From Yahoo:
http://news.yahoo.com/lockheed-says-makes-breakthrough-fusion-energy-project-123840986--finance.html
"WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Lockheed Martin Corp said on Wednesday it had made a technological breakthrough in developing a power source based on nuclear fusion, and the first reactors, small enough to fit on the back of a truck, could be ready for use in a decade."
Who knew? But then again every other article I ever read said "Fusion is on 50 years away", maybe this time we get lucky!
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Lockheed Claims Fusion Breakthrough
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(Score: 5, Insightful) by cmn32480 on Thursday October 16 2014, @03:26PM
We've heard all this before. Until there is a working reactor, even in test, I'll play the skeptic.
If it is true, and this give way to true Fusion, it is a pretty sweet breakthrough.
"It's a dog eat dog world, and I'm wearing Milkbone underwear" - Norm Peterson
(Score: 5, Interesting) by captain normal on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:08PM
"Tom McGuire, who heads the project, said he and a small team had been working on fusion energy at Lockheed's secretive Skunk Works for about four years, but were now going public to find potential partners in industry and government for their work.
...
Lockheed shares fell 0.6 percent to $175.02 amid a broad market selloff." (From TFA)
This doesn't make any sense to me. If you have a viable design for such a reactor, a large company like Lockheed wouldn't have any problem finding " potential partners in industry and government" even in deep secrecy. It seems to me that Lockheed should have all the resources it needs to develop such a design.
Also, if this is a valid claim, why did Lockheed stock fall following this announcement?
Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts"- --Daniel Patrick Moynihan--
(Score: 3, Informative) by Kromagv0 on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:28PM
The best description I have ever heard of how the stock market prices things is:
The market prices of a stock is only ever correct once on the way up, and once on the way down.
With the current factors that are claimed to be weighing on the markets (Ebola, weakness in Europe, Putin's bowl movements) who knows what the market thinks of this announcement. Personally I would say it thinks highly of it considering the blood letting that has happened over the past few days.
T-Shirts and bumper stickers [zazzle.com] to offend someone
(Score: 3, Informative) by RaffArundel on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:53PM
You made me curious and a quick check of the markets suggest a few reasons for the "drop" (or adjustment if you prefer)
1. Overall markets are taking a beating, at this time DOW is down ~0.3% and the NASDAQ is down ~0.38% SP500 is down ~0.1%. At this very moment - LMN is down ~0.18%*
2. The defense industry took a beating when the Pentagon said they would be cutting their budget by $500B over the next decade. That leaves foreign markets which are not a lucrative and/or stable.
So, this announcement probably helped. Here is Forbes' take:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/lorenthompson/2014/10/16/lockheed-martins-fusion-breakthrough-is-just-one-piece-of-its-fast-growing-energy-portfolio/ [forbes.com]
* uh, yeah, so these number all fluxed a bit during the time I was checking, YMMV
(Score: 3, Insightful) by mhajicek on Thursday October 16 2014, @09:42PM
The value of a stock is what someone else will pay for it. They might as well be baseball cards.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 2) by PinkyGigglebrain on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:36PM
"Also, if this is a valid claim, why did Lockheed stock fall following this announcement?"
The stock market as a whole market has been dropping in the last week. Claiming that the dip in share value is caused by the announcement is like saying you can grow an apple tree from a seed from an orange.
Total nonsense.
"Beware those who would deny you Knowledge, For in their hearts they dream themselves your Master."
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday October 16 2014, @05:02PM
You obviously haven't seen my genetics laboratory - I can grow a *horse* tree from an orange seed...
(Score: 4, Funny) by forsythe on Thursday October 16 2014, @06:27PM
(Score: 2) by tibman on Thursday October 16 2014, @06:58PM
Thanks, chortled my coffee on that one : )
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 16 2014, @07:46PM
I blame HFT.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Thursday October 16 2014, @08:02PM
Horse Forest Trading?
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 1) by RobotLove on Thursday October 16 2014, @08:09PM
Dammit! That was my password!
(Score: 1) by Urlax on Friday October 17 2014, @10:51AM
Correct!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:44PM
Big Oil. Duh.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by gman003 on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:46PM
Because the stock market is fucking retarded. They heard "we're working on something that won't be generating profit by next quarter" and buggered off.
