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Category: nuclear energy

Experiments conducted in August achieved a record yield of more than 1.3 megajoules.

After decades of inertial confinement fusion research, a record yield of more than 1.3 megajoules (MJ) from fusion reactions was achieved in the laboratory for the first time during an experiment at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s (LLNL) National Ignition Facility (NIF) on August 8, 2021. These results mark an 8-fold improvement over experiments conducted in spring 2021 and a 25-fold increase over NIF’s 2018 record yield (Figure 1).

NIF precisely guides, amplifies, reflects, and focuses 192 powerful laser beams into a target about the size of a pencil eraser in a few billionths of a second. NIF generates temperatures in the target of more than 180 million F and pressures of more than 100 billion Earth atmospheres. Those extreme conditions cause hydrogen atoms in the target to fuse and release energy in a controlled thermonuclear reaction.

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In the race toward practical fusion energy, tokamaks (donut-shaped plasma devices) are the leading concept—they have achieved better confinement and higher plasma temperatures than any other configuration. Two major magnetic fields are used to contain the plasma: a toroidal field (along the axes of the donut) produced by external coils and the field from a ring current flowing in the plasma itself. The performance of a tokamak, however, comes with an Achilles heel—the possibility of disruptions, a sudden termination of the plasma driven by instabilities in the plasma current. Since the plasma current provides the equilibrium and confinement for the tokamak, the challenge of taming disruptions must be addressed and solved.

As the magnitudes of the plasma current and plasma energy increase, disruptions can cause more damage. As such, they are a particularly important concern for the newest and most powerful machines, such as the SPARC . SPARC is a compact, high-magnetic– tokamak under design and in the early stages of construction by a joint team from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Commonwealth Fusion Systems. The SPARC plasma is predicted to produce more than 10 times the power than is required to maintain its 250 million F temperatures. All tokamaks of this performance class must develop strategies to protect the machine against disruptions.

A solution, however, may be in hand. Prompted by a theoretical idea from Prof. Allen Boozer of Columbia University, the SPARC design includes an innovative new structure which promises fully passive protection from the threat of runaway electrons.

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Engineers have successfully transferred digitally encoded information wirelessly using nuclear radiation instead of conventional technology.

Radio waves and mobile phone signals relies on for communication but in a new development, engineers from Lancaster University in the UK, working with the Jožef Stefan Institute in Slovenia, transferred digitally encoded information using “fast neutrons” instead.

The researchers measured the spontaneous emission of fast neutrons from californium-252, a radioactive isotope produced in nuclear reactors.

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Rolls-Royce will move ahead with a multibillion pound plan to roll out a new breed of mini nuclear reactors after securing more than £450m from the government and investors.

The engineering firm will set up a venture focused on developing small modular nuclear reactors, or SMRs, in partnership with investors BNF Resources and the US generator Exelon Generation with a joint investment of £195m to fund the plans over the next three years.

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Use the code “Undecided” to get Curiosity Stream for less than $15 a year! https://curiositystream.com/Undecided. Before you blow your fuse and start leaving your nuclear fusion jokes in the comments, there’s been a major fusion development we have to talk about and it’s kind of a nuclear bombshell… poor choice of words… it’s big news. It’s all about high temperature semiconductors (ie. magnets).

Watch Exploring the 1,000 Mile Car Battery — Aluminum Air Hype? https://youtu.be/9OOq3f6mUxU?list=PLnTSM-ORSgi7UWp64ZlOKUPNXePMTdU4d.

Special thanks to MIT (http://news.mit.edu/) and Commonwealth Fusion Systems (https://cfs.energy/) for some of the video and photos used, as well as Dr. Greenwald for his time and expertise.

Video script and citations:
https://undecidedmf.com/episodes/exploring-why-this-nuclear-fusion-breakthrough-matters.

Follow-up podcast:
Video version — https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4-aWB84Bupf5hxGqrwYqLA
Audio version — http://bit.ly/stilltbdfm.

👋 Support Undecided on Patreon!
https://www.patreon.com/mattferrell.

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If China — and then Russia and other nuclear powers — get gliders, however, these defensive systems will be obsolete. Nuclear payloads could then zip around the South Pole instead, for instance. They’d never even exit the atmosphere. And they could change their trajectory, being controlled all along by a Chinese operator with a joystick.

All this makes China sound menacing and aggressive. In that sense, the news seems to rhyme with revelations that China is also building a couple of hundred silos for more conventional intercontinental missiles that could carry nukes.

In reality, China probably appears so aggressive only because it feels incredibly insecure. The greatest fear in Beijing is that in an escalating conflict — over Taiwan or whatever else — the U.S. might be tempted one day to launch preemptive nuclear strikes to take out all or most of China’s arsenal. The Americans would only contemplate such a drastic step, of course, if they thought that their own defenses could parry any remaining missiles coming from China in retaliation.

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PERHAPS THE MOST PROMISING ROUTE TO FUSION uses Boron instead, reqiring higher temperatures atainable by chirped lasers—using a widely available fuel, and an output which can be turned directly into energy without the need for steam turbines, etc.

“when it’s finally deployed on electric grids, humanity can leave uranium, coal, oil, and gas in the ground. We won’t need to drill for geothermal energy, or line our hills with unrecyclable wind turbines. It won’t matter if the sun isn’t shining or the wind isn’t blowing…”

Using super powerful lasers to create clean, emission-less energy, HB11 Energy is expanding options for commercial nuclear fusion.

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As the U.S. military has finalized a space for its first micro-nuclear reactor. The Department of Air Force has chosen the Eielson Air Force Base (AFB) in Alaska to introduce this next-generation energy capability, a press release said.

The US military has been inclining towards electronic warfare along with nuclear reactors for cleaner sources of energy. Last month, we reported that the Department of Defense was planning to install a portable nuclear reactor in Idaho.

It is also being said that the micro-reactor pilot is being built in response to the National Defense Authorization Act of 2019 that requires potential locations to be identified to build and operate a microreactor before 2027. The Air Force will work in collaboration with the Department of Energy, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to execute the project of the micro-reactor pilot, and to ensure this pilot is conducted with safety as the number one priority, the press release said. This facility will have a license from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and will operate commercially.

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