Talk-Polywell.org

This article is written by the author of the book "Sun in a Bottle: The Strange History Fusion and the Science of Wishful Thinking". When I was reading the article it reminded me of the content of the book so I wasn't surprised that it was by the same author. In his book he devotes one paragraph to the Polywell in the appendix on table top fusion devices. He points out that IEC devices have been created by high school students but the amount of fusion energy produced is way too small. He says that the math that explains the physics of the IEC device indicates that it cannot produce any meaningful amount of fusion. He also says the same applies to the Polywell since it is in the same category.

Rather snarky column.

The guy is right about the endless promises. However fusion is hard. And ultimately it is the right way to solve the energy problem. Not all the projects and money were blown in bad faith.

Fortunately we still have oil, coal, and fission for the near term.

JoeP wrote:Fortunately we still have oil, coal, and fission for the near term.

We have fission for the very very very very very very very very very LONG term. But in certain cases I'd give it up for fusion. I suspect Polywell could be one of those cases. From what I've seen, tokamaks will not be.

NB: each "very" indicates an additional order of magnitude in years.

I see no mention of Sandia Labs Z pinch or Tri-Alpha.

choff wrote:I see no mention of Sandia Labs Z pinch or Tri-Alpha.

Seife buries two links, one to Tri-Alpha and one to LPP, in the one-liner "schemes touted by startup companies with more cash than brains"...

... that's it. Talk about hit and run.

KitemanSA wrote:From what I've seen, tokamaks will not be.

From what?
Please specify.

As from what I've seen, TOKAMAK is the most advanced approach accepted by DOE and others.
While Polywell was not even concidered seriously.
Have you better background than folks working in Fusion Science Office of DOE?

Joseph Chikva wrote:

KitemanSA wrote:From what I've seen, tokamaks will not be.

From what?
Please specify.

As from what I've seen, TOKAMAK is the most advanced approach accepted by DOE and others.
While Polywell was not even concidered seriously.
Have you better background than folks working in Fusion Science Office of DOE?

Joey, boychik,
we've had this discussion before. If you don't recall the reasons, look.

KitemanSA wrote:

Joseph Chikva wrote:

KitemanSA wrote:From what I've seen, tokamaks will not be.

From what?
Please specify.

As from what I've seen, TOKAMAK is the most advanced approach accepted by DOE and others.
While Polywell was not even concidered seriously.
Have you better background than folks working in Fusion Science Office of DOE?

Joey, boychik,
we've had this discussion before. If you don't recall the reasons, look.

Really?
Reasons? Are your "reasons" heavier than DOE experts' conclusions?
"I've seen". You've seen nothing and you do not know TOKAMAK at all.

Joseph Chikva wrote:As from what I've seen, TOKAMAK is the most advanced approach accepted by DOE and others.

And has been persuasively argued here, the economics of a Tokomak are such that the math only makes sense as jobs programs for the over-educated ans insufficiently wise.

I'm not going out on a limb to say a commercial Tokomak of the DOE sort will never be built.

TDPerk wrote:

Joseph Chikva wrote:As from what I've seen, TOKAMAK is the most advanced approach accepted by DOE and others.

And has been persuasively argued here, the economics of a Tokomak are such that the math only makes sense as jobs programs for the over-educated ans insufficiently wise.

I'm not going out on a limb to say a commercial Tokomak of the DOE sort will never be built.

Any technology is expensive initially with the trend of further decreasing cost. From the other side the trend of permanent increase of energy’s cost is also observed.
And what do you prefer: to have expensive but viable technology of to have cheap but unviable one?

While Polywell was not even concidered seriously.

Tell that to the government funding it has.

As for Tokamak, yes it may/should work at full scale. But that does not make it sensible. It is like saying, "well, I can take all the gold in the world and make a small tower." Well, yes you could, but is the cost worth it? What did you achieve? Can you do it again?

Tokamak, as far as I can see, is a one-off very cool most expensive science experiment ever. Will we learn from trying. Well yes. Will it be worth it, odds are not.

But it will be a cool looking tower of gold.

Joseph Chikva wrote:Any technology is expensive initially with the trend of further decreasing cost. From the other side the trend of permanent increase of energy’s cost is also observed.
And what do you prefer: to have expensive but viable technology of to have cheap but unviable one?

The Tokamak is expensive enough it is obviously will be cheaper to get the power from fission reactors, so if Polywell or some else doesn't pan out, we will use those instead of a Tokamak. The Tokamak is unviable.

No commercial Tokamak will be built.

TDPerk wrote: The Tokamak is unviable.

Have you ever heared about Lawson criterion? And if yes, please inform me which machine overcome that?

Also be noted that TOKAMAK's idea is simple enough - not more complex than Polywell, which would not be cheaper in case of comparable scale machine.
First table-top TOKAMAKs also were rather cheap.

ladajo wrote:

While Polywell was not even concidered seriously.

Tell that to the government funding it has.

Reading fusion relating papers you often would find the standard phrase: "This work was sponsored by DOE. This does not mean that all approaches are equally considered by DOE as promising. Once I recall ASTRON - very nice idea. Where is that? Forgotten.

ladajo wrote:As for Tokamak, yes it may/should work at full scale. But that does not make it sensible. It is like saying, "well, I can take all the gold in the world and make a small tower." Well, yes you could, but is the cost worth it? What did you achieve? Can you do it again?

Tokamak, as far as I can see, is a one-off very cool most expensive science experiment ever. Will we learn from trying. Well yes. Will it be worth it, odds are not.

But it will be a cool looking tower of gold.

Here you are making one mistake: the cost of program is not equal to cost of machine. As I know you are a military man.
So, consider the cost of new missile development cost and compare that with the cost of each missile. For example, development cost of Javelin missile would reach billion, while one missile costs about one hundred thousand dollars. Feel difference?