As for the partnerships, Lockheed might want partners just for trustworthiness. If you hear "Lockheed has made a working fusion reactor", you're inclined to think it's bullshit (more believable than most claims, but still good odds of bullshittery). If you hear "Lockheed, MIT and the Department of Energy have made a working fusion reactor", that's less likely to be bullshit.
(Score: 2) by digitalaudiorock on Thursday October 16 2014, @05:05PM
True, but I'd say that a more thorough explanation is that we've created a system (including but not limited to the U.S. tax system) that rewards, encourages, and favors speculation over innovation. To no surprise we have much more of the former than the latter.
(Score: 2) by Dunbal on Thursday October 16 2014, @05:53PM
And litigation! Don't forget litigation. Also vast rewards over innovation.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday October 16 2014, @05:25PM
Because the stock market is fucking retarded. They heard "we're working on something that won't be generating profit by next quarter" and buggered off.
Probably the market is a lot less retarded than that comment.
If Lockheed is going to seek partners there is a huge risk to the companies cash position and future ownership of the technology. There is a huge risk of venture capitalists walking away with all the IP involved. If LM had to sell stock to acquire the funds to proceed with this project that would dilute investors share even more.
Any actual working model is 10 years away, and actual production probably 15 years away. In the meantime the US government is funding no less than THREE fusion projects, and looking to shut down one of them. There are a lot of players with big money in this field.
That is a LOOOONG time till payout. Its a LOT of risk. The market as a whole realizes these things. Even if you don't.
As others have pointed out, the market drop doesn't mean a thing in a sea of market drops.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Thursday October 16 2014, @10:02PM
The stock market IS f*cked.
Back when, after Nortel stock had bottomed out, I started hearing everyone talking about Nortel: not saying buy it, just talking about it A LOT.
So i bought some shares (this was at, I think, $2.50 a share). Waited a little while. It went up to $5.00 a share and i sold. A week later, i think it was, the stock went up another couple bucks, but then tanked again.
So, buying a stock JUST BECAUSE PEOPLE ARE TALKING ABOUT IT A LOT is a valid principle.
Could i have done as well throwing a dart at a monkey tattooed with the stock symbols on it??? I will never know.
Disclaimer: no monkeys were hurt during the making of this post.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 3, Informative) by frojack on Thursday October 16 2014, @05:09PM
There is a better write up here:
http://aviationweek.com/technology/skunk-works-reveals-compact-fusion-reactor-details [aviationweek.com]
The author was able ti interview the Lockheed scientists that designed this thing.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Thursday October 16 2014, @10:15PM
Thank you! There were NO details in TFA.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 1) by delt0r on Friday October 17 2014, @11:50AM
There are 3 patents about the method they use.
http://pdfaiw.uspto.gov/.aiw?PageNum=0&docid=20140301519 [uspto.gov]
http://pdfaiw.uspto.gov/.aiw?PageNum=0&docid=20140301518 [uspto.gov]
http://pdfaiw.uspto.gov/.aiw?PageNum=0&docid=20140301517 [uspto.gov]
I posted a more informed story with good links. But apparently this places is more like /. than this breakaway group thinks they are.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Friday October 17 2014, @03:05AM
Not only is the stock price a red herring, the bit about potential partners isn't unusual either. They are either looking for customers. They want to demonstrate the technology and roll it out decisively (if it works).
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Friday October 17 2014, @02:45PM
why did Lockheed stock fall following this announcement?
Why do you think there's any connection? I would think it's because they finally have a very good competitor in space. Their launch vehicles used to carry almost all American equipment and people into space, lately we've been hitchhiking rides with the Russians and SpaceX [wikipedia.org] carried the last couple of loads to the ISS and will soon be ferrying passengers.
Your question is like asking "why was my wallet stolen the same day I got a raise?". Correlation does not equal causation.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 3, Insightful) by buswolley on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:08PM
But from Lockheed Martin? This isn't some hack in a basement.
subicular junctures
(Score: 2) by metamonkey on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:09PM
Ordinarily I'd be right with you. When some guy in his basement says he's figured out fusion and just needs a few billion from investors, yeah it's bullshit.
But this is Lockheed Martin, and the project lead is a Ph.D. in physics from MIT. I just don't think they would be announcing "we'll have a test reactor in a year" unless they have a decent shot at making a test reactor in a year.
