fusion energy source? really?
 

That would be beyond totally amazing if it really works. I hope it is real.

very cool and its not like the company that is doing it is a crazy gererator start up...it's Lockheed Martin for Pete's sake!

Lockheed Martin's new fusion reactor can change humanity forever

Very cool. I can't believe the Lockheed would go public with this if it did not hold serious promise.

Imagine what the Skunk Works already has in the can.

They designed the SR71 nearly 60 years ago with slide rules. I suspect they have some pretty cool toys.

SmileWavy

I say "show me". Those articles don't say how they are trying to accomplish useable fusion with their setup. After all fusion for power generation requires enormous plasma pressures and temperatures:

How Nuclear Fusion Reactors Work - HowStuffWorks

I hope it's not another "cold fusion" story!

I remember in college in 1989-90 ish when this came out:
Martin Fleischmann - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
As a student in science I got all my hopes up.
"ALL the world's energy problems solved!" I thought.
"HIP HIP HOORAY!!!!!!" I thought.
But it didn't work.
I was bummed.
Hopefully it will work this time, but I'm not getting my hopes up until I see it work!

Unfortunately, Lockheed (or the article) doesn't mention anything at all about the methodology.

We (ORNL/ITER) have been working on fusion for a long time. Based on my understanding of the technical challenges, I am skeptical that Lockheed (sort of on their own) would come up with a workable solution where everyone else has failed.

Put me in the "show me" camp. I want to know how they get around the fast neutron energy issue.

But if this works, the world has changed!

If true this will change our entire world. Most likely for the better.
But we've heard it before several times and it turned out to be BS.
Put me down as hopefully pessimistic.

BTW back in 1985 or 86 I was at Lawrence Livermore labs and say a mock-up of a fusion reactor to be sent into space. It was not functional but they must have built it for a reason.

Fingers crossed. Wouldn't it be nice to tell the ME / big oil in general to go suck it? Won't help with the ISIS problem per se but I still hope this is for real so we can cut off the funding streams for many of the petro profiteers (including opec) if nothing else.

It should be mentioned, of course, that we do have working fusion reactors - they just require more energy than they produce. I think JET has gotten close with a ratio of around .7 or so (power output to power input).

As James mentions, there are many obstacles. Those 14 MeV neutrons are butt-kickers.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof.

i barely understand fire :D

Fire good.
Unga bunga bunga, Binga binga binga bunga! (trivia reference??)




http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1413475819.jpg


do you know why cavemen drug their women around by the hair?

If they drug them around by the feet they'd fill up with dirt.

I'm out.

http://www.smbc-comics.com/comics/20100501.gif

Well, that over simplifies things. But...

Many things today would change. Let's speculate on the obvious:

Electricity Generation. Assuming this thing doesn't cost a mint to produce, we should be able to go hard over to this for power generation.

Most large transportation systems would become Fusion powered.
Ships
Trains
Planes

How about a different type of fusion?

Extreme Tech - Don't call it cold fusion