Back in March, in a post about energy, I advocated for more research into nuclear fusion as an energy source. Fossil fuel use is poisoning our planet. Solar and wind energy are weather-dependent. Nuclear fission can be dangerous. But nuclear fusion is both safe, environmentally friendly and could be limitless and cheap. One of my readers disagreed. "Fusion is never going to be commercially viable. I wish this was wrong but ask any physicist who is not looking for the latest investment cash and they will tell you the truth." Well, I am pleased to report there's been a major fusion energy breakthrough. Scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory have finally succeeded in producing a nuclear fusion reaction that creates more energy than it consumes. While they acknowledge they are decades away from, making this a commerical reality, it is no longer just a pipedream.
Nuclear fusion is what powers the sun. It's what we see when we look at the stars. In the plasma coreof these celestial bodies, four hydrogen atoms fuse into one helium atom. In the process, a massive amount of energy is released.
This could be just the game changer we need.
24 comments:
If you believe that fusion energy will become a reality in our lifetime I have a time machine in my basement I would like to sell you.
My son is a scientist at CERN and says this will certainly not be viable on a commercial scale in any of our lifetimes. The amount of money flowing into this pipe dream would be better spent on ramping up innovations that are already viable but being fought by the fossil fuel industry and their sycophants. Additionally, investment in revamping the power grid itself is more and more urgently needed.
"If you believe that fusion energy will become a reality in our lifetime"
I never said that. I said there's been a major breakthrough, and that commercial applications are decades away. That won't be within my lifetime, but might be within my grandson's.
Just a few months ago, it was Never. Now it is not in our lifetime.
I am somewhat surprised at this kind of negativity. Americans have always been known for their "can do" attitude. Perhaps you should move to the 15th century.
That's all people know how to respond to anything anymore. And what should we do not persue it? Remember maybe 15 years ago the Republicans were fond of saying what about our children and grandchildren in response to numerous things. I guess this doesn't count. The fossil fuel lobby has successfully corrupted many minds.
Oh, we'll probably "give" the technology to the Chi-coms. Worse yet, they may already have it, and are years ahead of us in putting it to use.
Nations and big energy will kill this. Also, if it does become practical the elites will take it over and charge the rest of us more than they do now to use it. Regular people are nothing but pawns to fill wealthy pockets.
It's an absolute gamechanger. I've read that we're closer than you've stated, perhaps a decade away. It's going to happen and we should immediately redirect funding toward its rapid development that we're currently spending on wind and solar, which aren't cutting it and never will. I suspect wind and solar proponents will be the loudest opponents of fusion, just as oil and gas proponents complain about wind and solar. Nobody likes being the last investor in old tech. This is bigger news than most realize.
Apollo 17 Astronaut Harrisson Schmidtt constantly promoted Fusion technology to refine the isotope Helium 3 which is found in the regolith on the Moon. Helium 3 is also found on Earth in small numbers because our atmosphere traditionally shields us from excessive accumulation of solar rays which is the source of Helium 3 According to Schmidtt bringing this resource back to Earth would produce great benefit for the economy of the United States and also the world. As Bernie said it could be a game changer. And I have advocated the possibility of bringing back Helium 3 to Earth from the Moon ever since I heard Harrison Schmidt speak in 2014 at the Los Angeles NSS International Space Development Conference ...
There’s a little bit of misrepresentation when it comes to this story. The lasers themselves require 200 mega joules in order to create the 3.5 mega joules of fusion energy, so we are no where near the required yield to generate energy with this technique. But it’s a start.
Bernie - your blog certainly has its share of nattering naybobs of negativity who only know how to complain and find faults in everything in the moment, only to be proven quite wrong over time. These same idiots existed in;
1436 when Gutenberg created the printing press...
1886 when the first horseless carriage was invented...
1895 when Marconi invented radio...
1903 when the Wright brothers flew...
1926 when Baird invented television...
1936 when Turing invented modern computing...
1947 when the first transistor was invented...