Okay 3, 2, 1, let's jam.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:22PM
"in a year" usually translates to "Project will be cancelled in 6 months". Seri'sly [xkcd.org]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by weeds on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:37PM
From TFA:
So there is the schedule:
Test reactor in a year,
Prototype in five years,
Operational in ten years.
The problem is the skunk works works because they are left alone. As soon as someone starts checking on them and asking questions and asking for weekly TPS reports (with proper cover sheets), the whole thing bogs down.
Get money out of politics! [mayday.us]
(Score: 5, Insightful) by metamonkey on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:50PM
Meh, I'm kind of sick of the pessimism surrounding this story. Everybody wants to be the cool cynic and repeat the tired old line that "fusion's been 20 years away for 50 years."
But these guys look like they're on to something. Combine a magnetic mirror with a polywell to handle the plasma leakage along the axis. Smart. Lithium shielding to catch that fast D-T neutron and breed more tritium. Good. What's not to like?
And this is the skunkworks. This is the outfit that built the SR-71 in the 60s, and it's still the fastest plane in the world. Hell they've probably already had fusion for 30 years from those crashed alien spaceships and they're finally letting it out now.
And they've announced "breakthrough" and are looking for strategic partners (materials, testing, regulatory hurdles) to actually build it. Not financial partners. They don't need money. They're ready to bring in other people to actually put the damn thing together.
Are we not geeks? Is this is not our holy grail? Unlimited safe energy? Imagine what you could do with that. You could start solving every other problem in the world. First thing I think of is desalination plants running 24/7. Solve the looming water crisis, stave off wars. The Navy has a project where they think they can process water and CO2 from the air into jet fuel, 41,000 gallons/day with 100MW. Run that and you've got carbon neutral fueling for aircraft.
Just saying, how about a little "go team go" and a little less "too cool for school?"
Okay 3, 2, 1, let's jam.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Blackmoore on Thursday October 16 2014, @06:33PM
Again - i'll be a pessimist here; skunkworks or not they have some great ideas, but no working prototype; and that's what i want to see.
they have a great track record for both working product; and budgetary blackholes. I hope that they do manage to get fusion working, but for now I'm looking at the next great project to consume a large amount of government funds.
(Score: 2) by buswolley on Thursday October 16 2014, @06:59PM
Pessisim is overrated and easy.
Lockheed isn't going to sacrifice their reputation on a bogus claim. I bet they have the theoretically hard parts figured out and now its to the nontrivial task of engineering.
subicular junctures
(Score: 1) by curunir_wolf on Thursday October 16 2014, @07:01PM
Right on their heels, the University of Washington in Seattle has filed patents for a fusion reactor design they call a "Dynomak" [blogspot.com]. Seems like it uses some of the same original ideas, but I can't find a lot of details about it. They are either further along to a practical solution, or they have something that's more theory than a proven design.
I am a crackpot
(Score: 1) by srobert on Thursday October 16 2014, @08:58PM
Maybe patents are part of the problem. Let's put all the fusion researchers from government, academia, and the private sector, in room and lose the gag orders. We'd probably have a working reactor in six months.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday October 16 2014, @09:58PM
So, you reckon it take 6 months to confine those researchers properly?
Methinks, it depends how small the room is. You see, the higher the confinement and the temperature, the better chances you get to have fusion.
(by the way, you may want to consider using hydrogen and lithium, it will be cheaper than using researchers to initiate the reaction).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 17 2014, @08:53AM
All fusion researchers in one room is guaranteed to produce a lot of heat, though.
(Score: 3, Informative) by MozeeToby on Thursday October 16 2014, @07:05PM
Even worse, the tired old "fusion's been 20 years away for 50 years" is only true if you tack on "with decent funding". No one in the field ever claimed they would have a working reactor if funding fell off. In fact, if you look at the original reports the "20 years" number comes from, you'll see that 20 years was the "practically unlimited funding" level, 50 years was the "at current funding" and "never" was the timeline if funding was cut. That report came out right around 50 years ago and guess what, funding was cut to a fraction of then current levels and they've still made amazing progress on shoestring budgets (and yes, for a project like fusion power, the few billion that's been provided over the last 40 years is shoestring levels).
