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Saturday, September 9, 2017
How is NIF?
What's Happening at the National Ignition Facility (NIF). LLNL sure has been "mum" about it's billion dollar showcase failure.
23 comments:
Anonymous
said...
Ask Sandia about MAGLIF on the Z machine. That's a failure.
Did we learn anything after spending $12 billion for the science? Nice buildings and well landscaped lawns. Great stage for Hollywood. Alas, I'm afraid that it was not worth the money spent. This was some of the great science from the University of California? Did Bechtel construct NIF?
Damn. Just when this blog was starting to get interesting, some fool has to go and start another NIF thread. Can you people not stop beating that dead horse?
NIF is hardly a failure, it's a great success and a monument to human ingenuity. As long as you don't talk about "ignition", that is. They should change the name.
"Great team. Great facility. Great science...just not at a Great price."
Sorry, you can't get the best USA science and engineering on the cheap. Our competitors in Russia, China, Japan, and France (yes France) have all failed to make a weapons science simulation/ignition machine even close to NIF. Our only mistake on NIF was to not be "bold" enough. We all knew from underground tests that we needed a 10 MJ UV laser driver, not a 1.8 MJ machine. Scale is important when instabilities are critical to control.
No one can say if even 10 MJ is "enough", because it's never been done, period. Underground tests were in a different regime and, (surprise!) there was no laser and therefore zero laser plasma instabilities. About all anyone can say for laser driven indirect drive is, 1.8 MJ ain't enough.
I don't believe LANL science is "cheap" by any stretch of the imagination. Billing rates in the $200-$300 range per manhour, programs and project who only half complete because they run out of money. $2.2 to $2.4 Billion per year....
"have all failed to make a weapons science simulation/ignition machine even close to NIF"
That is not a very accurate way of saying things as NIF has also completely failed at actually simulating ignition, so as many have of little value to the weapons scientists.
A question you can ask is for that price that was paid, could the same results that have been obtained by NIF or will be could have been obtained by other far less expensive methods, and if you know anything about this than the answer is yes. Much more and better science could have been with the money that was spent on NIF.
Big science projects often fail to live up the expectations. NIF is a bit more odd since it is not really a discovery machine like the LHC, it either gets ignition or it fails. If the LHC finds new particles than that is a discovery if it does not find new particles it is also a discovery since that is telling us something deep about the universe. NIF not finding ignition is telling us what everyone had already been saying that 1.8 MJ was not enough, so when they don't get ignition it is kind of obvious. The LHC was driven by science but NIF was driven by politics so one sees the outcome.
There is one argument about for NIF which I kind of agree it and it is an economic argument. If one asked for 2 Billion for a series of smaller experiments the Congress would never fund it. If you ask for something big but dubious the Congress may fund it. If the Congress decides it will not fund it, it is not like that money will automatically go to other science projects, it will probably go to keeping us in Iraq one or two days longer. In other words even though NIF failed to get ignition the number of ways the money could have been even more wastefully spent is much higher than not having spent the money at all. You have to remember money is not a conversed quantity.
Having retired a few years ago, it's not clear to me that NIF could not eventually achieve ignition at the 2 MJ level (today) if the "crew" where allowed to spent full time on it. The NIC was extremely rushed. Simulation capability today is in a much improved state, more capable to guide experiments. On the NIC, simulations lagged shots by 6 months or more. We where shooting at modified targets and holhraums with differing laser conditions (energy, three color wavelengths, pulse shape, inner-outer beam balance, etc...) based solely on extrapolation and guessing. It didn't work. The guessing was wrong. The NIC did NOT prove that ignition on NIF can't be achieved. That's my opinion.
Could have reached ignition, can still reach ignition? The construction of NIF are (ouch) sunk costs. The question Is are NIFs current operationing costs a better value for ignition research, material science, and weapons simulations, or are there better and or less expensive options for all three?
The NIC did NOT prove that ignition on NIF can't be achieved... September 16, 2017 at 4:16 PM
True, but that can always be said. The only way to disprove it is to ignite something, short of that it will always be true that lack of ignition does not prove it cannot possibly be done. The real question is, do we as a nation have the free resources available to tackle such a daunting problem, especially given the bad PR NIF has received after Moses and Miller oversold it? The answer is almost certainly no, therefore ignition won't be achieved on the NIF regardless of whether or not it is technically possible.
23 comments:
Ask Sandia about MAGLIF on the Z machine. That's a failure.
Lawn looks pretty good these days.
Meaning successful ignition?
The backdrop for a recent Star Trek movie was awesome.
Did we learn anything after spending $12 billion for the science? Nice buildings and well landscaped lawns. Great stage for Hollywood. Alas, I'm afraid that it was not worth the money spent. This was some of the great science from the University of California? Did Bechtel construct NIF?
NIF was brought to you by the west coast Cowboys. All hat, no cows.
