DESCRIPTION
Research Development Test Evaluation (RDT&E) Plan Plasma Fusion (Polywell) project for research, analysis, development, and testing to validate the basic physics of the plasma fusion (polywell) concept as well as requirements to provide the Navy with data for potential applications of polywell fusion with a delivered item, wiffleball 8 (WB8).
Meanwhile, my backyard space hopper weeps rusty tears from its empty power-module bay...
FPDF.gov
last modified date: 01/14/2014 18:58:27, and now the completion date 4-30-14
so an update after all, but no extra money unless the option is exercised. Maybe their final report is yet to have been delivered to the Navy? Chuckie II?
The problem with this "hand to mouth" funding is people can't live that way, and neither can projects. This is bureaucratic crap.
Counting the days to commercial fusion. It is not that long now.
So now we have no news or annoucement, but a revamped completion date (again) to near future.
Is this teeing up a follow-on contract? Or is it a contract closeout adjustment?
We will need to see money allocations to have any real sense of what is going on.
But no status report is telling. It would seem to indicate someone still has 'something to hide'. It would make no sense to hide 'nothing'.
Meh.
The development of atomic power, though it could confer unimaginable blessings on mankind, is something that is dreaded by the owners of coal mines and oil wells. (Hazlitt)
What I want to do is to look up C. . . . I call him the Forgotten Man. (Sumner)
I would say we are coming off a year in which the funding situation was so bizarre that any application of rational thought would only lead to confusion.
Maybe the madness has passed. I've got a lot of friends from my old employer who jumped ship or were laid off last summer. The way the military avoided impacting their own employees was to shift the burden to contractors. They just stopped authorizing new phases of work, leaving the contractors with contracts but no authority to work on them. I had a sudden wave of old friends cozying up to me on LinkedIn as they counted the number of chords on their parachutes. Now I'm seeing them pop up at new companies all over the country.
Have you guys noticed a distinct uptick in telemarketing calls over the last year? My guess is that it is still prohibited, but the telemarketers know good and well that there is zero budget for enforcing the ban.
Do not call list was establish in 2003 and you have to renew every five years. This law was change in 2007 to be permanent but some company are still calling because they said if you did not sign up for the 2007 list then your number is available after five years until you sign up again. The FTC is very lax in enforcing the rule because all you have to do is "renew" to be on this permanent list.
Bottom line you may want to sign up again.
I am not a nuclear physicist, but play one on the internet.
Tom Ligon wrote:I would say we are coming off a year in which the funding situation was so bizarre that any application of rational thought would only lead to confusion.
Double yup.
The development of atomic power, though it could confer unimaginable blessings on mankind, is something that is dreaded by the owners of coal mines and oil wells. (Hazlitt)
What I want to do is to look up C. . . . I call him the Forgotten Man. (Sumner)
paperburn1 wrote:Do not call list was establish in 2003 and you have to renew every five years. This law was change in 2007 to be permanent but some company are still calling because they said if you did not sign up for the 2007 list then your number is available after five years until you sign up again. The FTC is very lax in enforcing the rule because all you have to do is "renew" to be on this permanent list.
Bottom line you may want to sign up again.
Yeah, we renewed. They keep calling. I like caller ID. The ones claiming to be the IRS like leaving voice mail messages, and sound suspiciously like they're from some Former Soviet Republic.
(Ligon mumbles something about if he were President something something drone strike.)
Tom Ligon wrote:I would say we are coming off a year in which the funding situation was so bizarre that any application of rational thought would only lead to confusion.
Maybe the madness has passed. I've got a lot of friends from my old employer who jumped ship or were laid off last summer. The way the military avoided impacting their own employees was to shift the burden to contractors. They just stopped authorizing new phases of work, leaving the contractors with contracts but no authority to work on them. I had a sudden wave of old friends cozying up to me on LinkedIn as they counted the number of chords on their parachutes. Now I'm seeing them pop up at new companies all over the country.
Have you guys noticed a distinct uptick in telemarketing calls over the last year? My guess is that it is still prohibited, but the telemarketers know good and well that there is zero budget for enforcing the ban.
So maybe this is the reason the old website was resurrected?
Or, EMC2 found 10 minutes free time (time to write that darn report, anything but write a report, wash the dog, clean behind the refrigerator, etc), and $8 (Navy emptied the petty cash drawer, accountants tidying up) more like it... and EMC2 smelled the rope burning (9/30/13 contract end and no exercised option).
Counting the days to commercial fusion. It is not that long now.
Fusion R&D Phase 1 - Validate and extend WB-6 results with WB-7 Device:
1.5 years / $1.8M, Successfully Completed
Fusion R&D Phase 2 - Design, build and test larger scale WB-8 Polywell Device
2 years / $7M, In Process
Fusion R&D Phase 3 - Design, build and test full scale 100 MW Fusion System:
4 years / $200M, In Design Phase
notice, phase 2 costs about 3 times that of phase 1, but phase 3 costs _28_ times that of phase 2. though to be fair, it's a drop in the bucket compared to what's spent on weapon research that doesn't produce anything... so... comparing molehills might be missing the bigger picture.
also, i'm curious whether phase 3 used to say "in design phase" or if that's new...
Hold on a second.. Am I to understand they recently _shortened_ the contract completion time, _while keeping the funding the same_? If you keep the funding the same for something, it by definition means that it does not cost you anything, regardless of whether you made it shorter or longer. Making it shorter does not give it more opportunity for success. And not making it shorter is free. So the only rational reason you have for shortening the deadline, and keeping funding the same, is if it was already a success; is to avoid the opportunity lost by needlessly delaying contract renewal.
If the Navy was going to spring for that option it would seem they would do it after the completion of the WB-8 main work, which has been moved out to 4-30-14 by an update to the FPDS.gov site on 01/14/2014, and it is worth adding that the update was made without posting additional money. Indeed, the report's authorized money is the original budgeted contract amount to the penny; read what you want into that. The Navy has kept a tight lid on EMC2 project fruitfulness, or lack thereof. The reason for the tight lid is supposed to be to prevent substantive speculation, which leaves the subject open only to those who drink tea and can read leaves at the cup bottom. As far as I know there has been no MSM update since...man, it has been forever.... It is anybody's guess what is going on.
Counting the days to commercial fusion. It is not that long now.
It would seem that we are either headed for a press conference or a money move on FPDS. Doesn't seem to be another route.
I guess maybe if the navy closes it up, and EMC2 is not allowed to talk afterward that would be pretty darn weird.
Meh. Something will give sooner or later. A crumb? Any crumb, just one would be enough...sniff...
The development of atomic power, though it could confer unimaginable blessings on mankind, is something that is dreaded by the owners of coal mines and oil wells. (Hazlitt)
What I want to do is to look up C. . . . I call him the Forgotten Man. (Sumner)
As far as I know there has been no MSM update since...man, it has been forever.... It is anybody's guess what is going on.