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Nuclear Fusion: Research & Development

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Teenager builds fusion reactor from junk.
Link is long dead. The MIA news article can be accessed via the Wayback Machine.
See later post for the text of the MIA news article.
 
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Since I feel the overwhelming urge to post something here, I'll just helpfully point out that this device doesn't produce more energy than it takes to run it. It does make a reasonable neutron source, however.
 
based on the plans of Utah's own Philo Farnsworth, the inventor of television.
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Erm... i was led to belive that it was john logi baird, who invented the television, granted he's not american so he may not appear in their educational system (snigger, snigger) but surely i haven't been lied to all these years?

NOTE: Subsequent discussion on the history of television technology has been moved to the appropriate thread:

https://forums.forteana.org/index.php?threads/the-history-of-television-technology.188/
 
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I certainly didn't intend to sow any additional confusion by dragging the provenance of modern television technology into this! (Really!) Actually, I kind of like the somewhat Fortean confusion about the various contributions made to the concept.

But I can't resist making the snarky comment that "Hey, did any of those other guys invent an electrostatic fusion reactor?!!!!" :D
 
EU 'confident' of star power site

Europe is still confident that it will be chosen to host Iter, the world's biggest nuclear fusion reactor.

Philippe Busquin, the EU's research commissioner, told gathered experts the volume of Europe's fusion research would double from 2007 to 2013.

Fusion powers stars and is seen as a cleaner approach to energy production than nuclear fission and fossil fuels.

Mr Busquin was speaking at a 25th anniversary event at the Jet (Joint European Torus) fusion centre.

The Jet project is one of the world's leading fusion research facilities, and holds the record for fusion energy production.

Based at Culham in Oxfordshire, it is a collaboration between all European fusion organisations, and involves technology and physics research from the global scientific and engineering community.

Prime Minister Tony Blair sent a message of support for the achievements of the project, which could lead to a substantial reduction in the use of fossil fuels to produce electricity.

At the anniversary celebrations, Mr Busquin reaffirmed Jet's position as the main driver in the progress towards eventually producing commercially viable, clean, safe and cheap energy.

Summer decision?

But the decision on whether the Iter project (International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor) is built at Rokkasho-mura in Japan, or Cadarache in France, has been delayed several times.

Iter would be more than double the size of the facility at Jet, and would aim to generate 500 megawatts of fusion power for 500 seconds or longer.

In a special message, Mr Blair said he "hoped to see the siting issue resolved in the next few months".

Mr Busquin told BBC News Online that his hope was that the decision would be made quickly, before the end of the summer.

Crucial to the decision is the plan for a broader approach to the Iter project and the technological support involved, which includes the location of further research sites and data centres.

This includes the location of the International Fusion Material Irradiation Facility (IFMIF), which would help develop materials for fusion production.

He also reiterated the importance of gaining full European support for Iter.

At a recent European ministerial meeting, the plans to adopt a broader approach to the Iter project were given to ministers.

Mr Busquin said that both Japan and Europe had recognised the plans, which would mean that the site not chosen to be the location of Iter would still have a crucial technological role in the project as a whole.

Behind the scenes, there has been much political manoeuvring, and the decision is said to be as much about wider geopolitical concerns as technical issues.

The European Union, Russia and China want France to win; but South Korea, the United States and Tokyo are backing Japan.

In some quarters, it is felt the US objects to the French option because of its position on the war in Iraq.

Star power

After the International Space Station, Iter would be the largest international research and development collaboration.

In terms of the physics and huge amounts of energy involved, the project would be akin to building a star on Earth.

It would be the first fusion device to produce thermal energy at the level of conventional electricity-producing power stations, and would pave the way for commercial power production.

In a fusion reaction, energy is produced when light atoms - the hydrogen isotopes deuterium and tritium - are fused together to form heavier atoms.

To use fusion reactions as an energy source, it is necessary to heat a gas to temperatures exceeding 100 million Celsius - many times hotter than the centre of the Sun.

The technical requirements to do this, which Jet has been working on for 25 years, are immense. But the rewards, if can be made to work at a commercial level, are extremely attractive.

One kilogram of fusion fuel would produce the same amount of energy as 10,000,000 kg of fossil fuel.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/3735017.stm

Published: 2004/05/23 09:36:06 GMT

© BBC MMIV
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I remember reading, in an old 'Omni' magazine in the 1980's about various new ideas for fusion machines at the time. Most of which people interested in the field would recognize. There's one that I vaguely recall that I can't scratch up a name for, and was wondering if anyone else had heard of this.


