General Fusion Inc

[gabster]

I have come across another company researching a different technique for fusion. http://www.generalfusion.com. They plan to uses Lithium as a fuel. What’s more they have recently recieved funding by venture capitalist Wal van Lierop CEO of Chrysalix Energy Venture Capital. If Wal is a fusion enthusiast maybe he will also be interested in investing in Focus fusion.

[Alex Pollard]

Thanks for that link.

I do not know much about any advantages Magnetized Target Fusion would have over Focus Fusion.

The concept is described here

http://www.generalfusion.com/t5_general_fusion.php

It seems pretty elaborate and quite untested.

The main disadvantages appear to be that
* it requires the extraction of tritium from a liquid lead-lithium mixture
* it would rely on conventional thermal conversion to electricity, and not use a highly efficient approach such as capturing an ion beam and X-rays. This makes break-even much harder.

These challenges are not much different from those of the Tokamak project, they are just trying to solve the same problems in a more creative way.

Whereas Focus Fusion pretty much avoids these problems in the first place.

Focus Fusion is the only fusion technology I have come across that seems to have a plausible end-to-end solution covering the following issues:

* commonly available and cheap fuel
* heating the plasma
* confining the plasma
* not producing excessive neutrons
* extraction of waste products from chamber
* and crucially, capturing the resulting energy in the most efficient manner possible.

[Brian H]

Alex has it right. General Fusion has a very steep break-even hill to climb. Quite complex equipment (steam rams, anyone)?

[ailabs]

You might want to check out Electron Power Systems – they seem to have a similar approach to FF.

A New Clean Energy Technology

[Brian H]

ailabs wrote: You might want to check out Electron Power Systems – they seem to have a similar approach to FF.

http://www.electronpowersystems.com/

Nothing new for 6 years? Something blew a gasket. They are also looking for stable plasma, which is NBD as long as you don’t want to contain fusion energies. Then, all Hell is out for noon.

[ailabs]

Sorry but I’m not a plasma fusion scientist. Please explain.

[Brian H]

Plasma isn’t all that rare or weird, it’s just ionized gas. Flame is a plasma, e.g. Glowing gas of any kind is a plasma.

So there are all levels of energy possible, and an ionized miniature donut of “ball lightning” is many orders of magnitude less energetic than plasma creating or “hosting” fusion processes, and consequently much easier to contain and stabilize. I haven’t seen their projections, but it seems implausible that they can “ramp up” what they’ve got to the necessary levels.

[ailabs]

Thank you for the explanation.

Is it possible that they haven’t reported any progress for six years because of having a strategic partner in a large aerospace company which could use their technology for high-kinetic energy anti-missile beams? They do claim to have this “strategic partner in a large aerospace company.”

[Brian H]

ailabs wrote: Thank you for the explanation.

Is it possible that they haven’t reported any progress for six years because of having a strategic partner in a large aerospace company which could use their technology for high-kinetic energy anti-missile beams? They do claim to have this “strategic partner in a large aerospace company.”

Particle beams in atmosphere make a hell of a show! Impacts and secondary radiation galore. But they don’t get too far. Outside of that, you’re talking masers and lasers. I saw no indication they had any such plans or expertise. But any “hot” energy source can be used to crank those up.

[Author]

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