It's like estimating 2 weeks for a project, then getting told you can only work on it 1 hour per week, getting 3/4 of the way done in a month and having people give you a hard time for not meeting your original estimate.
(Score: 1) by Mainframe Bloke on Thursday October 16 2014, @09:29PM
Excellent post, can't really add more.
(Experimental physic major here, but not any more, sadly).
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Thursday October 16 2014, @10:07PM
There... you just went and killed the project.
You want to stave off wars when the American War Machine makes BIG money off of wars?
Thanks. Killed it off completely. This is why we can't have anything nice.
Now i gotta go call Mulder.....
(Takes a puff of cigarette)
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Friday October 17 2014, @02:56PM
And this is the skunkworks. This is the outfit that built the SR-71 in the 60s, and it's still the fastest plane in the world.
They had nine of them at Beale when I was stationed there. The SR-71 was the most awesome piece of hardware I've ever seen, with the possible exception of the Saturn V. The SR-71 is unbelievably fast. It rolls down the runway, does a wheelie, and takes off like a bottle rocket, out of sight in seconds. After seeing SR-71s in action, I have few doubts Lockheed can do this.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 16 2014, @03:27PM
Wake me up when you have it!
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday October 16 2014, @03:43PM
2.1 x 3 meters. 100 MW. That gonna run hot indeed: the largest jet engine [airlineratings.com] is around that in terms of power.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 4, Funny) by Thexalon on Thursday October 16 2014, @03:47PM
Also, critically, we'd still need 13 of these things to power a flux capacitor, which would be more than you can fit into a Delorean.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 3, Funny) by WizardFusion on Thursday October 16 2014, @03:48PM
[Citation needed]
(Score: 5, Informative) by Thexalon on Thursday October 16 2014, @03:59PM
It's simple math:
A. One flux capacitor requires 1.21 GW of power, according to the work of Dr Emmett Brown.
B. 1.21 GW = 1210 MW. 1210 MW / 100 MW = 12.1, but since you can't have 0.1 reactors, you have to take the ceiling, which is 13.
C. A Delorean is 4.21 meters long, 1.2 meters tall, and 1.82 meters wide, making its available space no larger than 10 m^3.
D. Each reactor is 2.1m by 3m by, let's say 1m, which means that 13 reactors is 13 * 6.3m = 72m^3
E. 72m^3 > 10m^3, so there's no way to fit these reactors into a Delorean. Even if they're only 0.5 m high, they still are about 4 times too large.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 3, Funny) by iwoloschin on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:02PM
They'd probably fit into the steam locomotive though.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:12PM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by nitehawk214 on Thursday October 16 2014, @05:51PM
Well, many nuclear reactors do have steam turbines...
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 16 2014, @10:19PM
Nonsense, all they would need to do in order to get 1.21GW is to run one reactor for 13 seconds, and by doing so, you have traveled into the future!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 16 2014, @03:59PM
Well, just skip the DeLorean and go directly with the steam train design.
(Score: 3, Funny) by dublet on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:15PM
Can't wait to invest on Kickstarter. Wonder what their rewards will be?
$50 - a t shirt.
$100 - a t shirt & poster.
$1,000 - two t shirts and a fluffy SR71.
$10,000 - A tour of the first installation.
$100,000 - Rent the reactor for a day.
$1,000,000 - A bonus flight in an SR71.
$10,000,000 - A fluffy reactor toy.
$100,000,000 - have a reactor of the first batch installed into the vehicle of your choice (pending USDoD approval).
$1,000,000,000 - Actual Iron Man suit powered by one of these.
"If anyone needs me, I'm in the angry dome. [dublet.org]"
(Score: 2) by skullz on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:21PM
Do they have a payment plan on the Iron Man suit?
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday October 16 2014, @05:09PM
Sure, the iron man suit *sounds* cool, but having a 14' reactor strapped to your back is going to really screw up the flight dynamics...
(Score: 2) by PinkyGigglebrain on Thursday October 16 2014, @06:15PM
might screw up a man sized suit but you could put a few of these in a C-5 cargo plane and still have room to spare. I don't know how much power a C-5's engine puts out but I'm betting its not as much as this reactor puts out.
A plane that could fly for months without refueling, zero carbon emissions and could be used a a power plant for a base when not flying.