Theories lead to experiments, experiments lead to breakthroughs, breakthroughs lead to applications, applications get developed and built upon until we have useable technology.
While these jagoffs are sitting in their climate conditioned home, on their couch with their iPhones in hand watching cable news - other people are out there getting educated, learning, developing, and changing the world. They complain about it because it makes them feel better about themselves.
Would be cool if it ever gets commercialized. But with this "breakthrough", realize the time scale of the experiment, where the energy output was greater than the energy input was on the nano-second scale. This was not a sustained experiment. Exciting achievement, yes. Cause for hope, maybe. Enough to change our energy policy, no... it shouldn't. But we all know that our politicians who are fighting to end fossil fuel energy production will use it as a reason to advance their agenda.
I think you will have to go forward to the 25th century for fusion energy to become a reality. So don't wet your pants quite yet Bernie. This is just a Dem diversion from our current energy crisis.
The Amish have a blueprint for sustainable living, the E.L.F will set in motion a series of protests that bring us to that place.
BLUE BADGER
"That's all people know how to respond to anything anymore. And what should we do not persue it? Remember maybe 15 years ago the Republicans were fond of saying what about our children and grandchildren in response to numerous things. I guess this doesn't count. The fossil fuel lobby has successfully corrupted many minds."
The funny thing is that I met the nation's top oil lobbyist several years ago. He spoke in support of nuclear fusion. And guess what, the fossil fuel industry actually is investing in nuclear fusion tech. Their business is to profit from a power dense energy source that produces heat. https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/why-are-oil-and-gas-companies-investing-in-nuclear-fusion
" This is just a Dem diversion from our current energy crisis."
This is yet another absurd statement. Fusion energy has everything to do with producing cheap and clean energy that makes us independent. It has nothing to do with politics. Research into fusion has been heavily funded by both Biden and Trump. Congress has a bipartisan fusion energy caucus. If anything, this could be considered Republican. We should be pouring more money into fusion energy research and less into weather-dependent solar and wind. I am frankly astonished that someone could be so stupid and so negative that he would pan a scientific breakthrough that is neither Democratic nor Republican.
Bernie did you really think these smooth-brained anti-intellectuals will appreciate a phenomenon like this?
You’re giving these Neanderthals too much credit
I read the article in this morning's MC. It was stated that this game changer would allow fusion to be used in "a few decades" rather than the previously thought 50-60 years.
I guess this Neanderthal's mind is "nuanced" enough to be impressed by the difference.
Has Trump taken credit for this yet?
For comparison.
Chicago Pile 1 was the world's first nuclear reactor, built in 1942 by Nobel Prize winner Enrico Fermi. The reactor was built underneath the University of Chicago's Stagg Field football stadium. On Dec. 2, 1942, Enrico Fermi and 48 of his colleagues succeed in achieving in this reactor the world’s first man-made controlled nuclear chain reaction, thereby establishing the ability of mankind to control the release of nuclear energy.
This criticality event was sustained for 28 minutes and was manually stopped by Fermi's colleagues, proving its success.
15 years later, the first commercial nuclear reactor started up in 1957 in Shippingport, PA.
Misuse of our natural resources will one day destroy life on this planet as we now know it and enjoy it. AND if we don't come up with alternative sources of energy that are safe for us and our planet global warming will destroy us as a human race. We who are in our seventies and eighties won't be around but our youngsters will be. Fusion energy can't come soon enough.
It may not be a game changer in my lifetime but we should absolutely keep working on it. 25 years ago I was running at work with a “bag phone”. The internet was in its infancy. Technology changes fast.
Patent this, sign the patent over to Exxon/Mobil and we'll have fusion in 10 years.
https://www.aol.com/news/why-nuclear-fusion-breakthrough-won-202616755.html
Not a fan of left leaning AOL but here's an article I came across.
World ends in 10-15 years.
Again.
It is amazing the alt right believes pillow salesman who suggest Italian space lasers changed votes but refuse to believe science journals.
Price
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