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I'd love to read equivalent commentary about the Lockheed Martin Skunk Works Compact Fusion project. https://www.lockheedmartin.com/us/products/compact-fusion.h
by PhantomGremlin 9y ago
I'd love to read equivalent commentary about the Lockheed Martin Skunk Works Compact Fusion project. https://www.lockheedmartin.com/us/products/compact-fusion.html https://www.lockheedmartin.com/us/products/compact-fusion.ht...
If Compact Fusion is crank science, why is it on Lockheed's website? Potential Applications:
safe power for safe seas
planes with unlimited range and unmatched endurance
power a city of 50,000 people
speed up space travel
Etc. Is that just bullshit to make shareholders feel better? Or are there realistic alternatives to grandiose megaprojects like ITER?
- simias 9y agoHas there been any update since 2014? I'm not holding by breath.
- Nihilartikel 9y agoI think there are quite a few credible alt-fusion projects out there. I have no particular animus towards ITER but I am disappointed that its multi-decade scope, megabudget, and sunk cost, are starving research allocation into other approaches. Some of which seem to have clearer paths to energy production than magnetic confinement fusion. My favorite dark horse is the inertial electrostatic confinement Polywell design, which is currently being funded (crumbs in comparison to ITER) by the Navy, who would of course love a submarine sized fusion reactor. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polywell https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polywell Cool thing with the Polywell - if the physics actually pan out, the full size one should be able to fuse hydrogen and boron, which won't produce neutron radiation, just alpha particles that can be directly converted to electricity.