Tri-Valley Cares needs to be on this if they aren't already. We need to make sure that NNSA and LLNL does not make good on promises to pursue such stupid ideas as doing Plutonium experiments on NIF. The stupidity arises from the fact that a huge population is placed at risk in the short and long term. Why do this kind of experiment in a heavily populated area? Only a moron would push that kind of imbecile area. Do it somewhere else in the god forsaken hills of Los Alamos. Why should the communities in the Bay Area be subjected to such increased risk just because the lab's NIF has failed twice and is trying the Hail Mary pass of doing an SNM experiment just to justify their existence? Those Laser EoS techniques and the people analyzing the raw data are all just BAD anyways. You know what comes next after they do the experiment. They'll figure out that they need larger samples. More risk for the local population. Stop this imbecilic pursuit. They wan...
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This is a story about successful fusion reactors that be used for commercial means. NIF does not quality for either.
That assumes a new facility called Z next which presumably would cost billions of $$$. When is the NNSA going to get started on this important project which meets all the requirements for a fusion reactor?
December 30, 2017 at 10:08 AM
Fusion has failed so often at Sandia that it is no longer newsworthy. (Hydra, EBFA, PBFA, etc., etc.)
MagLIF is a case in point. They were predicting break even by now but only have produced 10^12 neutrons (compare to NIF’s 10^16). Attempts to improve the design have resulted in lower yields (there’s a lack of plasma physics understanding). Clearly the NNSA is trying to maintain some legacy technology out there. SNL should consider cancelling the program to expand into other, more successful, missions.
December 31, 2017 at 12:08 PM
Don't forget the Magnetic Fusion Test Facility (MFTF) at LLNL, never flipped the switch.
I don’t understand the logic. Because X is not about ignition, X is successful?
Let X be anything: Z, Justin Bieber, a random dumpster fire, etc.
Livermore tested hydrogen bombs on weather balloons in the ‘50s that lit the Yucca trees on fire.
LLNL started designing a commercial-size mirror fusion machine even before MFTF-B was completed; the Mirror Advanced Reactor Study (MARS). To make net power at a commercial size, MARS determined that a 130 meter long solenoid would be needed. For comparison, MFTF-B was about 40 meters between ying/yang coils. At the time, MARS didn't make economic sense and if LLNL scientists already knew that 130 meters would be needed, and would be uneconomical, why continue spending money to support experiments on the 40 meter MFTF-B? Of course, so many uncertainties existed that LLNL really didn't know if 130 meters would do. The way magnetic fusion had progressed, MFTF-B most likely would have shown 130 meters to be quite insufficient. LLNL inadvertently killed their own machine with MARS.
W88
Both from LANL