Slightly off topic, still...

I know we have quite a bit of scientific know how on this board due to the folks who post here. Seeing as how this is "sort of" related to Honorverse power mechanics I was curious what the folks here thought of Lockheed Martin's claims to creating a fusion energy device.

Link to the article, with further links to Lockheed's released specs, found here:

http://www.technologyreview.com/news/53 ... n-machine/

You probably want to check out the discussion we already had on that last week--http://forums.davidweber.net/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=6343

Since I've got an aversion to watching videos (I'm behind a very slow line - videos tend to lose their punch when I get two or three second views in every 10 or 15 seconds), I got most of what I know from a couple of the other articles. What they seem to be claiming is that they've solved the problem that has plagued tokamak research for the last several decades: instability of the magnetic field confining the plasma. If that is in fact true, and their system will generate enough negative feedback to keep the plasma away from the physical walls of the device, then they have the possibility of some interesting developments. One of the articles said that they were aiming for 10 seconds of sustained plasma as a proof that their concept worked.

I have the impression that they regard the next steps as "just engineering." I'm not so sanguine, but then they're a lot smarter than I am.

The Nuclear_Fusion article at Wikipedia, as well as one of the linked articles, gives a pretty decent background on how the actual reactions work.

JohnRoth wrote:Since I've got an aversion to watching videos (I'm behind a very slow line - videos tend to lose their punch when I get two or three second views in every 10 or 15 seconds), I got most of what I know from a couple of the other articles. What they seem to be claiming is that they've solved the problem that has plagued tokamak research for the last several decades: instability of the magnetic field confining the plasma. If that is in fact true, and their system will generate enough negative feedback to keep the plasma away from the physical walls of the device, then they have the possibility of some interesting developments. One of the articles said that they were aiming for 10 seconds of sustained plasma as a proof that their concept worked.

I have the impression that they regard the next steps as "just engineering." I'm not so sanguine, but then they're a lot smarter than I am.

The Nuclear_Fusion article at Wikipedia, as well as one of the linked articles, gives a pretty decent background on how the actual reactions work.

I did see a skeptical article (which of course I can't find at the moment) that thought that Lockheed's design seemed to require the superconducting magnet rings to be too close to the fusion chamber - that they couldn't have enough shielding there to keep neutron bombardment from the fusion from knocking them out of superconducting mode.

I've no idea if that's a concern, and really hope Lockheed (or somebody) makes some real progress on economical fusion power.

Well, Lockheed must be on to something or I don't think they would publish anything that might be wonky (theoretically anyway).

Yeah, because no reputable megacorporation (?) has EVER done that.

dreamrider

dreamrider wrote:Yeah, because no reputable megacorporation (?) has EVER done that.

dreamrider

Now you are just being downright cynical, Lockheed is a company with an excellent engineering reputation. Do you really think that they would willingly publish dubious information which would tarnish that reputation?

Especially concerning the contentious subject of fusion...

Joat42 wrote:Well, Lockheed must be on to something or I don't think they would publish anything that might be wonky (theoretically anyway).

The problem is that people have been publishing proposals and articles on controlled fusion for sixty years. They all thought they "must be onto something." And mostly they were, but it didn't work out quite as well as expected. That doesn't mean that what they wrote was "wonky", just that there were unanticipated problems.

Joat42 wrote:

dreamrider wrote:Yeah, because no reputable megacorporation (?) has EVER done that.

dreamrider

Now you are just being downright cynical, Lockheed is a company with an excellent engineering reputation. Do you really think that they would willingly publish dubious information which would tarnish that reputation?

Especially concerning the contentious subject of fusion...

Lockheed (whose reputation, as a historically important and successful aerospace company I highly respect) has also done stuff like sell the State of Texas a total bill of goods on how improved and efficient the Texas Employment Commission would be if it were closed down and totally outsourced to Lockheed. Unemployment in Texas has been up relative to past similar economic periods every year since.

Premature hype is an inherent fault of American corporate culture. Most (~80%) high-level corporate executives come out of marketing and sales backgrounds, not engineering.

dreamrider

dreamrider wrote:Lockheed (whose reputation, as a historically important and successful aerospace company I highly respect) has also done stuff like sell the State of Texas a total bill of goods on how improved and efficient the Texas Employment Commission would be if it were closed down and totally outsourced to Lockheed. Unemployment in Texas has been up relative to past similar economic periods every year since.

Premature hype is an inherent fault of American corporate culture. Most (~80%) high-level corporate executives come out of marketing and sales backgrounds, not engineering.

dreamrider

If there is a buck to make a lot of companies will fudge the truth as you say, but in this case there isn't any money to make, just a loss of reputation if it turns out that it's hype.