Reply To: Military Effects

[asymmetric_implosion]

My question is how do they know that alternative concepts are economically competitive? This has been the bane of the mainline ICF and MCF programs for years. Claims of clean, cheap energy without a configuration that is capable of producing more energy than it takes in. Doesn’t it seem premature to assume the economics are known before the physics is demonstrated to work? Doesn’t engineering the system need to be done to understand the components and people that are the real cost of fusion? This will provide the inputs to decide if carbon free energy from fusion is worth the investment.

It frustrates me to no end that national lab folks talk about clean, cheap energy as a way to keep pouring money into programs they know are not viable for producing energy. I guess the folks at the top of these programs lost sight that they were once credible researchers that knew that science strives to be an objective process. While not as satisfying, it is just as important to know what doesn’t work. One can conclude with our current level of technology that fusion from NIF and ITER may be beyond us. Are other concepts going to meet the same end? I don’t know but isn’t it time to state honestly that the fusion program is more about hunting and pecking for what might be possible i.e. science rather than producing energy? If a concept produces net energy, the engineering and economics will come on their own.

Astrophysics and particle physics seem to stay funded when one can easily argue in tough times they have little practical value such a creating sustainable jobs worldwide, improving energy efficiency, reducing need for carbon based fuel, etc. They stand on quality of their work and people continue to support them. I’m not sure what it says about fusion but I don’t think the commentary is good.