Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: vyper on February 17, 2005, 03:52:19 pm
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/tvradio/programmes/horizon/experiment_prog_summary.shtml
[q]In March 2002, the scientific world was rocked by some astonishing news: a distinguished US government scientist claimed he had made nuclear fusion out of sound waves in his laboratory.
Rusi Taleyarkhan's breakthrough was such important news because nuclear fusion is one of the most difficult scientific processes, and also one of the most coveted. It could solve all of our energy problems for ever. In principle, sufficient fuel exists on earth to provide clean, pollution-free energy for billions of people for millions of years.
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So Horizon decided to try to sort out the issue once and for all. ... But then it came down to the crucial question: did Putterman find fusion? The result was negative. Recording data nanosecond by nanosecond, Putterman did not find a single neutron close enough to a flash of light for it to be considered the result of nuclear fusion.[/q]
Do you believe it still to be possible?
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I wish...
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Of course it's possible, just not at a scale we can reasonably use. The best and most efficient source of nuclear fusion energy we have is the one 93,000,000 miles away.
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There was a more recent experiment on this than 2002. In fact, I posted a thread about it somewhere around here. Here's the link I posted: http://www.rpi.edu/web/News/press_releases/2004/lahey.htm#cool
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/*looks at sun*/
yes, I'm prety sure it's posable.
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a distinguished US government scientist
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as opposed to a disgraced one
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Or, worse yet, a foreign one... :rolleyes:
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key word being *government*
gezz, sarcasm guys, sarcasm
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Originally posted by Raa
Or, worse yet, a foreign one... :rolleyes:
he was foreign, it was a BBC article.
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Ahh true. You can't trust those foreign americans...
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yes it is possible the only thing you need to adpt to is containment of the little sun that fusion creates ... currently we just lack the knowledge to develop an alloy or magnetic field capable of holding say 10 H atoms in one spot while they fuse
we probobly could harvest the energy but the heat created from the process is insanely large and no alloy can withstand it ... so magnetic fields and heat harvesters! :)
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You know, think what the US governmet would so if one scientist achieved easy nuclear fusion?
Do you really belive they would spread the word around? Or would they try to burry that discovery form seing the light of day in near future?
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Originally posted by TrashMan
would they try to burry that discovery form seing the light of day in near future?
er, that discovery would:
Save the U.S. billions of dollars in oil imports
Solve the energy crisis
Make it so we no longer have to deal with OPEC
Reduce air pollution
Cut down on oil spills (less of it will be on the ocean)
Money spent on fusion research could be used elsewhere
Change the political climate to a more friendly view of the U.S. government (i.e. people won't think we are in Iraq for the oil, since we won't need nearly so much of it anymore.)
So why would the U.S. Government want to bury it?
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Still need oil for cars.
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Originally posted by Carl
er, that discovery would:
Save the U.S. billions of dollars in oil imports
Solve the energy crisis
Make it so we no longer have to deal with OPEC
Reduce air pollution
Cut down on oil spills (less of it will be on the ocean)
Money spent on fusion research could be used elsewhere
Change the political climate to a more friendly view of the U.S. government (i.e. people won't think we are in Iraq for the oil, since we won't need nearly so much of it anymore.)
So why would the U.S. Government want to bury it?
Well, firstly; US government has never been too bothered about the environment, so that wouldn;t be a factor. Neither would fusion reasearch money be a problem - just cancel it or slush it away. Politically, it would only be a friendly view if the US was to give away the complete plans for fusion and allow free use; otherwise it would just lead to further resentment in, for example, third world countries.
The oil thing...is interesting. I'm not sure what the US 'hold' over oil is (with the occupation of Iraq as well as its own reserves, as well as those of allies like Saudi Arabia) - but, if the US managed to preserve it's own oil reserves until the rest of the world ran (more or less) dry, it'd put it in an incredibly powerful position.
Of courses, there's the secondary thing - how many US elected officials have received campaign funding or finances from oil companies?
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I think the estimate on how long the US oil reserves would last would be about 1-3 months, assuming I'm remembering this correctly.
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Did anyone see the Daily Show last night? Jon Stewarts guest was a guy who wrote a book about how 3 trillion barrels of oil are sitting in Canda but the problem is it cant be extracted easily using current technology. I cant remember the guy's name but that is certainly interesting.
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oh and BTW research into cold fusion is going to take place on a neutral site in france if i remembre correctly :)
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Theres trillions of barrels of oil in a lot of places that cant be extracted with todays technology, and even future projections put the time at when it can be extracted at a cost effective rate at a long time off. The main problem with replacing oil is not finding alternative sources for electricity, car fuel etc, its finding cost effective replacements for everything oil is used for, which as you can see by this page is quite a lot:
http://www.priweb.org/ed/pgws/uses/uses_home.html
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Originally posted by Ashrak
oh and BTW research into cold fusion is going to take place on a neutral site in france if i remembre correctly :)
Fusion, but not cold fusion. Cold fusion is regarded as pretty much impossible nowadays. There are a number of sites around the world where a majjor fusion research project is due to start in the next couple of years, with France being one of the main contenders to site the reactor...
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would anyone mind explaining the difference between fusion and fission ... i know fusion is the joining of hydrogen atoms to make new atoms and therefore releasing insane ammounts of energy
how bout fission?
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Fission is splitting atoms of a heavy (and unstable) element into two lighter elements. Uranium and plutonium are most commonly used as fission fuels because their half-lives are long enough to actually use them before they decay.
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Fission also results in lots of nasty radioactive leftovers, whereas fusion has very little resultant waste.
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That's only partly true; fission is "dirty" because the elements that it reacts, both the fissionable material and the resultant isotopes, are highly atomicly unstable and so emit lots of nasty alpha and beta radiation for a long time after reaction. Fusion generates a massive Gamma-ray burst along with the other light levels that come out, but gamma rays are very short-lived and so don't pollute an area over a long time. Fission produces less gamma radiation than fusion, IIRC.
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Originally posted by Ashrak
oh and BTW research into cold fusion is going to take place on a neutral site in france if i remembre correctly :)
It's either France or Japan, but the four major countries (Russia, China, US, and someone else) can't agree on which one.