On Wed, 27 Jun 2012 17:46:08 -0500, Jon Elson
wrote:

Tom Gardner wrote:


Eventually, fusion power will be the best solution until some new energy
source comes along, maybe antimatter. I wonder how the leftists will
take THAT! (If leftists still exist)

Har! Perhaps The Cull will have taken them by then.


Fusion turns out to be a LOT harder than anybody thought.

It's too bad that harmonics didn't play the part they did in the movie
"Chain Reaction". We'd be there by now.


Physicists have been saying it is 10 years away for 50+ years, now.
Tokamak looked promising until you understand the surface area to
volume relationship, then it becomes obvious you can't have a thread
of plasma many meters long at 10 megaKelvins, all the heat leaks away.

The only hope is a VERY compact plasma, and that is a hard state to
maintain. And, the implosion devices are most likely to self destruct
due to the massive thermal cycling. Not immediately, but it seems like
they would end up requiring huge amounts of maintenance.

From material degradation?


--
Always bear in mind that your own resolution to
succeed is more important than any one thing.
-- Abraham Lincoln