Bussard's fusion work - the "Polywell" looks VERY promising

[kyser_soze]

Where's my Delorean?

 

[Jonti]

For a non scientist, please could you elaborate?

Net gain means that there is more energy coming out than going in? And that has been achieved?

No.

What's been established is that Bussard is right about this design. It's going to work.

This kind of science is rigorously repeatable. The calculations that a full-sized model, costing approximately $150–200M (depending on the fuel), should be an effective power plant, producing notably more energy than it consumes.

The next reactor, WB-8, will test the scaling laws, or give the engineers time to ramp up their skills. This is an entirely new technology, after all. No-one's built small clean fusion reactors before.

Final step is the full scale test model, a 100 MW little beastie.

 

[prunus]

<hyperventilates>

 

[EastEnder]

that's cos all previous fusion 'promises' have been based on the frankly insane tokamak design. that's what's given fusion a bad name and has spread the assumption that fusion requires insane temperature and pressure. all it really requires is fast-moving ions.

you can get ions to fuse on your desktop with a hirsch-farnsworth device. the poywell just removes that design's barrier to unity - the solid electric grid - and replaces it with a permeable electron cloud. accelerating +ve ions is easy with an electric field.

Yes, yes, I'm sure they've cracked it this time - as we all know, the move from tenuous proof-of-concept to viable commercial reality is practically negligible. The number of billionaire back-shed boffins who've made that easy-peasy leap is astounding. And I'm absolutely certain that the claims these chaps are making have absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with attracting more funding. I confidently expect to be driving around in a fusion powered hover-car by the end of the year.

 

[kyser_soze]

And while $200m might sound like a lot, in comparison with stuff like the National Ignition Facility (about $4bn so far) and JET/ITER (anything upwards of €15bn so far), it's bascially pennies.

 

[Jonti]

Yes, yes, I'm sure they've cracked it this time - as we all know, the move from tenuous proof-of-concept to viable commercial reality is practically negligible. The number of billionaire back-shed boffins who've made that easy-peasy leap is astounding. And I'm absolutely certain that the claims these chaps are making have absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with attracting more funding. I confidently expect to be driving around in a fusion powered hover-car by the end of the year.

Just go away and do some background reading for now.

Some geeks may get overheated, and if toby jug turns up, there could be mayhem

 

[Crispy]

Yes, yes, I'm sure they've cracked it this time - as we all know, the move from tenuous proof-of-concept to viable commercial reality is practically negligible. The number of billionaire back-shed boffins who've made that easy-peasy leap is astounding. And I'm absolutely certain that the claims these chaps are making have absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with attracting more funding. I confidently expect to be driving around in a fusion powered hover-car by the end of the year.

Replace back-shed with US navy and boffin with founder of fusion research and maybe you'd be onto something. the current researcher, Rick Nebel is your proper sober serious scientist, not a fly-by-night whackjob looking for a quick buck. I understand your cynicism, but won't you accept that there's a real chance for success here? For the amount of money required, and the benefits if realised, it's got to be worth a go.

These guys are more like your stereotype. Loose science, "charismatic visionary" lead researcher. Vague claims. Compare and contrast with the dry, fact-based way that Dr. Nebel has described their work.

First of all, our work has been peer reviewed. An independent panel of experts has looked at these results. I don’t believe that there was anyone on the panel who has less than 40 years experience working with magnetic confinement. It included senior professors and people who have managed the fusion program. We asked them for their honest opinions and that’s exactly what we got. We are proceeding with our program in line with their recommendations.

Yes, there are neutrons and the numbers are consistent with the plasmas we are measuring. However, neutrons can be deceptive. A lot of fusion researchers have gotten in trouble in the past by relying on these types of measurements. You need to know where they come from and that's difficult to measure.

Those quotes are from 2008, so the work described therein is now complete and verified - Bussard claims for his original experiment have been validated.

It will be very interesting to see what new information comes with tomorrow's FIA information (assuming it comes)

 

[kyser_soze]

I would add (for anyone interested) that in fairness to the NIF it's not a dedicated fusion experiment, and was in fact started as a way of testing nuke without blowing them up, and announced earlier this year and, in contradiction of the Wiki comments, has been able to produce a laser powerful enough to achieve ignition:

https://publicaffairs.llnl.gov/news/news_releases/2010/NR-10-01-06.html

I still reckon Bussard tho - if you're going to make fusion happen it'll either be simple or beyond our capacity to do it outside a lab because the tech won't be scalable enough to mass produce (ITER), or will require too much finicking about with the fuel (NIF).

I remember watching a doc about JET/ITER and the scientists are proudly saying 'Yes, the core temperature in here is 1 million times hotter than the core of the sun!!' and thinking 'Why would you need to do that? If the sun can fuse at a lower temperature, why aren't you seemingly making things harder? Impressively so, buy harder nonetheless.'

 

[Jonti]

And while $200m might sound like a lot, in comparison with stuff like the National Ignition Facility (about $4bn so far) and JET/ITER (anything upwards of €15bn so far), it's bascially pennies.

We’ve spent billions on tokamak research and one thing we’ve learnt is they’re no damn good.

Fusion works – you only have to look up in the sky at night to see thousands of fusion reactors. And not one of them is toroidal.

 

[kyser_soze]

They are a little bit like the NIF tho...

