I don't think it is them, because DT is mentioned specifically, but maybe.
Regarding Star Scientific, I don't know why, but they intrigue me more than most of these other snake oil companies.
I mean, they are right. If you can make pions cheaply, then that is all you need. They ingeniously talk extensively about muon catalyzed fusion on their web site, but give almost no clues as to how they make pions cheaply.
Heck, they imply that the pions are basically free. "The Star Scientific system requires very little energy to run, which means 99% of the energy liberated by the fusion reaction is available for use." No alpha sticking problem because, "Star Scientific is perfecting a method to constantly produce pions, which immediately decay into muons, which means the natural loss of some muons during the reaction is of no consequence."
Wow, how do you do that? What is the trick to making these cheap/free pions? "Star Scientific remained convinced the best approach was to look to nature for the answers, and that commitment has paid off, and led us to where we are today... Star Scientific is developing a method to efficiently and consistently produce pions, and hence muons economically – and these muons are the catalyst for fusion energy."
Ah, nature!
In honesty, I am captivated by these guys. Probably because when learning about muon catalyzed fusion, I had the same simple thought that if you can make muons cheaply, the problem is solved. There must be a way. They have me hooked.
Plus their website is glossy!
regards
Aussies Claim Working Fusion Reactor
ROTFL, you are right, I guess that's all what you need to sell an idea in these daysseedload wrote:Plus their website is glossy!
regards
When I researched them I noticed the same standard scheme typical of these companies.
A fairly large (or rich) investor base, NO financial reports whatsoever, claims to have improved a previously researched technology and powerful claims to have a revolutionary energy related product in the coming future. Last but not least, a well structured lab to impress wannabe investors.
The most amazing feat so far from CEO is that he has been able to have his father, his wife and his daughter all employed by the company. I think shareholder should be impressed by this!
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philcowans
- Posts: 6
- Joined: Sun Oct 30, 2011 10:04 pm
Here's something interesting: The article says that you get 1MW out for 40W in. If you work through the math:
1 MW = 6.25e24 eV/s. If you take energy output per D-T fusion at 17.6 MeV, that would require 3.55e17 fusion events per second. If a muon catalyzes 150 fusion reactions (which seems to be the current record), you'd therefore need 2.37e15 muons/s. At 40 W = 2.50e20 eV/s that gives 105.6 keV per muon.
The weird thing is that the rest mass of a muon is 105.7 MeV/c^2, i.e. pretty much exactly a factor of 1000 out from this number. I can believe that the 40 W should be 40 kW, or 1 MW should be 1 kW, which would make the numbers add up exactly.
In any case - this is all still pretty unlikely, but there's an attention to detail here you don't normally get with pseudoscience.
1 MW = 6.25e24 eV/s. If you take energy output per D-T fusion at 17.6 MeV, that would require 3.55e17 fusion events per second. If a muon catalyzes 150 fusion reactions (which seems to be the current record), you'd therefore need 2.37e15 muons/s. At 40 W = 2.50e20 eV/s that gives 105.6 keV per muon.
The weird thing is that the rest mass of a muon is 105.7 MeV/c^2, i.e. pretty much exactly a factor of 1000 out from this number. I can believe that the 40 W should be 40 kW, or 1 MW should be 1 kW, which would make the numbers add up exactly.
In any case - this is all still pretty unlikely, but there's an attention to detail here you don't normally get with pseudoscience.
I don't know the tritium content in a typical glow in the dark sign, but I suspect you would have to crack open a few thousand, if not a few million signs in order to get the necessary tritium, especially for more than momentary operation.IntLibber wrote:Tritium supply: buy a few 300 dollar glow in the dark exit signs, crack open the glass ampules containing the tritium... .... ...... PROFIT!
In any case, if this is a plausible muon catalyzed scheme, the pertinent question is not the tritium source- that is a relatively trivial concern now. The question is where do you get the muons from?
You might produce them in an accelerator, but with the rest mass of muons, and the inefficiencies of accelerators it might take 500-1000 MeV to produce one. How do you then transport it from inside the accelerator to the fusion chamber before most of it decays. How do you optimize the reactions so that one muon might catalyze over a hundred fusions.
In theory muon fusion may be reasonable, possibly even at mildly positive Q's. But the total machine would not be a rice cooker,, it would probably dwarf ITER, and all for ~ 1-10MW of power. Does anyone want to pay $10,000 per KWh?
Dan Tibbets
To error is human... and I'm very human.
If one looks at the pictures on star website one can find an overly engineered red sphere in several of the shots, about the size of a rice cooker, where diagnostics are pointed. If that thing is the source of 1MW of neutrons it would be very shocking. Such a thing should be behind several meters of concrete or water with remote handling. Yet they're just casually setting it on a table and walking around it it.
Carter
Allowing that they made a factor of 1000 error in input or output power, those numbers add up almost too exactly. Near 100% efficient conversion of input energy to muons greatly stretches credibility.philcowans wrote:If a muon catalyzes 150 fusion reactions (which seems to be the current record) ... The weird thing is that the rest mass of a muon is 105.7 MeV/c^2, i.e. pretty much exactly a factor of 1000 out from this number. I can believe that the 40 W should be 40 kW, or 1 MW should be 1 kW, which would make the numbers add up exactly.
Still, a breakthrough in muon production could make muon catalyzed fusion very attractive.
On the other hand, HR is constantly hiring... and the death benefits are awesome.kcdodd wrote:If one looks at the pictures on star website one can find an overly engineered red sphere in several of the shots, about the size of a rice cooker, where diagnostics are pointed. If that thing is the source of 1MW of neutrons it would be very shocking. Such a thing should be behind several meters of concrete or water with remote handling. Yet they're just casually setting it on a table and walking around it it.
When opinion and reality conflict - guess which one is going to win in the long run.
That's a thought I have also in mind since a couple of years.KitemanSA wrote:I wonder if all this talk about coming breakthrus isn't promoted just to divert our attention from the fact that no breaklthru is needed.
LFTRs can do everything we want to do (except maybe space propulsion) and we could have functioning reactors in years, not decades.
Oh well.
Apart some small issues in the fluid treatment, Liquid Fluoride Reactors is a technology that coupled to supercritical CO2 turbines can indeed change the world of energy as we know it today.
Hmmm, straight power reactor, no breeder or fuel reprocessing for a short period to launch into orbit, looser thermal limits than a solid core (higher exhaust velocity engine)... How are prospects for a LFTR based NERVA type design?KitemanSA wrote:LFTRs can do everything we want to do (except maybe space propulsion)