As I recall, it was some inventor, who may have actually had a company formed at the time, that had a design that he claimed would allow him to build machines about refrigerator-sized that you could run in your basement. The key idea was that they had a particle beam that was magnetically bent in a self-intersecting, 'figure-8' path, which would cause a greater number of collisions.


Does this ring any bells? Does anyone have old 'Omni' magazines in their library? Was this just another hairbrained inventor, or did he at least build a prototype and test it?
 
I am assuming this has nothing to do with the group who are still trying to convince everyone about cold fusion? Some feller trying to get "funding" for his "experiments" in fusion energy creation?
 
No, this was before the cold fusion flap ever occurred.

From what I recall, this guy could have been a snake-oil salesman or a crank. From the paucity of detail, it was hard to determine how close to reality this was.

I was hoping from the description someone on the board would chime in with "oh, that sounds like a ****** machine" or "that's a well known crank invention from back then".

From my small reading upon such matters the whole "magnetic criss-crossing beam pattern" seemed like a unique feature.
 
I believe it was called Migma fusion. If I recall correctly, Bob Guccioni (sp?) backed the project with his own money and was convinced the government sabotaged the project.
 
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0, ... _tophead_3

LOS ANGELES -- A tabletop experiment created nuclear fusion long seen as a possible clean energy solution under lab conditions, scientists reported.

But the amount of energy produced was too little to be seen as a breakthrough in solving the world's energy needs.

For years, scientists have sought to harness controllable nuclear fusion, the same power that lights the sun and stars. This latest experiment relied on a tiny crystal to generate a strong electric field. While falling short as a way to produce energy, the method could have potential uses in the oil-drilling industry and homeland security, said Seth Putterman, one of the physicists who did the experiment at the University of California, Los Angeles.

The experiment's results appear in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature.

Previous claims of tabletop fusion have been met with skepticism and even derision by physicists. In 1989, Dr. B. Stanley Pons of the University of Utah and Martin Fleischmann of Southampton University in England shocked the world when they announced that they had achieved so-called cold fusion at room temperature. Their work was discredited after repeated attempts to reproduce it failed.

Fusion experts noted that the UCLA experiment was credible because, unlike the 1989 work, it didn't violate basic principles of physics.

"This doesn't have any controversy in it because they're using a tried and true method," said David Ruzic, professor of nuclear and plasma engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. "There's no mystery in terms of the physics."

Fusion power has been touted as the ultimate energy source and a cleaner alternative to fossil fuels like coal and oil. Fossil fuels are expected to run short in about 50 years.

In fusion, light atoms are joined in a high-temperature process that frees large amounts of energy.

It is considered environment-friendly because it produces virtually no air pollution and does not pose the safety and long-term radioactive waste concerns associated with modern nuclear power plants, where heavy uranium atoms are split to create energy in a process known as fission. In the UCLA experiment, scientists placed a tiny crystal that can generate a strong electric field into a vacuum chamber filled with deuterium gas, a form of hydrogen capable of fusion. Then the researchers activated the crystal by heating it.

The resulting electric field created a beam of charged deuterium atoms that struck a nearby target, which was embedded with yet more deuterium. When some of the deuterium atoms in the beam collided with their counterparts in the target, they fused.

The reaction gave off an isotope of helium along with subatomic particles known as neutrons, a characteristic of fusion. The experiment did not, however, produce more energy than the amount put in an achievement that would be a huge breakthrough.

UCLA's Putterman said future experiments will focus on refining the technique for potential commercial uses, including designing portable neutron generators that could be used for oil well drilling or scanning luggage and cargo at airports.
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(Split from the Cold Fusion thread - Stu)

Frozen talks over fusion reactor warm up


Europe and Japan have taken a significant step towards finalising the highly contentious plan to build the world's largest nuclear fusion facility, thawing negotiations that have been frozen for 18 months. But the countries have not yet settled the most crucial question of where to build the reactor.

The ambitious project, called ITER - International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor - aims to lay the groundwork for using nuclear fusion as an inexhaustible and clean energy source. But progress on ITER ground to a halt in December 2003 because its six member parties could not agree on where to locate the premier facility. The EU, China and Russia lobbied for Cadarache in France, while the US, South Korea and Japan supported the Japanese town of Rokkashomura.

Both France and Japan continue to vie for the project's main site. But representatives from the EU and Japan apparently thrashed out a deal in Geneva, Switzerland on 5 May outlining the responsibilities of the country that will host ITER and those of the country that will miss out on the reactor.