Damn. Just when this blog was starting to get interesting, some fool has to go and start another NIF thread. Can you people not stop beating that dead horse?
How is NIF a "dead horse" if it is still being funded to this day?
Feeding a dead horse makes as much sense as beating it.
NIF is hardly a failure, it's a great success and a monument to human ingenuity. As long as you don't talk about "ignition", that is. They should change the name.
Really?? NIF is, and always was, nothing more than a jobs program for the UC science types to have as a taxpayer funded play pen.
NIFs fine. Thanks for inquiring. 10 shots per week, like clockwork and 100s of happy customers.
Great team. Great facility. Great science.
Great team. Great facility. Great science...just not a a Great price.
"Great team. Great facility. Great science...just not at a Great price."
Sorry, you can't get the best USA science and engineering on the cheap. Our competitors in Russia, China, Japan, and France (yes France) have all failed to make a weapons science simulation/ignition machine even close to NIF. Our only mistake on NIF was to not be "bold" enough. We all knew from underground tests that we needed a 10 MJ UV laser driver, not a 1.8 MJ machine. Scale is important when instabilities are critical to control.
No one can say if even 10 MJ is "enough", because it's never been done, period. Underground tests were in a different regime and, (surprise!) there was no laser and therefore zero laser plasma instabilities. About all anyone can say for laser driven indirect drive is, 1.8 MJ ain't enough.
I don't believe LANL science is "cheap" by any stretch of the imagination. Billing rates in the $200-$300 range per manhour, programs and project who only half complete because they run out of money. $2.2 to $2.4 Billion per year....
Bold enough? Try stupid enough. You Livermites crack me up.
"have all failed to make a weapons science simulation/ignition machine even close to NIF"
That is not a very accurate way of saying things as NIF has also completely failed
at actually simulating ignition, so as many have of little value to the weapons scientists.
A question you can ask is for that price that was paid, could the same results
that have been obtained by NIF or will be could have been obtained by other far less expensive methods, and if you know anything about this than the answer is yes. Much more and better science could have been with the money that was spent on NIF.
Big science projects often fail to live up the expectations. NIF is a bit more odd since it is not really a discovery machine like the LHC, it either gets ignition or it fails. If the LHC finds new particles than that is a discovery if it does not find new particles it is also a discovery since that is telling us something deep about the universe. NIF not finding ignition is telling us what everyone had already been saying that 1.8 MJ was not enough, so when they don't get ignition it is kind of obvious. The LHC was driven by science but NIF was driven by politics so one sees the outcome.
There is one argument about for NIF which I kind of agree it and it is an economic argument. If one asked for 2 Billion for a series of smaller experiments
the Congress would never fund it. If you ask for something big but dubious the Congress may fund it. If the Congress decides it will not fund it, it is not like that money will automatically go to other science projects, it will probably go to keeping us in Iraq one or two days longer. In other words even though NIF failed to get ignition the number of ways the money could have been even more wastefully spent is much higher than not having spent the money at all. You have to remember money is not a conversed quantity.
That is not a very accurate way of saying things as NIF has also completely failed
at actually simulating ignition...
September 14, 2017 at 8:14 AM
NIF wasn't designed to "simulate" ignition. It was designed to ACHIEVE ignition. It didn't.
Having retired a few years ago, it's not clear to me that NIF could not eventually achieve ignition at the 2 MJ level (today) if the "crew" where allowed to spent full time on it. The NIC was extremely rushed. Simulation capability today is in a much improved state, more capable to guide experiments. On the NIC, simulations lagged shots by 6 months or more. We where shooting at modified targets and holhraums with differing laser conditions (energy, three color wavelengths, pulse shape, inner-outer beam balance, etc...) based solely on extrapolation and guessing. It didn't work. The guessing was wrong. The NIC did NOT prove that ignition on NIF can't be achieved. That's my opinion.
The NIC did NOT prove that ignition on NIF can't be achieved. That's my opinion.
September 16, 2017 at 4:16 PM
It matters not. Ignition has not been achieved. Therefore, the National Ignition Facility is not. Plus, how did you expect NIC to prove a negative?
Could have reached ignition, can still reach ignition? The construction of NIF are (ouch) sunk costs. The question Is are NIFs current operationing costs a better value for ignition research, material science, and weapons simulations, or are there better and or less expensive options for all three?
The NIC did NOT prove that ignition on NIF can't be achieved...
September 16, 2017 at 4:16 PM
True, but that can always be said. The only way to disprove it is to ignite something, short of that it will always be true that lack of ignition does not prove it cannot possibly be done. The real question is, do we as a nation have the free resources available to tackle such a daunting problem, especially given the bad PR NIF has received after Moses and Miller oversold it? The answer is almost certainly no, therefore ignition won't be achieved on the NIF regardless of whether or not it is technically possible.
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