(tok) fusion in the news

[rcain]

couple of pieces on fusion in the news:

http://americansecurityproject.org/blog ... nvestment/

- on USA's Tok programme (or what's left of it - not)

http://www.nature.com/news/fusion-proje ... er-1.11669

- on ITER, and how badly managed it is (again).

- though it continually annoys me that when the (lay) press (and governments) ever bring up fusion, they only ever seem to connect DD/DT and Tokamaks - hence they only ever spin the same tired story of the 'failed 50 year promise'.

nor do we ever seem to get any intelligent debate on alternative fission technology (eg: Thorium, Transmutation, etc).

don't these journalists and politicians know how to google, or browse wikipedia even?

[MSimon]

couple of pieces on fusion in the news:

http://americansecurityproject.org/blog ... nvestment/

- on USA's Tok programme (or what's left of it - not)

http://www.nature.com/news/fusion-proje ... er-1.11669

- on ITER, and how badly managed it is (again).

- though it continually annoys me that when the (lay) press (and governments) ever bring up fusion, they only ever seem to connect DD/DT and Tokamaks - hence they only ever spin the same tired story of the 'failed 50 year promise'.

nor do we ever seem to get any intelligent debate on alternative fission technology (eg: Thorium, Transmutation, etc).

don't these journalists and politicians know how to google, or browse wikipedia even?

don't these journalists and politicians know how to google, or browse wikipedia even?

No.

And no one talks about the tok radiation problems. Or the breeding problem.

[Skipjack]

on ITER, and how badly managed it is (again).

To be fair, it is not the management of the ITER project itself that is bad, it is the fact that politicial interests interfer with the project all the time, that causing all the problems.

[Joseph Chikva]

they only ever seem to connect DD/DT...

Only DT to be more realistic. People advocating other types of fuel today are too far from reality. As only if you would show the positive balance on DT you can go to the next stage - e.g. pB11, etc.

[rcain]

they only ever seem to connect DD/DT...

Only DT to be more realistic. People advocating other types of fuel today are too far from reality. As only if you would show the positive balance on DT you can go to the next stage - e.g. pB11, etc.

agree in principle. however, both FocusFusion and Polywell are planning on attempting pB11 shots within this next year or so - so we shall see.

[Joseph Chikva]

they only ever seem to connect DD/DT...

Only DT to be more realistic. People advocating other types of fuel today are too far from reality. As only if you would show the positive balance on DT you can go to the next stage - e.g. pB11, etc.

agree in principle. however, both FocusFusion and Polywell are planning on attempting pB11 shots within this next year or so - so we shall see.

Ok, let's see. One year or so is not a big time frame if to recall that the end of crude oil era is estimated as 50 years and fusion researches last at least 60 years.
But we also should be agreed that any fusion approach showing positive balance even running on DT fuel would be a great success.
And on my belief people offering other more difficult for realization fuels aren’t so sure of their approaches. As in case of failure they always can say: "I failed on pB11 but give me one more chance (give me money one more time) as success on DT is just in my pocket". But let's they do that if success for DT is so obvious.
Nobody argues that DT is "good", while pB11 (or other aneutronic) is "better". As "better is the enemy of good". (c)