After the recent headlines about the problems with ITER there is an article, albeit only one at the moment (I have not searched for similiar ones) ITER will be built by 2018
Give the current news about Polywell WB-8 Testing Pre-solitication news article and assuming that the work for this started around the beginning of the year 2009. Then if and only if Polywell works then it will be all over by 2010 (maybe 2011) at the latest.
In other words "Polywell leads by a nose"
Regards
Polywell
The race is on Polywell vs ITER
The race is on Polywell vs ITER
The more I know, the less I know.
It may just mean that the amount of money spent to build or buy things exceeeds a low percentage of the total contract amount. I forget what the percentages are to go from 6.0 to 6.1 to 6.2 research, but there are cut-offs and such. None of it indicates that the science is done, merely that no more can be done without building more that a minimum amount of stuff and testing it.MSimon wrote:Is it some kind of contract or money dodge?scareduck wrote:So they say ...MSimon wrote:Most significant is that the Navy calls Polywell "Applied Research".
If Polywell WB-8 results are positive it means that very likely Polywell fusion will be feasible, and the problems are engineering. Because of the smaller scale the engineering is cheaper and quicker to build than ITER. But still there is engineering to sort out, a lot of it.
So in two years time Polywell may be where ITER is now. Science proved and awaiting proof of concept engineering.
Best wishes, Tom
So in two years time Polywell may be where ITER is now. Science proved and awaiting proof of concept engineering.
Best wishes, Tom
I sincerely hope that in two years Polywell is not where ITER is now. i.e. on the verge of collapse.tomclarke wrote:If Polywell WB-8 results are positive it means that very likely Polywell fusion will be feasible, and the problems are engineering. Because of the smaller scale the engineering is cheaper and quicker to build than ITER. But still there is engineering to sort out, a lot of it.
So in two years time Polywell may be where ITER is now. Science proved and awaiting proof of concept engineering.
Best wishes, Tom
I hear rumblings that the US Congress (having pulled out of ITER once before) is very unhappy with the current state of affairs. If the lawyers in the American Congress pull the plug there is going to be a collapse of the DOE fusion effort which for the most part was designed to support ITER.
Engineering is the art of making what you want from what you can get at a profit.
Should one dare to hope?MSimon wrote: I hear rumblings that the US Congress (having pulled out of ITER once before) is very unhappy with the current state of affairs. If the lawyers in the American Congress pull the plug there is going to be a collapse of the DOE fusion effort which for the most part was designed to support ITER.
Sorry Art, I know you think ITER is the way to go. And in truth, unless a good deal of the "savings" are directed at other such energy technologies, I wouldn't want it eliminated either.
I suspect it's because they've been funding the donkey for 20 years, so if those that want more funding roll up to the purser and ask for a cheque for a 21st year of 'elementary research' they'll get told sharpish where to stow their cash requisition.MSimon wrote:Is it some kind of contract or money dodge?scareduck wrote:So they say ...MSimon wrote:Most significant is that the Navy calls Polywell "Applied Research".
Heh. And we blind men still can't agree on what the hell this thing is.chrismb wrote:The idea of a polywell vs ITER race immediately caused me to imagine a fat elephant with no legs up against a dwarf on a penny farthing, sitting there at the start line long after the starter klaxon.
But soon the legless elephant will start rolling downhill, crushing competitors under its bulk (though he stands no chance of rolling up again to the finish line at the top of the next hill). Even now, he begins to rock back and forth...
Hardly a similar scenario. Polywell/ITER is more like when caveman was trying to decide between triangular or star-shaped wheels, and had to wait several thousand years for someone to invent the circle.rcain wrote:Betamax anyone? DC grid perhaps? I'm sure we'll all get along just fine, so long someone gets to market.... quickly as you like
(ps by welcome contrast Unix/open-source is still doing just fine - bucking the trend/skewed game).
(D'you like my little bit of 'instant' philosophy - was the circle, as a shape, 'invented' or 'discovered', and if the latter where was it before it was first 'found'? The invention of the 'notion of a circle' had to come before the wheel.....)