and grants and building infrastructure. That in turn would have spured massive growth here at home. New industries would have sprung. Average american would have benefited. An we would have been a step away from the forsaken middle east. We also would ahve had enough left over to fix social security, New Orleans and the lights on my street. Instead a select few defense contractors are reaping the rewards our grandkids will pay. The military is not what made America great. Science and technology is what made America a leader.

7. RE: 1000-MW Fusion Reactor Warms Up for Sun-Level Physics Work
Wow, the Americans managed to build a fusion reactor, how sweet, prepare to face the next problem: to get the heat out of the chamber without melting everything down, because that's the problem the designers of the european fusion reactor are facing atm.

6. RE: 1000-MW Fusion Reactor Warms Up for Sun-Level Physics Work
OK yes lets fund the fusion reactor and not the military, who needs the military anyway....oh we do!! have you traveled out of the U.S. But I do think fusion reactors are one of the important ventures that should be funded.

5. RE: 1000-MW Fusion Reactor Warms Up for Sun-Level Physics Work
I thought your readers would be interested in looking at these energy technologies and EPS's theoretic base for ball lighting. Aneutronic Fusion: Here I am not talking about the big science ITER project taking thirty years, but the several small alternative plasma fusion efforts. There are three companies pursuing hydrogen-boron plasma toroid fusion, Paul Koloc, Prometheus II, Eric Lerner, Focus Fusion and Clint Seward of Electron Power Systems Vincent Page (a technology officer at GE!!) gave a presentation at the 05 6th symposium on current trends in international fusion research , which high lights the need to fully fund three different approaches to P-B11 fusion He quotes costs and time to development of P-B11 Fusion as tens of million $, and years verses the many decades and ten Billion plus $ projected for ITER and other "Big" science efforts Here are the links: http://www.electronpowersystems.com/ U.S., Chilean Labs to Collaborate on Testing Scientific Feasibility of Focus Fusion http://pesn.com/2006/03/18/9600250_LPP_Chilean_Nuclear_Commission/ However, short of a Energy "silver bullet" like fusion , Here is a fully DOABLE technology Time to Master the Carbon Cycle with Terra Preta Soil Technology; The integrated energy strategy offered by Charcoal based Terra Preta Soil technology may provide the only path to sustain our agricultural and fossil fueled power structure without climate degradation, other than nuclear power. The economics look good, and truly great if we had CO2 cap & trade in place: Terra Preta soils I feel has great possibilities to revolutionize sustainable agriculture into a major CO2 sequestration strategy. I thought the current news and links on Terra Preta soils and closed-loop pyrolysis would interest you. SCIAM Article May 15 07 http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=5670236C-E7F2-99DF-3E2163B9FB144E40 After many years of reviewing solutions to anthropogenic global warming (AGW) I believe this technology can manage Carbon for the greatest collective benefit at the lowest economic price, on vast scales. It just needs to be seen by ethical globally minded companies. Even with all the big corporations coming to the GHG negotiation table, like Exxon, Alcoa, .etc, we still need to keep watch as they try to influence how carbon management is legislated in the USA. Carbon must have a fair price, that fair price and the changes in the view of how the soil carbon cycle now can be used as a massive sink verses it now being viewed as a wash, will be of particular value to farmers and a global cool breath of fresh air for us all. If you have any other questions please feel free to call me or visit the TP web site I've been drafted to co-administer. http://terrapreta.bioenergylists.org/?q=node It has been immensely gratifying to see all the major players join the mail list , Cornell folks, T. Beer of Kings Ford Charcoal (Clorox), Novozyne the M-Roots guys(fungus), chemical engineers, Dr. Danny Day of EPRIDA , Dr. Antal of U. of H., Virginia Tech folks and probably many others who's back round I don't know have joined. Also Here is the Latest BIG Terra Preta Soil news; UN Climate Change Conference: Biochar present at the Bali Conference http://terrapreta.bioenergylists.org/steinerbalinov2107

4. RE: Fusion Reactors Closer To Reality
The US military complex has BILLIONS to spend, but this could maybe even power a Mars or Moon base

3. RE: Fusion Reactors Closer To Reality
At $10 a watt for solar photo voltaic, that would be 7.4MW installed today. This has been the great hope for so long I fall into I'll believe it when I see it category.

2. RE: Fusion Reactors Closer To Reality
Website: http://iecfusiontech.blogspot.com/
Could you please tell me why you don't cover developments in IEC Fusion Technology? Specifically Dr. Bussards work? We may actually be only 5 years away from a working fusion reactor.

1. RE: Fusion Reactors Closer To Reality
Ya see? Just think how much closer fusion would be to reality, if the entire iraq war budget was redirected into these types of POSITIVE endeavors. But if that happened what would fund the US military complex?

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