January 30, 2009

An interesting question

Why hasn't Polywell Fusion been funded by the Obama administration? From IEC Fusion Technology:
Easy Low Cost No Radiation Fusion
I thought it was about time to post this here. Originally posted at: Easy Low Cost No Radiation Fusion. Let me note that Low Radiation is more apt than no radiation. The main reaction between Hydrogen and Boron 11 produces only alpha particles which can be stopped with a layer or two of aluminum foil. However there are side reactions which will produce about one millionth the neutron flux of an operating fission reactor. If construction materials are chosen carefully there should be no long lived radioisotopes.
A bit more:
An interesting question is: when was the first steady state (operation times of at least 10s of seconds) electrically operated nuclear fusion machine which produces at least 10s of millions of fusions a second built? The astounding answer? 1959. So far 18 experimenters have produced similar machines including this young experimenter.
The estimate to get a working full-scale reactor is $200M and five years. This is a drop in the bucket and is sound science -- why is so much money being put into outdated designs (ITER at $3.7B overall) and this is getting only a few contracts from the US Navy. Posted by DaveH at January 30, 2009 7:29 PM
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