Compact Nuclear Fusion Reactor Is 'Very Likely to Work,' Studies Suggest

[reACTIONary]

Compact Nuclear Fusion Reactor Is ‘Very Likely to Work,’ Studies Suggest

A series of research papers renews hope that the long-elusive goal of mimicking the way the sun produces energy might be achievable.

Sparc employs the same kind of device as ITER: a tokamak, or doughnut-shaped chamber inside which the fusion reaction takes place. Because the plasma cloud is so hot — hotter than the sun — it must be confined by magnetic forces.

Sparc takes advantage of a newer electromagnet technology that uses so-called high temperature superconductors that can produce a much higher magnetic field.

William Dorland, a physicist at the University of Maryland and editor of The Journal of Plasma Physics, said the journal had asked some of these fusion projects “to tell us their physics basis.” The M.I.T. and Commonwealth Fusion group quickly said yes, he said.

“From my perspective, it’s the first of these groups that have private money that actually is saying very clearly what they’re doing,” Dr. Dorland said.

[Phoenix61]

1. Wow! That would be amazing. nt

[texasfiddler]

2. I always get my hopes up with Fusion Reaction.

[Doodley]

3. What could possibly go wrong?

[reACTIONary]

4. The most probable, realistic, and severe risk is that...

... it might not be economical and the investors will lose their money.

Hey, stuff like that happens.

[NNadir]

5. What IS going wrong is climate change.

Of course, it is in the mentality of anti-nukes to consider that Fukushima is a much worse disaster than, um, stuff, like Australia burning, California Burning, the State of Oregon Burning, cavalcades of increasingly strong hurricanes slicing through the Southern US, 70 million people dying from air pollution every decade, the ice sheets in the Himalayas on which more than 2 billion people depend for their water supply disappearing.

Nothing wrong with that in the minds of witless anti-nukes. The word "nuclear" scares their empty little heads into paroxysms of paranoia.

This fusion reactor will not work to produce electricity until well after we've hit 450 to 460 ppm of CO2 in the atmosphere, and reporters at the New York Times covering science are notable for understanding next to nothing about engineering reality, but that's neither here nor there.

One would need to have opened a science book to understand that in terms of risk a failed fusion reactor would represent a vanishingly small risk. One seldom encounters an anti-nuke who has opened a science book, and even if one does, one sees that they narrowly focus on a tiny risk while ignoring the large risks and, in fact, realities mentioned above.

The reality of what is going wrong is that witless anti-nukes have very selective attention, are perniciously destroying the planet through laziness, intellectual vacuity, and the belief that repeating a mindless soundbite represents insight.

And let's be clear, on a planet choking on dangerous fossil fuel waste, effecting all humanity, these soundbites are not on mindless, they in fact, border on criminally insane.

Have a nice weekend.