Now that would be cool.
"Beware those who would deny you Knowledge, For in their hearts they dream themselves your Master."
(Score: 1) by delt0r on Friday October 17 2014, @12:00PM
I can't find the exact power of the engines, just the fuel consumption which is 700kg/s. At 43Mj per kg that is a energy consumption of 30GW. Ok so that is batshit insane. There an extra zero somewhere. Perhaps its 70kg/s? 3GW sounds more believable.
Either way. It is probably more than 100MW at peek.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Friday October 17 2014, @03:08PM
Size isn't the limiting factor on a C5, those things are HUGE. A man can stand up inside one of the engines. The limiting factor is weight; what does the reactor weigh compared to the C5's fuel?
The C5s home was Dover, where I was first stationed. They were still really new then and buggy as hell; engines falling off, landing gear failing, etc. I rode a C-5 from Thailand to Alaska, we passengers were bumped so they could fly a fire truck somewhere, and the passenger section was upstairs from cargo and about the size of an airliner.
To show just how humungous those things are, a C-140 sitting next to it made the C-140 look like a toy. Put a four passenger Piper next to a C-140 and IT looks like a toy in comparison.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 2) by skullz on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:31PM
Given the rise in alternative energy sources and some actually decent electric cars this could really be the turning point of my kid's generation.
If it works.
What will be interesting is a weapons company like Lockheed with deep governmental influence going up against Big Oil with deep governmental influence. Popcorn, anyone?
(Score: 2, Informative) by Rich on Thursday October 16 2014, @04:32PM
Any new utility scale power technology will have it increasing difficulties to compete with the ever cheaper decentralized green stuff. Photovoltaic panel prices are diving into the range of plain roof shingles of the same area, while the wind supporters say that they're even cheaper. We see negative electricity prices in certain peak generation times now. So, as the storage options gradually improve, I'm not sure if large scale power generation as we know it is feasible in the long term at all. Eventually the "Generator + Storage" cost might drop to below a point where it is feasible to provide "Plant + Grid" on an industrial scale.
England will pay EDF roughly 10c per kWh (inflation adjusting!) for Sizewell C. Your rooftop PV kWh comes at roughly 5c. It's economically not far off to just store electrolyzed hydrogen locally (80% eff.) and run it through a CCPP (60% eff.) to balance peak loads. Given the true long term cost of tidying up the irradiated mess (or even just for the after-care of abandoned coal mines), it might actually be cheaper already. Next year, EDF will charge 10.5c, while the PV panel price drops from 47c to 45c/Wp or so. And in the years after, it's the same.
So if some company is invested into fusion (or any other magic new large scale power generation), they better play their cards now. From the tone of the message, it seems LM think along these lines, too. Let's see what they have.
Rough prices for your reference: Combined cycle gas plant 1G € for 1 GW. New nuclear 5G€ for 1 GW. Rooftop PV: 500M € for 1 GW peak, which in Germany averages at 10%, in Southern Italy at 25%. Wholesale kWh: 6c, Post-Grid kWh (pre subsidies): 18c. Run the numbers in any fashion you like.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 16 2014, @05:26PM
So you are in the middle the desert and can see the sign that says 'nowhere' and you need some power to run your newly setup base. Do you just run an extension cord? Or you coming into orbit around a moon for a 15 year survey mission perhaps you can beam it up there? Someone just took out the power junction for your local power substation and you need a few megawatts for your data center...
From the way they are describing it, it sounds like it is meant to go into military applications (considering where it came from). Basically a drop in replacement for fission and diesel generators.
Not everyone will be able to get solar/wind. For example in my yard I can not put in a giant 50 meter windmill. Solar is really only good for about 5-7 hours a day at my house. They are quickly making sure the subsidies are gone and selling it is bellow cost. They are currently at 9c per and talks of 3-4c in the next set of laws they will write and pay for. So I end up buying it anyway.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday October 16 2014, @05:33PM
Okay, let's run some numbers - your average solar installation in a consistently sunny area gets *at best* 6 hours peak equivalent per day, so average capacity will be less than one fourth peak capacity: for 1GW average potential you need 4GW peak potential, so call it 2G€ according to your numbers, or twice the price of a combined cycle gas plant. That changes things a bit.
