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NIF is doing weapons research, what they achieved is essentially irrelevant for electricity production as there is no plausible route towards a power plant. And
by danbruc 3y ago
NIF is doing weapons research, what they achieved is essentially irrelevant for electricity production as there is no plausible route towards a power plant. And if you take the overall energy balance, they did not even break even.
- cmpxchg8b 3y agoWarships need electricity too..
- Symmetry 3y agoAnd the Navy puts money into fusion research for that reason, including a bit into cold fusion just in case. But that's not what their doing at NIF, those guys are trying to figure out if you can make a thermonuclear bomb with just cheap lithium deutride and not the expensive plutonium/enriched uranium.
- tivert 3y ago> But that's not what their doing at NIF, those guys are trying to figure out if you can make a thermonuclear bomb with just cheap lithium deutride and not the expensive plutonium/enriched uranium. IIRC, thermonuclear bombs are already made with lithium deutride. Do you mean they're trying to build a thermonuclear bomb without the fission "detonator"? That doesn't make tons of sense to me, since I'd think the test ban treaty would realistically prevent creation of novel types of weapons (because it wouldn't be foolish to rely on a weapon for deterrence that you've never fully tested).
- actionfromafar 3y agoThe treaty Russia just punted on?
- danbruc 3y agoThe one that the United States signed but never ratified? Just as China, Egypt, Iran and Israel. And that India, North Korea and Pakistan never signed to begin with? And that will enter into force only after all those countries have signed at ratified it?
- actionfromafar 3y agoExactly. We shouldn’t be extremely surprised if testing resumes.
- noobermin 3y agoI'm freaking tired of this line. NIF has an actual break even result which is greater than the results of any mcf experiment. If the NIF result is shit that whole field's result is then below shit.
- danbruc 3y agoAlready the first fusion bomb had a break even result.
- dreamcompiler 3y agoNIF's result is significant milestone in the same sense that the invention of the airplane was a significant milestone in the field of space travel. It matters, but we're still a very, very long way from landing on the moon (a fusion-powered electric grid).
- howenterprisey 3y agoThat doesn't address their point. It doesn't matter how good the result is if the entire research direction is a dead end, which it is, being practically impossible to convert into a power plant.