The details have not been officially released, but some were provided by recent Japanese media reports - details that had been previously mooted. In the agreement, the host would cover 50% of the construction costs - estimated at between $5 billion and $10 billion - while the non-host and the other four parties would each cover 10%.

Also, the non-host would itself play host to a related facility - estimated to cost between $1 billion and $2 billion - to test how various materials stand up to bombardment by the high-energy neutrons produced in fusion reactions. And the non-host country would be allowed to send 40 researchers to the facility - making up 20% of its work force.

Inflamed officials
"We see the recent talks as very optimistic and moving the process forward," EU spokesperson Antonia Mochan told New Scientist. "But we've still got a way to go."

Indeed, recent comments by French president Jacques Chirac asserting that ITER would almost certainly be built in France inflamed Japanese officials, who vehemently denied they had given up their bid.

But the recent crossfire may actually be a positive sign, says Raymond Fonck, a physicist at the University of Wisconsin in Madison who has reviewed ITER for the US National Academy of Sciences. It suggests the two countries "are talking and bartering back and forth," he says. "That's very encouraging."

The initial agreement hammered out by the two countries will be ratified by the six parties at a ministerial meeting in June, according to French research minister Francois d'Aubert, who says a site agreement could follow shortly thereafter.

"There is a lot of hope there will be a decision in June or July of this year," Fonck told New Scientist. "But who will win? Just place your bets."

ITER would work by heating isotopes of hydrogen to hundreds of millions of degrees, creating a plasma of charged particles. Confined by magnetic fields in a doughnut-shaped machine called a tokamak, the particles would collide and fuse, producing high-energy helium nuclei and neutrons.

The uncharged neutrons would escape the tokamak, creating heat that could be used to generate electricity. But the positively charged helium nuclei would be trapped by the magnetic fields and would help sustain further fusion reactions.


http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn7361
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edit;cheers
 
Q&A: Nuclear fusion reactor



A decision has finally been made to site the 10bn-euro (£6.6bn) Iter nuclear fusion reactor at Cadarache in France. The announcement brings to an end months of argument between the project partners - the EU, the US, Japan, Russia, China and South Korea.

What is Iter (International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor)?


Iter is an experimental reactor that will attempt to reproduce on Earth the nuclear reactions that power the Sun and other stars. It will consolidate all that has been learnt over many decades of study. If it works, and the technologies are proven to be practical, the international community will then build a prototype commercial reactor, dubbed Demo. The final step would be to roll out fusion technology across the globe.

What exactly is fusion?

Fusion works on the principle that energy can be released by forcing together atomic nuclei rather than by splitting them, as in the case of the fission reactions that drive existing nuclear power stations.

In the core of the Sun, huge gravitational pressure allows this to happen at temperatures of around 10 million degrees Celsius. At the much lower pressure that is possible on Earth, temperatures to produce fusion need to be much higher - above 100 million degrees Celsius.

No materials on Earth could withstand direct contact with such heat. To achieve fusion, therefore, scientists have devised a solution in which a super-heated gas, or plasma, is held and squeezed inside an intense doughnut-shaped magnetic field.

What are the advantages of fusion?

The best fuel for fusion comprises two types, or isotopes, of hydrogen: deuterium and tritium. The former can be derived from water which is abundant and available everywhere. The latter can be produced from lithium, which is plentiful in the Earth's crust.

Unlike the burning of fossil fuels, fusion reactions produce no carbon dioxide, the greenhouse gas blamed by scientists for warming the planet.

Fusion scientists also say the system would be inherently safe because any malfunction would result in a rapid shutdown.

Will Iter produce radioactive waste?

Yes. The neutrons produced in fusion reactions will "activate" the materials used in the walls of Iter's plasma chamber. But one of the project's tasks will be to find the materials that best withstand this bombardment.

This could result in waste materials that are safe to handle in a relatively modest timescale (50-100 years), compared with the much longer lived radioactive waste (many thousands of years) produced as a direct result of splitting atoms in fission reactions.

It has been calculated that after 100 years of post-operation radioactive decay, Iter will be left with about 6,000 tonnes of waste. When packaged, this would be equivalent to a cube with about 10m edges.


How soon will Iter be built?

The 28 June meeting of the Iter partners agreed to site the reactor at Cadarache in southern France over Rokkasho in northern Japan. Further progress on technical issues is still required but it is hoped an agreement can be reached on these by the end of this year, so that Iter construction can begin by the end of 2005.