Of course that's only the initial investment - gas/oil/coal plants also have considerable incremental fuel costs while solar does not. For that matter neither does nuclear - when your fuel has over a million times the energy density of gas you don't need much, almost the entire lifetime cost is in building and operating the plant itself. And with non-tokamak fusion the reactor is likely to be MUCH cheaper and safer. Meltdowns are impossible, so containment domes and triply-redundant safety systems, etc. are unnecessary. Proliferation is a non-issue so you don't need heavy security. There's no spent fuel to store/dispose of, and using lithium for shielding/fuel breeding would mean negligible radioactive waste (just be damn sure you feed all that tritium fuel back into the reactor - you do NOT want that stuff getting into the environment.). Conceivably you could simply replace the boiler in an old coal plant with a comparable-capacity fusion reactor - in fact designing (and licensing) reactors for such a scenario is probably the single most cost-effective method available for reducing CO2 emissions.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday October 16 2014, @06:00PM
Tritium is far less dangerous "in the environment" than you suggest.
Its half life is only just over 12 years, its half life in the human body is only about 7 years.
Tritium is a low energy beta emitter, it is not dangerous externally (its beta particles are unable to penetrate the skin).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tritium#Health_risks [wikipedia.org]
.
The risk is someone producing enough of it to weaponize is not a concern. [aviationweek.com]
“There is a very minimal amount of radioactive tritium—it’s on the order of grams—so the potential release is very minimal. In addition, there is not enough to be a risk of proliferation. Tritium is used in nuclear weapons but in a much larger inventory than would be involved here, and that’s because you are continually making just enough to feed back in [to maintain the reaction],”
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Thursday October 16 2014, @06:29PM
The danger is inhalation in the vicinity of any gas releases. And even worse if it binds to the hemoglobin.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 16 2014, @07:32PM
> Its half life is only just over 12 years, its half life in the human body is only about 7 years
School me in the physics of this. Why should it make a difference where it is?
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Thursday October 16 2014, @08:09PM
The 12 years is about how long it takes to decay, the 7 years is about how long your body needs to get rid of it.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday October 16 2014, @10:44PM
Ask Wiki, I'm not sure, unless it is because it is so reactive.
Or, lol, may that's the body's half life once exposed.....
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Friday October 17 2014, @12:52AM
Actually the shorter the half life the greater the danger, up to a point at least. Something like uranium with a half life in the millions of years can be used to line your walls - essentially none of it will decay in your lifetime, so no radiation to worry about. On the other end of the spectrum something with a halflife of minutes or less will decay so quickly that you don't want to be anywhere near it initially, but it will have decayed to harmlessness in short order.
Materials with half lives in the years to decades range are the most dangerous: they're radioactive enough that you don't want to be exposed to them, and long-lived enough that they're going to be around long enough to do lots of damage.
You are correct that tritium is relatively safe externally, I was unaware of the unusually low energy of its beta radiation, but that only applies externally. And while tritiated water (HTO) has a half-life in the human body of only 7-14 days, that's just because animals mostly use water as a working fluid, and the radioactive water be passed relatively quickly along with its normal counterparts. It will still be radioactive though, and plants have no such limitation - they will use that tritiated water to synthesize complex carbohydrates within their cells, which humans and animals will then ingest and incorporate into their own cell-structure, ensuing long-term irradiation, especially among fast-growing children.
Still not a major issue in small quantities - that HTO will rapidly be diluted to the point that you're unlikely to encounter more than a few molecules at a time. But if reactors all over the planet start carelessly leaking tritium it will be a very different matter, especially for anyone immediately downstream. Or who eats food raised downstream.
(Score: 1) by Rich on Thursday October 16 2014, @06:12PM
"... twice the price of a combined cycle gas plant. That changes things a bit."
That's why I said they need to be quick. And assuming they could build a fusion plant similar to an ordinary CCPP or coal station. I'd expect it to be at least twice as expensive because of all the technology involved, so the equation would even out again. A water-cooled fission plant is effectively just a big water kettle in a big case, and that's already 5 times as expensive as the gas plant. For that reason, btw, I believe all the tossed around hi-tech fission stuff already drops out of the economical game once it has to be metal-cooled at that scale.
