Nuclear Fusion in five minutes (ITER)

10 Comments on "Nuclear Fusion in five minutes (ITER)"

Stilgar Wilcox on Thu, 10th Apr 2014 2:39 am 



How can a design that did not achieve a net energy return on a smaller scale, attain 10 units of energy for every unit of input on a larger scale?

How practical is it from a cost standpoint to build more power plants this big should this test prove successful?

Is it really 100% clean, i.e. no radioactivity, no toxicity?

What is the expected life of a fusion reactor like this once it is producing energy continuously? What is the cost per KWH?

GregT on Thu, 10th Apr 2014 4:03 am 



So let’s just imagine for a moment, that fusion becomes possible…………..

What would we use all of this amazing new-found energy for? To continue to exponentially grow our populations? To continue to rape the Earth of her natural biological systems, or what WE consider to be human resources? To continue to grow our human economic systems, at the expense of all other life that we need for our very survival?

Or maybe, we can build human containment domes, complete with human test tube grown ‘meat’, with human engineered desalinated ocean water, and human engineered plant matter? Or maybe we can just recycle our own dying corpses, to feed back to ourselves, while we continue to decimate our planet of all other life forms?

Maybe then, we could live happily ever after, just like we would of, if we only had of colonized Mars.

DC on Thu, 10th Apr 2014 7:23 am 



When does one cross the line from propaganda to outright lying? Is there even a difference?

This blurb claims makes every false claim about fusion and they only take 90 seconds to do it.

Claim#1 Safe-They have no idea whether its ‘safe’ or not. There is no critrea or measure of ‘safe’ in regards to fusion as there are exactly….zero operational fusion plants one can point to and make this absurd claim credible.

-Available anywhere on Earth? WTF? No idea how they figure that is going to, or would be the case.

-In unlimited quantity and with no negative impact on the environment. Holy fooking schnit. They really claimed that. I know what ‘unlimited’ means, and I also know what no negative impact on the environment means as well. Saying that against a backdrop of a field of flowers on a sunny day really convinced me…uhuh….

Equally absurd, is the opening quotes. Clearly fusion boosters are well aware of many peoples prevailing attitudes about the feasibility of fusion. To deflect this, they set up a few strawmen quotations from 100+ years ago. As if expressing doubt about containing plasma at pressures and temperatures exceeding that of a star and doing so continually for years or decades has some equivalent to going from 10mph in a horse drawn cart to 30 or 40 mph along the surface on a set parallel iron rails of the surface earth in a coal powered train.

Yes, some people do think ‘fusion’ is flat out impossible. But that is not a very nuanced view. Myself, I think fusion *may* be technically doable, but its still a going to be DOA for too many reasons to list. We can set up moon colonies now if we wanted to, or travel to Mars. What stops us, is the enormous cost, both in money and resources to make such ventures practical in any meaningful way. Such as it is with fusion, except X10.

At the 4 min mark-the narrator talks about the high energy neutrons that will impact the container wall. What he doesnt say, is that this process not only causes what is known as neutron embrittlement,

http://www.tms.org/pubs/journals/JOM/0107/Odette-0107.html

but the neutrons themselves are quite radioactive. They irradiate the vessel wall-as well as weakening it.None of the lofty and too-good-to-be true statements by fusion proponents are valid. I would have less of a problem if they were a lot more honest abouts fusions very real downsides. But like all risky, expensive, dangerous techs, ‘we’ are always told they are(or will be) perfectly safe. Coal is safe, nuclear fission is safe, drugs are safe, cars are ‘safe’ and so on.

Meld on Thu, 10th Apr 2014 9:32 am 



Stilgar said “How can a design that did not achieve a net energy return on a smaller scale, attain 10 units of energy for every unit of input on a larger scale”

Ssssshhhhhh, you’ll put all the scientists out of a job and upset the natives. We need this tech as the equivalent of the rapture for the techno fundamentalists to look forward too. Can you imagine what would happen if they didn’t have a light at the end of the tunnel, it would be like incontrovertibly proving god doesn’t exist to the religions of the world. Mass panic!

Arthur on Thu, 10th Apr 2014 12:27 pm 



Completely running out of energy is a nightmare, but so is the idea of unlimited energy. I’m not so sure fusion can’t work, but hope it doesn’t.

Trent on Thu, 10th Apr 2014 5:24 pm 



I am with you Arthur but my fear is that they some how make the methane hydrates work….either way we are heading for a brick wall at 100 miles an hour….

Stilgar Wilcox on Thu, 10th Apr 2014 8:53 pm 



“What he doesnt say, is that this process not only causes what is known as neutron embrittlement,

http://www.tms.org/pubs/journals/JOM/0107/Odette-0107.html

but the neutrons themselves are quite radioactive. They irradiate the vessel wall-as well as weakening it.”

That is very interesting and speaks volumes regarding the potential pitfalls once a continuous fusion reaction is possible, i.e. even once it is up and running, time, pressure and vibration will cause wear and tear including embrittlement and irradiation, and how much does that add to the costs?

From a laymen’s dead reckoning the whole thing looks way too expensive and complex to be a realistic, viable energy expectation, and that’s even before any of the wear and tear issues come into play. After all we can see what happened to the world economy as it shifted from cheap to expensive oil. Imagine how much borrowing and QE printing would be needed with super-duper expensive fusion.

MSN fanboy on Thu, 10th Apr 2014 9:43 pm 



If this works I guess you chaps will be wrong about “collapse” dun dun duuuun.

Lol don’t worry. The title should say nuclear fusion in 69 years and counting.

We all know the decline will hit first before/ if they figure this out. I wonder how they plan to build more with no money.

Trent on Thu, 10th Apr 2014 10:06 pm 



Damn I hope not, I already told my boss to kiss my big white fat A$$$ and moved in with a young teenager….if collapse doesn’t happen I am in trouble….!!!!!!

Kenz300 on Fri, 11th Apr 2014 2:39 pm 



The nuclear industry brought us Chernobyl and Fukishima…………. both are nightmares that continue to poison the world………..

They are not the solution….. they are the problem..