 

[cybertect]

* agog *

 

[EastEnder]

I understand your cynicism, but won't you accept that there's a real chance for success here? For the amount of money required, and the benefits if realised, it's got to be worth a go.

There's always a real chance for success, it's always just around the corner, the experimental results are always thoroughly promising, the attendant extrapolations equally ebullient.... this time next year Rodney...

I'd wet myself at the prospect of viable nuclear fusion actually happening any time soon - it would be a pivotal moment in human history.

Do I want it now? YES! Do I think it's gonna happen any time soon? NO!

Fusion works – you only have to look up in the sky at night to see thousands of fusion reactors. And not one of them is toroidal.

You've got to love that sort of rhetorical histrionics. "Fusion works"? No shit Sherlock. Who suggested it didn't?

 

[Jonti]

We’ve spent billions on tokamak research and one thing we’ve learnt is they’re no damn good.

Guessed you missed this bit ^

 

[beesonthewhatnow]

Looking good, now all we need is someone to sort out the warp drive

 

[Dr Jon]

...
I remember watching a doc about JET/ITER and the scientists are proudly saying 'Yes, the core temperature in here is 1 million times hotter than the core of the sun!!' and thinking 'Why would you need to do that? If the sun can fuse at a lower temperature, why aren't you seemingly making things harder? Impressively so, buy harder nonetheless.'

The sun is a pretty inefficient fusion reactor. It works because it's so BIG.

 

[EastEnder]

Guessed you missed this bit ^

"Fusion works" + tokamaks don't == "WB-D Polywell Device" works

Fantastic stuff, Einsteinian reasoning.

Any more pearls of wisdom?

 

[Jonti]

Your best course of action is to quietly wait and see?

 

[spacemonkey]

The folks at talk.polywell have a FOIA request that should deliver goods tomorrow, giving us loads of detail on the machines they're currently working on. Things look brighter and brighter

Looking forward to this.

Crispy, if you've got my hopes up for nothing, well, so help me god.

 

[Crispy]

The FOI request was denied, no new goodies

 

[Crispy]

I missed this earlier in the year: http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/05/10/6619613-fusion-goes-forward-from-the-fringe - the current money is about half spent and everything seems to be going well.

The terms of their recovery act funding require quarterly reports, the latest of which (http://www.recovery.gov/Transparenc...ctSummary508.aspx?AwardIDSUR=46419&qtr=2011Q2) says

As of 2Q/2011, the WB-8 device has demonstrated excellent plasma confinement properties. EMC2 is conducting high power pulsed experiments on WB-8 to test the Wiffle-Ball plasma scaling law on plasma energy and confinement.

So the outlook is not as gloomy as I said on that other thread the money lasts until the end of the year, so let's see if there's any news then...

 

[Crispy]

Latest Recovery Act report is out, with the tiniest snippet of info:

During 4Q of 2011, EMC2 has modified the electron injectors to increase the plasma heating. The higher plasma density in WB-8 prompted the need for higher heating power. We plan to operate WB-8 in high beta regime with the modified electron injectors during 1Q of 2012.

This is generally good news. Higher plasma density = more likely fusion. In plasma physics, Beta is the ratio of plasma pressure to magnetic pressure. It's a measure of efficiency of containment. Operating at high Beta means they're making good progress.

Amount of Award $7,855,504
Funds Invoiced/Received $3,382,826

Still plenty of funding in the pot

 

[Crispy]

Oh, and lots of analysis (speculation, really, given the slim info on offer) from the Talk Polywell people from this page onwards: http://www.talk-polywell.org/bb/viewtopic.php?t=1681&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=945

 

[likesfish]

Well the us navy are still dreaming of rail gun battle ships that use ludicrous amounts of power.
So they are motivated.
Persuading the republicans they can tell the middle east to go to hell is win win

 

[MikeMcc]

Latest Recovery Act report is out, with the tiniest snippet of info:

This is generally good news. Higher plasma density = more likely fusion. In plasma physics, Beta is the ratio of plasma pressure to magnetic pressure. It's a measure of efficiency of containment. Operating at high Beta means they're making good progress.

Still plenty of funding in the pot

I'm amazed that they are doing so well given such a low level of funding.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Well the us navy are still dreaming of rail gun battle ships that use ludicrous amounts of power.
So they are motivated.
Persuading the republicans they can tell the middle east to go to hell is win win

TBF navies have been a fan of railguns since they were first dreamed up. Remove magazines from a ship, and you've eliminated the single biggest potential cause of destruction.

 

[Bob_the_lost]

TBF navies have been a fan of railguns since they were first dreamed up. Remove magazines sailors from a ship, and you've eliminated the single biggest potential cause of destruction.

FTFY

 

[ViolentPanda]

FTFY

Harsh, but fair.

 

[stuff_it]

TBF navies have been a fan of railguns since they were first dreamed up. Remove magazines from a ship, and you've eliminated the single biggest potential cause of destruction.

But without their mucky mags wouldn't they all go boat happy?

 

[ViolentPanda]

But without their mucky mags wouldn't they all go boat happy?

It could be said, especially by the army, that sailors are already boat-happy.

 

[Crispy]

News! An actual paper from the polywell team!
http://arxiv.org/pdf/1406.0133v1.pdf
It confirms the electron confinement and wiffleball formation. It's good news basically. FFS someone give these guys more money!