How much will Iter cost?

Iter construction costs are estimated at 4.57 billion euros (at 2000 prices), to be spread over about 10 years. Estimated total operating costs over the expected operational lifetime of about 20 years are of a similar order.

How will Iter be financed?

The EU and France will contribute 50% of the construction costs and the other five parties will each contribute 10%. Because Japan agreed to stand aside in favour of Cadarache, the nation gets favourable terms. Japan will get to host a related materials research facility - of which half the construction costs will be shouldered by the EU. Its scientists will get a larger share of Iter's research posts.

The EU will now support a Japanese official to become the director-general of the Iter project; and will also back Japan to host the Demo fusion reactor if, or when, it gets built.

Why is the EU so keen to host the reactor?

Iter will require considerable investment from all six partners, but the potential pay-offs are thought to be well worth it.

Hosting the experimental reactor will put the EU at the front of the queue to take commercial advantage of fusion.

The project is expected to generate more than 10,000 jobs and the expertise developed on Iter will allow Europe to reap the benefits of spin-off technologies.

Why is fusion energy seen to be so desirable?

We cannot rely on fossil fuels indefinitely. Firstly, supplies of oil, coal and gas are finite and will eventually run down. Secondly, the greenhouse gases produced through the burning of fossil fuels are a major driver of climate change, scientists believe.

However, demand for energy is also increasing. In 1990, about 75% of the world's population (those in the developing countries) were responsible for only 33% of the world's energy consumption.

By the year 2020, that 75% is likely to have risen to 85% and the energy consumption to around 55%. Thus, there will be greater competition for the fuel resources available.

Some think fusion will provide a relatively safe, green alternative to fossil fuels; enabling the production of vast amounts of energy from abundant sources.

When will the first commercial fusion reactor be built?

Not for a long time. Experimental fusion reactors like the Joint European Torus (Jet) at Culham in the UK currently use more energy than they release.

There are therefore many major scientific and engineering hurdles to overcome before the technology becomes commercially viable. A commercial reactor is not expected before 2045 or 2050 - if at all. Indeed, there is no guarantee that Iter will succeed.

The running joke is that fusion has been "just decades away" for several decades.

And many commentators, particularly those greens who have fought long campaigns against nuclear fission, are deeply suspicious of fusion.

They doubt Iter will deliver and believe the money earmarked for the project would be better spent on renewables, such as wind, wave and solar, for which technical solutions already exist.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4627237.stm
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Apparently the one in oxfordshire uses 2% of the national grid when it first fires up :/
 
My father worked at the Oxfordshire site for over 30 years.Recently retired.

*insert proud smilie*
 
Is that site at Abingdon still operational :?: I remember going there in the late sixties to service time clocks for an onsite contractor.
 
From: New York Times Editorial Published July 3rd 2005
A standing joke among scientists is that fusion power - the holy grail of those seeking a boundless supply of energy to supplant fossil fuels - is always decades away. That has been the guesstimate for half a century, and it remained the guesstimate last week when an international consortium announced that it had finally resolved an internal struggle over where to site an experimental nuclear fusion reactor. It will be in southern France, with Japan receiving some consolation-prize benefits.
Read full article at- http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/03/opini ... ?th&emc=th :nooo:
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Yeah its still going, and will be for another 5 years or so, albeit on a smaller scale than in recent years.It will still be helping with further research in preperation for the planned site in France.
 
:D Thanks for that. Was it called the JET Project or something similar; Joint European T... :?:
 
No probs.Yeah, Joint European Torus.


The JET Joint Undertaking was established in June 1978 to construct and operate the Joint European Torus (JET), of its time the largest single project within the European nuclear fusion programme. It was coordinated by Euratom (the European Atomic Energy Community), and the JET project went on to become the flagship of the Community Fusion Programme. It started operating in 1983 and was the first fusion facility in the world to achieve a significant production of controlled fusion power (nearly 2MW) with a Deuterium-Tritium experiment in 1991.
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JET is the world's largest nuclear fusion research facility.

