Can World's Largest Laser Zap Earth's Energy Woes? 372
newviewmedia.com writes "Scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory plan on using a laser the size of three football fields to set off a nuclear reaction so intense that it will make a star bloom on the surface of the Earth. If they're successful, the scientists hope to solve the global energy crisis by harnessing the energy generated by the mini-star."
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Re:Funding... Anyone? (Score:1, Insightful)
In the 1970's, researchers working on magnetic confinement fusion (the other way of achieving fusion - without the lasers) set out a timetable and the required funding to achieve fusion within 30 years. At the time they asked for approx. $10bn. The fusion community still hasn't received that much funding and so hasn't achieved their goal yet. So the quote "fusion is always xx years away" is actually something of a misnomer. It should read "Fusion is xx years and $xx away."
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Re:Not to be hosted inside cities (Score:3, Insightful)
how is powering an entire city not worth 3 football fields of real estate?
I would not be surprised if that is not already in the ballpark of what is being used.
When will we quit generating steam for power? (Score:3, Insightful)
The most technical power plants in the world still use steam powered turbines. When and who is going to get us a way to convert directly to power?
Re:Focus Fusion (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Focus Fusion (Score:3, Insightful)
So they make more energy by not turning it on. Great.
Re:in 20 years ... again? (Score:3, Insightful)
"It will take at least another 20 years, with adequate funding, to develop a continuous fusion reaction that
could heat water, create steam and turn generators at a commercial fusion power plant, she said."
See the problem now?
Re:And nothing could possibly go wrong... (Score:4, Insightful)
How about how the one guy was bitten by a radioactive spider and gained spider powers?
Re:Super Cool er I mean hot (Score:4, Insightful)
"So to replace the fuel based primary energy Germany must build 95 nuclear plants."
Or four reactors, 24 times as powerful.
How many fossil fuel plants do you think they're running now to produce the rest of their power? A few hundred?
Not mutually exclusive! (Score:3, Insightful)
"The world needs to employ existing fixes for climate change rather than looking for a technological silver bullet that will prove to be too expensive for commercial energy production anyway"
Actually, the world really ought to be doing both. I'm not implying the existence of a "silver bullet" but any renewable energy source (especially one as fundamental as solar fusion) is probably a worthwhile endeavor. Just because it isn't immediately commercially viable doesn't mean we can't still benefit from it.
Re:bad journalism (Score:1, Insightful)
TFA states that you just get tritium from seawater, which is wildly incorrect. Tritium is synthetic, only the deuterium can be had from seawater.
Re:And nothing could possibly go wrong... (Score:3, Insightful)
1. You actually found these jokes funny in the first place.
2. You impression of the humor changes just because you learned about the guys religious/political stance.
3. You even care what his religious/political stance of an actor is?
You are one really petty person.
Re:bad journalism (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:bad journalism (Score:3, Insightful)
When you go read the material at the NIF web site, there seem to be a lot of problems that haven't got past the "conceptual design" stage:
In some ways, it seems like ignition is one of the more minor problems they have to solve.