Nuclear Fusion Power Without Regular Tokamaks Or Stellarators:
When it comes to nuclear fusion, the most well-known reactor type today is no doubt the tokamak, due to its relatively straight-forward concept of plasma containment. That's not to say that there aren't other ways to accomplish nuclear fusion in a way that could conceivably be used in a commercial power plant in the near future.
As we covered previously, another fairly well-known type of fusion reactor is the stellarator, which much like the tokamak, has been around since the 1950s. There are other reactor types from that era, like the Z-pinch, but they seem to have all fallen into obscurity. That is not to say that research on Z-pinch reactors has ceased, or that other reactor concepts — some involving massive lasers — haven't been investigated or even built since then.
In this article we'll take a look at a range of nuclear fusion reactor types that definitely deserve a bit more time in the limelight.
[...] Inertial Confinement Fusion
[...] Magnetic Confinement Fusion
[...] All the Other Designs
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday February 18 2020, @04:41PM (4 children)
Maybe some might believe it was (by some means) put there by God, powered by fusion balanced against gravitational compression of the core, and that His eternal love might simply be part of why it is there rather than as a means of powering it. And maybe some others believe something else.
People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
(Score: 2) by barbara hudson on Tuesday February 18 2020, @05:52PM (3 children)
Someone actually worked out how long the sun could shine if it were coal or by the heat of compression of the sun it's - compression won, but only topped out at 2 million years.
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 18 2020, @06:03PM (1 child)
We've used up only about 0.3% of that 2 million since God created the world. I really doubt that we need the remaining coal before the end times, but maybe that's it. Maybe the 2 million is exactly the amount of time needed, so that is what God gave us.
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Tuesday February 18 2020, @11:08PM
That depends on which of the many gods you choose.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by DannyB on Tuesday February 18 2020, @08:59PM
The clean coal was put there as a challenge for us to strip mine the sun.
People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.