From-http://www.jet.efda.org/
Situated at Culham in the UK, the Joint European Torus is run as a collaboration between all European fusion organisations and with the participation of scientists from around the globe.
Despite the Put Downs
New York Times Editorial Published July 3rd 2005
8) Well they've done it, right here in UK! 16 Megawatts of electricity generated by Fusion, albeit, only a few seconds, but it has proven that it is feasible in our lifetime and NOT 'Pie in the Sky'.
Now comes the mammoth task of designing and constructing a commercially viable Generating Station.
The fascinating story is revealed on the website at - http://www.jet.efda.org/ :D
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Brian Josephson writes a letter to the editor at the Guardian asking if a small portion of the funding used for big fusion research wouldn't achieve more investigating some tantalizing anomalies.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/letters/story ... 90,00.html
Letters
Nuclear energy options

Monday July 11, 2005
The Guardian

The official word is that the international thermonuclear experimental reactor is the way ahead for clean energy from nuclear fusion, though it will be decades before usable energy will materialise (Letters, July 1). Commitment to this approach seems to have led to officialdom deciding to ignore apparently promising alternatives, such as a process known as sonofusion, featured in a recent lecture by Professor Rusi Taleyarkhan of Purdue University. This uses sound waves to create bubbles in a liquid and then collapse them, very high temperatures occurring at the point of collapse.


It has been known for some time that flashes of light are sometimes generated in such a situation, but Taleyarkhan and his co-workers appear to have shown that under carefully specified conditions nuclear fusion also occurs. His claims, published in Science and in the Physical Review, are based on the detection of nuclear products as well as on a range of other checks. A replication by another group has been published recently in Nuclear Engineering and Design, so the claims cannot readily be dismissed.

This work indicates fairly definitively that thermonuclear temperatures can be produced simply, in a table-top experiment, forcing one to take seriously the stronger claims of Stringham et al. They also use sonofusion, but have the bubbles collapse at a metal surface, and claim this greatly enhances the yield of the fusion process. Power outputs in a small volume of the order of 50 watts are currently claimed, and they are working towards power generation in the kilowatt range. Dare one hope that some of Iter's budget might be diverted to possibilities such as these?

Prof Brian Josephson
University of Cambridge
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as ever they probably have a military aplication in mind forcing them down the Iter path
 
Sonofusion already discredited

The good 'Professor'should try a Google search for sonofusion to get a comprehensive view on this 'crackpot' idea, and before rushing into print in the Guardian :roll: A BBC Horizon programme investigated this; see- http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/tvradio/program ... t_qa.shtml .Desk top fusion :?: Can I buy a neutron stream on eBay?
The Brian Josephson home page at http://www.roma1.infn.it/rog/group/fras ... phson.html is quite revealing. An 'Ivory Tower ' genius being well rewarded by a cash strapped University, whilst the real work is being carried out at places like Culham.
:twisted: Military applications :?: Nutters awake! :_old:
 
Can get all the energy we want from the Casimir effect - if only somone would build some 100,000 tonne parallel metal plates....
 
Steam engines and spindizzies

Mr Chippablog seems to read Prof. Josepheson's letter differently than I had.

Not that I'm taking it as being necessarily correct.

I found this interesting becuase, in the history of science realm, you often have appeals to authority where experts in one field make ludicrious statements about some totally unrelated field, and people listen to them. (Is this the case here?)

Also, I read that as Josephson supporting spending some pennies on promising research in the the anomolous from the entrenched hot fusion industry's dollars. Or was I drunk at the time?!!!

I'm fond of confabulating Fort and James Blish to the effect of "it spindizzies when it's spindizzy time".
 
For those of us unaware of the Casimir effect :oops: Wikipedia say this
The Casimir effect is caused by the fact that space is filled with vacuum fluctuations, virtual particle-antiparticle pairs that continually form out of nothing and then vanish back into nothing an instant later. The gap between the two plates restricts the range of wavelengths possible for these virtual particles, and so fewer of them are present within this space. As a result, there is a lower energy density between the two plates than in open space; in essence, there is less "nothing" between the two plates, creating negative energy and pressure, which pulls the plates together. The narrower the gap, the more restricted the wavelength of the virtual particles, the more negative the energy and pressure between the plates, the more restricted the vacuum modes and the smaller the vacuum energy density, and thus the stronger the attractive force.

Since the Casimir effect is small and falls off as the fourth power of distance, its effect is greatest on small objects that are close together. It can become an important consideration in studies of the interaction of molecules, together with other small scale effects, such as the fluctuations in the electronic structure of molecules causing transient dipoles which lead to Van der Waals forces.
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No Comment :_old:
 
Anton La_Vey said:
Can get all the energy we want from the Casimir effect - if only somone would build some 100,000 tonne parallel metal plates....
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...and put them very very close together, then move them back and forth rapidly...
 
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