First Nuclear Fusion by 2011? Still No Silver Bullet for Environmental Problems
by Matthew McDermott, New York, NY 
on 11.14.08
photo: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
What spawned that title is not just Friday speculation, but an article at SustainableBusiness.com which says exactly the opposite. I’m taking liberties a bit, as the article confines the silver bullet talk to clean energy:
Clean energy advocates generally shun talk of a "silver-bullet" technology that can replace fossil fuels and provide carbon-free power. However, the promise of fusion-based energy defies the common sense belief that an array of renewable fuel sources is needed to shift away from dirty carbon-based fuels.
The article then goes on to describe work being done at the National Ignition Facility at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California:
Commercial Deployment by 2030?
Basically, the NIF is nearly completed (fully completed in 2009); Governor Schwarzenegger toured it; the lab’s first ignition attempt will be in 2010; the goal of achieving nuclear fusion is 2011; and afterwards,
An aggressive development of this technology could lead to a LIFE ((Laser Inertial Confinement Fusion-Fission Energy) pilot power generation plant in the 2020 timeframe followed by commercial deployment in the following 10 years.
I don’t want to poo-poo the prospects of nuclear fusion. It really is the holy grail of energy. Though still, if the LLNL says aggressive development could lead to commercial fusion by 2030, I wouldn’t be pinning any climate change/carbon emission reduction plans on it...
Some Perspective: More Than Clean Energy Needed
And while it may be tempting to breathe easy in thinking that such an abundant source of non-carbon emitting energy is two decades away, we also need to be thinking more holistically. What will happen if we simply continue to increase our energy usage, even if from clean sources? Even if powered by clean energy and done in the most efficient manner possible, are natural resource consumption levels associated with a Developed World ‘good life’ scalable to a population of 8 or 9 billion people?
Instead of always looking outward, we need to look more inward (in the language of Ayurveda, more sattvic soul searching and less rajasic perpetual motion) and address this meta-issues of green. How much is enough? How do we actually rein in growth, as measured by increased ecological throughput, and increasing human impact on the planet?
OK. Friday afternoon soapboax away... Let’s cheer every bit of clean energy development, but not lose sight of the even bigger issues. Cheering prospect of nuclear fusion now. Woot!
via: SustainableBusiness and Cleantechnica
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For Arnold better suits being a Terminator, rather than a governor....
Color me skeptical. They may achieve positive net energy, but I doubt that they'll be able to hit the holy grail of "burn." It's called burn when the fusion process has reached the point that it not only produces positive net energy but enough of it that the plasma basically heats itself enough to sustain the reaction.
Here's hoping they succeed.
This definitely is a very exciting prospect. I never thought I'd have the chance to live in a time powered by nuclear fusion. I guess we shall see here pretty soon.
One question that needs to be asked more about this massive fusion project is this: what if all the money spent on fusion was spent on solar and wind today?
How many wind and solar farms could be build this year if the money was spent not spent on fusion? Would we have clean air and cooler temperatures now?
just food for thought.
It is easy to forget in all the hype and PR that the primary reason the NIF was built is support for the nuclear weapons stockpile and weapons research. If LLNL,a government weapons laboratory, gets anything of general scientific or commercial value from it, such as furthering fusion power generation, it is gravy.
IMHO, the best bet for practical fusion power is a steady state machine such as ITER rather than a pulsed machine such as NIF.
Bill
Matthew McDermott, You damnable, unsatisfiable hippie. You report about research (however possible) on nuclear fusion, the holy grail of science, the answer to all of man kind's problems and you have the NERVE to grumble about problems from solutions that have not even happened yet?!
"And while it may be tempting to breathe easy in thinking that such an abundant source of non-carbon emitting energy is two decades away, we also need to be thinking more holistically. What will happen if we simply continue to increase our energy usage, even if from clean sources? Even if powered by clean energy and done in the most efficient manner possible, are natural resource consumption levels associated with a Developed World ‘good life’ scalable to a population of 8 or 9 billion people?"
Since harnessing fire, man has strayed further and further from anything that might be considered natural or "holisitic". I really enjoy learning about new developments and strides towards a green future on this site. However, guys like like you make no sense. Apparently unless we are all bathing in mud and eating non root vegetables so the mother plant is not killed and letting firewood rot on the ground so we don't hurt the little creatures that live there, we are all doomed! Give Me A Break!
Some of you people on this site are just plain nuts.
Get real and put your mind to something that will actually help!
There's three important milestones for Fusion:
* Ignition – actually fusing atoms into larger atoms, releasing energy
* Net Energy – using fusion to generate more energy than you put into initiating it, counting losses
* Economic viability – being able to generate energy at a competitive cost in the marketplace
The first milestone we passed decades ago. The second has recently been achieved (barely) in experimental reactors. The third I don't think we'll ever achieve, barring some revolutionary reactor designs. Tokamaks are just too bloody expensive.
Maybe limited energy is what's saved us thus far. Maybe the bottleneck of 'work' has prevented us from growing rampantly and exhausting the other parameters the ecosystem needs to live (e.g. habitat destruction, habitat fragmentation, soil depletion, water pollution, air pollution, resource extraction, population growth, etc)
"Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell."
"It really is the holy grail of energy."
I disagree; solar still wins in my book for a variety of reasons.
"Even if powered by clean energy and done in the most efficient manner possible, are natural resource consumption levels associated with a Developed World ‘good life’ scalable to a population of 8 or 9 billion people?"
Yes, it can. There is plenty of world. Our problem TODAY is that we're using it extremely poorly and unwisely.
We can find as many clean energy sources as we want, but really the solution to our energy crisis is efficiency. If we think that solar panels can supply the same energy that our coal-burning plants do today, we are wrong. Using less energy, collectively, will make more of a change than any technological fix can. I'm not saying we don't need technological fixes; we need both in order to solve this problem.
They can't bring a Laser Inertial Confinement system online until they solve the problem where the control chip fuses and the four intelligent, semi-autonomous mechanical arms actually take control of the operator, turning him into an evil, criminal mastermind.
To everybody complaining about fusion. Fusion would give us a clean form of energy that produces a lot of energy for everything.
Space travel included.
Talk about missing the point!
Nuclear Fusion is a clean, safe, reliable source of energy. The wind does not blow strong enough everywhere nor does the sun shine bright enough everywhere to make these our only sources of energy. The world population is growing and complaining about in the Blogs is not going to stop it.
The world is going to continue to need new and novel sources of energy to keep up with the demand. Nuclear Fusion is just another weapon in our arsenal to fight pollution, and to try to keep up with demand.
>It is easy to forget in all the hype and PR that the primary reason the NIF was built is support for the nuclear weapons stockpile and weapons research. If LLNL,a government weapons laboratory, gets anything of general scientific or commercial value from it, such as furthering fusion power generation, it is gravy.
>IMHO, the best bet for practical fusion power is a steady state machine such as ITER rather than a pulsed machine such as NIF.
>Bill
Bill, you're exactly right. Inertial confinement (NIF's strategy) will probably never be feasible. Magnetic confinement is the way to go: http://www.pppl.gov/images/fusion_progress.jpg (keep in mind that you're looking at a logarithmic graph).
Commercial fusion is decades away (30-50 years), and until then, we need to reduce carbon emissions with wind, solar, and fission.
Somehow it is always 20 years away. Why 20, and not 25 or 15? It has been 20 years away since I was a kid...