The real problem with the renewables is storage. For pure generation they are already past any competition. Any numbers we run are entirely useless on a cloudy January day. Which, btw, coincides with the heating period, so a distributed approach might be to bolt on stirling generators to household heating on a wide scale. But no universal storage solution is here, right now. There will be gradual improvements, and eventually you end up with a bottom line price that large-scale industry can't beat anymore because of their large-scale overhead, even if they run on carefree magic hamsters in spinwheels. I was wondering if and when that happens.
Now, in reality, LM is probably well aware of that and aims straight for the Navy. Unlimited range. No risk of a mess. No more carrier and sub overhauls. Win. Even if it costs a billion for just their 100 MW unit. While incumbent politics already set course to tax private power generation to save their utility buddies because it "stresses the grid". Which, in the future, will include "... by not using it in the fashion it was used in the last 50 years".
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday October 16 2014, @05:41PM
Any new utility scale power technology will have it increasing difficulties to compete with the ever cheaper decentralized green stuff.
Not so fast.
There are a bazillion places in this world that your so called green stuff doesn't work, and has no hope of working. As we add electric vehicles to the list of things demanding more electricity, the chances of green stuff ever keeping up with demand become slimmer and slimmer.
Here's a short sharp shock for you: http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=427&t=3 [eia.gov]
Anything that can dislodge the top two items on that list has long term viability. We are never going to be without a grid, we are never going to power all of our buildings with roof top solar. We all don't live in sunshine belts, and those that do, are going to be fighting an air-conditioning load that will be crippling. And don't tell me about Germany, because they are building new coal plants as we speak.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 1) by Rich on Thursday October 16 2014, @06:44PM
"And don't tell me about Germany, because they are building new coal plants as we speak."
Well, I have to. These replace the NPPs they switched off and ensure they don't waste coal in ancient plants. The 7 Pre-/Konvoi PWR plants alone supplied around 10GW around the clock, throw in a couple of better or lesser BWRs. As far as PV is concerned, this
http://www.sma.de/unternehmen/pv-leistung-in-deutschland.html [www.sma.de]
is a rather interesting display of the contribution. Today it got to roughly 10% of the peak 70GW Germany uses. In winter it's worse. In summer it can reach almost half of the peak consumption on a good day.
If you were to run the US on PV alone on a large scale, you'd probably clutter a "national sacrifice area" in the New Mexico desert with arrays (average power there is about 25% of panel peak power), hydrolyze water and pipe the hydrogen to CCPPs to fill the local gaps. Obviously, Manhattan could not run on rooftop PV. But then this would be the "large-scale industrial" that I mentioned, which has all the overhead. It's the numbers game. You can calculate how much cluttering the desert will cost, and how much the local CCPPs will cost and how much of a NM sunray arrives as NY hydrogen. The deciding factor will then be the grid. And right now, it's cheaper to just frack natural gas out of the ground and pipe it away, so no one will bother with anything else.
Only once you say "It's got to be CO2 neutral", it starts to get interesting. Is sun->desert->hydrogen->grid->CCPP cheaper than e.g the 15 (USD)cent/kWh EDF charges for new nuclear? I'm sure if you let the Russkies compete, they'd offer a VVER for 8 cent/kWh, and an MKER for 5. Heck, the MKER could even burn all the other nuclear leftovers down to half a percent of enrichment if you just run it void-positive enough *g*.
(Score: 2) by Sir Garlon on Thursday October 16 2014, @05:53PM
TFA was written by a doofus who spent his column space trying to explain what fusion is, as if everyone had not been taught that in high school.
Lockheed Martin's page goes into a a little more detail [lockheedmartin.com], but not much.
The "breakthrough" is apparently that they came up with a way to make a smaller and more efficient magnetic bottle.
Myself, I save the word "breakthrough" for ignition [wikipedia.org]. This I would call just a "new experiment design."
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
(Score: 2) by mtrycz on Thursday October 16 2014, @09:11PM
If you reach the point of ingition, then how do you regulate the process? Couldn't it go out of hand?
In capitalist America, ads view YOU!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 16 2014, @11:49PM
So where do I buy tritium and deuterium futures?
