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<div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><font face="garamond, new york, times, serif">I will be interested to learn what Lawrence Livermore National Lab (LLNL) and Department of Energy (DOE) people have to say about this "scientific breakthrough". Undoubtedly it's a tremendous technical achievement, but right now I have reservations.</font></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><font face="garamond, new york, times, serif"><br></font></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><font face="garamond, new york, times, serif">As I've understood the LLNL project, it's based on suddenly compressing a pellet of fusible -- hydrogen-containing, with tailored proportions of deuterium and tritium -- material. To accomplish the compression, LLNL has constructed an array of synchronized high power lasers. The pellet is dropped into the spot where the laser beams intersect; when the pellet reaches that spot, the lasers fire, compressing the pellet to achieve the conditions for fusion (light carries momentum). I presume that, in order to create actual power generation, pellets will be dropped, one after the other, with lasers repetitively firing.</font></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><font face="garamond, new york, times, serif"><br></font></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><font face="garamond, new york, times, serif">This is a super-complicated scheme, which makes me wonder whether it can be used to produce energy continuously and reliably over months and years (assuming the energy can be extracted reliably and continuously). Moreover, I wonder how many such installations power companies would build and install, and whether they will develop the technical competence to run them. It will be interesting.</font></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><font face="garamond, new york, times, serif"><br></font></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><font face="garamond, new york, times, serif">As a language purist of sorts, by the way, I object to the achievement being touted as a <i>scientific</i> breakthrough: It is an engineering breakthrough.<br></font></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><font face="garamond, new york, times, serif"><br></font></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><font face="garamond, new york, times, serif"> -- Mike Alexander</font></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><font face="garamond, new york, times, serif"><br></font></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><font face="garamond, new york, times, serif"><br></font></div><div><br></div>
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On Monday, December 12, 2022 at 05:29:53 PM EST, Drew King (dking65@kingconsulting.us) <dking65@kingconsulting.us> wrote:
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<div><div id="yiv2628931399"><div>All,<br><br>The Verge: A “scientific breakthrough” in nuclear fusion? How to watch the announcement tomorrow.<br><a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank" href="https://www.theverge.com/2022/12/12/23505416/nuclear-fusion-scientific-breakthrough-how-to-watch-announcement-biden">https://www.theverge.com/2022/12/12/23505416/nuclear-fusion-scientific-breakthrough-how-to-watch-announcement-biden</a><br><br><div class="yiv2628931399k9mail-signature">-- <br>Drew King<br><br></div></div></div>===============================================<br>::The Lexington Computer and Technology Group Mailing List::<br>Reply goes to sender only; Reply All to send to list.<br>Send to the list: <a ymailto="mailto:LCTG@lists.toku.us" href="mailto:LCTG@lists.toku.us">LCTG@lists.toku.us</a> Message archives: <a href="http://lists.toku.us/pipermail/lctg-toku.us/" target="_blank">http://lists.toku.us/pipermail/lctg-toku.us/</a><br>To subscribe: email <a ymailto="mailto:lctg-subscribe@toku.us" href="mailto:lctg-subscribe@toku.us">lctg-subscribe@toku.us</a> To unsubscribe: email <a ymailto="mailto:lctg-unsubscribe@toku.us" href="mailto:lctg-unsubscribe@toku.us">lctg-unsubscribe@toku.us</a><br>Future and Past meeting information: <a href="http://LCTG.toku.us" target="_blank">http://LCTG.toku.us</a><br>List information: <a href="http://lists.toku.us/listinfo.cgi/lctg-toku.us" target="_blank">http://lists.toku.us/listinfo.cgi/lctg-toku.us</a><br>This message was sent to <a ymailto="mailto:mna.ma@yahoo.com." href="mailto:mna.ma@yahoo.com.">mna.ma@yahoo.com.</a><br>Set your list options: <a href="http://lists.toku.us/options.cgi/lctg-toku.us/mna.ma@yahoo.com" target="_blank">http://lists.toku.us/options.cgi/lctg-toku.us/mna.ma@yahoo.com</a><br></div>
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