Okay so what

[Bondwriter]

i guess u got me wrong there...what i meant by money-less world was that there is no need for ANY kind of money...be it paper, plastic or metal....you see...what i meant was, with a money-less world, the crime rate would reduce considerably---because the reason we commit crimes is to get monetary gains---kleptomania notwithstanding (those ppl will steal come what may). Also, many of the social evils (inequality on the basis of economic status) will be rooted out if there is no money.

Some idealism at last. Actually, since income becomes more and more unrelated to production activities, it's not totally stupid to think about this. I disagree with people not wanting to work anymore, but then there may be other incentives than just money.

[C James]

There are three ways that mankind has been able to initiate fusion.

 

1. In a Hydrogen bomb. The problem is that exploding a nuclear weapon isn't very useful when you want to turn the energy produced into electricity....

2. Using a electromagnetic fields to contain and squeeze plasma until the pressure is sufficient to cause hydrogen atoms to fuse.

3. Bombarding deuterium/tritium pellets with either lasers or particles from particle accelerators, and the resultant pressure causes some of the atoms to fuse.

 

There is at least a #4; deuterium cavitation. Cavitation occurs when an object (such as a propellor) moves fast enough through a liquid to create vacuum bubbles. When the bubbles collapse, they do so with great force. In deuterium (heavy water) this is sufficient to cause a very tiny amount of fusion. Not enough to e useful, but it does occur.

 

The problem with fusion is the break-even point; releasing more energy than it takes to cause the fusion. We haven't even come close yet.

 

Even the "hydrogen bomb" is a bit of a misnomer; modern hydrogen warheads are called three-stage devices; fusion actually occurs in the first two stages; the first stage, a plutonium-implosion core, is usually "boosted" (yield-enhanced) via tritium (an isotope of hydrogen) which releases more neutrons, thus boosting the yeild. The main fusion occurs in the second stage, where the imense pressure and heat of the primary detonation is focused to achieve hydrogen fusion (often of lithium-6, transforming it into a tritium-lithium mix during detonation to avoid the short half-life of tritium, which is only a few years). The second stage fusion (there is also some fission in the second stage, the core of the holarum is usually a fissioning rod of plutonium) produces mainly high-energy neutrons (around 11MeV as I recall). These neutrons are energetic enough to cause fision of the third stage; the normally inert u-238 (often called depleted uranium). It is the fission of the third stage that releases about 75% (the percentage varies based on design) of the energy of a "hydrogen" bomb.

 

There are may variants; a neutron warhead, for example, is essentially a very small hydrogen bomb lacking a third stage (though there are many design differences). There is also the "layer cake" design of much lower yield (no much seen since the 1960's) and almost all single-stage modern nuclear devices use a fusion-boost to both decrease the amount of plutonium needed, and also to boost the yeild.

 

My own guess as to the road to fusion power is that it won't be a direct one. An intermediate fission/fusion reactor will be the stepping stone, and it will use small amounts of fusion to create the high-energy neutrons needed to fission u-238 (with is about 99% more abundant than u-235, which is what fissions in a conventional uranium reactor). Just a guess.

 

One advantage of such a reactor would be a very high operating temperature, high enough to crack hydrogen from water, thus making for a great source of hydrogen for fuel. Currently, most of the hydrogen used to run hydrogen vehicles, etc, is catalytically converted from natural gas, a fossil fuel, so it is not "clean" energy at the moment, much the same way that electric vehicles, when re-charged from fossil-fuel generated electricity (such as by plugging them in) are far from "clean".

 

OK, I'm rambling because I'm over-tired (I spent 15 hours on the road today) so I'll shut up now.