ITER Deep In The......

[MSimon]

You made it sound as though ELMs where unknown and the result of slap shot research. Of course they are not fully understood, but they are known of.

There are several proposals for elm control MSimon. I only know of the resonant coils actually shown to work. Not sure of the other methods.

Yep. And none of them were included in the ITER Design before they started cutting metal. No doubt a minor oversight.

[kcdodd]

Which part have they started? As far as I know the only parts actually made is superconducting cable.

At least it can be done.

[MSimon]

Which part have they started? As far as I know the only parts actually made is superconducting cable.

At least it can be done.

The magnets determine the size of the device. It is my understanding that a bigger device would have been desirable re: adding ELM control. But it is all moot. My bet is that with the ongoing cost escalation the device will be canceled.

[GIThruster]

"My bet is that with the ongoing cost escalation the device will be canceled."

Yup. As I quoted before, "The trouble with Socialism is that sooner or later, you run out of other people's money."

We run out of capital here too, in our capitalist pig economy, which is why we never built the SCSC. That was for much nobler reasons, however.

Europe is in ruins. How long will it take for the folks here to realize?

Got any friends in Greece?

[Lighthugger]

I have hopes that pollywell will work but it maynot and there is little to no evidence that it will. There are huge challenges with iter but in theory it will work. It should not be cancelled as it sends a message to the anti fusion green mob who do not want to see anything which distracts from the quest for renewables. Renewables have there place but we will need more then just renewables. Cancelling this will be a huge mistake due to all the spin off reasearch that would be lost.

Europe is not ruined and for those that have forgotten the crisis was triggered when the us subprime market colapsed and spread through the worlds money markets. The eu has a tough time ahead with the savage and at least some of them short sighted cuts but we will pull out of this. news from the us today saw a drop in new house sales not seen for fifty years. The world just missed a deppression a big market like the eu failing would be bad news for the world including the us. Furthermore 15bilion euro is nothing over the time scale of the project.

[chrismb]

There are huge challenges with iter but in theory it will work.

Kinda depends on what you mean 'will work'. It is an experimental reactor and as such things will be learned from it, and, thus, it will work. All devices that are built to explore how they work do, indeed, work [within that requirement]. It is a tautology.

Would you like to share 'in what way' you think it'll work?

[Lighthugger]

Your right it's an experiment however the theory and experience behind
iter from all over the world indicate it should acheave greater then brake even. building a power plant is another matter. Does not mean it should be cancelled as it will produce interesting science.

[Enginerd]

Would you like to share 'in what way' you think it'll work?

If built ITER will certainly be able to generate plasma... In that regard I have no doubt it will work. For small values of the word "work".

If built, I wouldn't be surprised if the plasma escapes the magnetic containment, melts through billions worth of ITER shielding and equipment, and triggers catastrophic superconductor failure, shredding much of the rest of the billions worth of ITER investment... That would no doubt make a very impressive boom, which might be briefly entertaining, but I would imagine that when it comes to wasting money, $15 billion wasted in Vegas would provide more fun per dollar. A mere $15 million spent on alternative fusion approaches would likely yield a much better return on investment however.

At best I expect ITER to be a cautionary tale of yet-another-way by which one cannot produce useful fusion power. But then, we already know that. Getting net energy out of ITER has never even been part of the design. In the immortal words of Dr. Nicholas Krall, “We spent $15 billion dollars studying tokamaks and what we learned about them is that they are no darn good.”

[MSimon]

Your right it's an experiment however the theory and experience behind
iter from all over the world indicate it should acheave greater then brake even. building a power plant is another matter. Does not mean it should be cancelled as it will produce interesting science.

The experiments could be done a LOT cheaper.

What I mean by work is economical net power. A 500MW power station the size of an aircraft carrier is not my idea of "work".

[MSimon]

Enginerd,

Love your handle.