(Score: 1) by delt0r on Friday October 17 2014, @12:03PM
No, you may end up with a bit of a uncontrolled burn, an in you don't directly control the power. But not for very long. Plasma is have very low density in these devices, so it would quickly burn all the fuel and stop. Also these tend to be run in pulsed mode,
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Friday October 17 2014, @03:16PM
I graduated high school in 1970; I don't remember fusion being mentioned even once in any science class. I knew of it because I was always a curious readaholic who wanted to know how everything in the universe worked and read a lot of science fact and science fiction. So "everybody" didn't have it taught in high school. I'm pretty damned certain my 86 year old mother never learned about it in high school.
Everybody here ain't 25, kid. ;)
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Thursday October 16 2014, @06:19PM
From the article at yahoo that include crappy javascript and deletion within 2-months:
* It's a project that has been developed in Lockheed Martin Corporation Skunk Works for 4-years. And this press release is in essence a call to find potential partners in industry and government.
* They have somehow demonstrated the "feasibility" (built and tested?) of a 100 MW reactor measuring 2 x 3 meter. And is 10-times smaller than current reactors (fission?).
* Their plan is that they can build and test a compact fusion reactor in less than 1-year, build a prototype in 5-years, anda "operational" reactor in 10-years.
* Perhaps we are looking into a energy-industrial feature? "In recent years, Lockheed has gotten increasingly involved in a variety of alternate energy projects, including several ocean energy projects, as it looks to offset a decline in U.S. and European military spending."
* The fuel is deuterium-tritium. Ultra-dense deuterium, an isotope of hydrogen, is found in the earth's oceans, and tritium is made from natural lithium deposits.
* Lockheed shares fell 0.6 percent to 175.02 US$ amid a broad market selloff. Market doesn't believe in it?
A more reputable source than yahoo: Lockheed Claims Breakthrough on Fusion Energy [scientificamerican.com]
Skunk Works Reveals Compact Fusion Reactor Details [aviationweek.com]
High beta fusion reactor [wikipedia.org]
This seems to be how the compact fusion reactor (CFR) works:
The reactor works by vacuum pump the reactor vessel and inject hydrogen isotopes deuterium and tritium. Gas is heated using radio-frequency making the gas to break into ions and electrons, forming plasma. The superhot plasma is controlled by strong magnetic fields that prevent it from touching the sides of the vessel and, if the confinement is sufficiently constrained, the ions overcome their mutual repulsion, collide and fuse. This process creates helium-4, freeing neutrons that carries energy kinetically through the confining magnetic fields. These neutrons heat the reactor wall which, through conventional heat exchangers, can then be used to drive turbine generators.
The Beta factor tells you the balance between plasma pressure and the magnetic pressure. The tokamak has a Beta factor of 0.05 and the physics of the tokamak dictate huge dimensions and massive cost. The CFR is expected to have a Beta factor of 1 and should be able to go beyond 1.
The CFR have something like a tube that expands into an ever-stronger wall. The system is therefore regulated by a self-tuning feedback mechanism, whereby the farther out the plasma goes, the stronger the magnetic field pushes back to contain it.
The Lockheed design takes the good parts from a lot of designs. Like high-beta configuration, the use of magnetic field lines arranged into linear ring “cusps” to confine, the engineering simplicity of an axisymmetric mirror,
According to Aviationweek: "The team acknowledges that the project is in its earliest stages, and many key challenges remain before a viable prototype can be built."
Transportable units will fit into a measure 7.0 x 13 meter. The fuel estimation is that less than 25 kg per year is needed.
Thomas McGuire, an aeronautical engineer in the Skunk Work says. “The latest is a magnetized ion confinement experiment, and preliminary measurements show the behavior looks like it is working correctly. We are starting with the plasma confinement, and that’s where we are putting most of our effort. One of the reasons we are becoming more vocal with our project is that we are building up our team as we start to tackle the other big problems. We need help and we want other people involved. It’s a global enterprise, and we are happy to be leaders in it.”
Another fusion reactor that seems quite similar.. Polywell [wikipedia.org] And it needs 30 million US$ as of 2014.
So it looks like it's working correctly from an experiment but a prototype is yet to be built. Lot's of headlines, less action. But if they have a recipe that works. Let's hope someone is willing to finance it.
(Score: 1) by wikkiwikki on Thursday October 16 2014, @07:18PM
Rossi and those E-Cat guys must be pissed