On Episode 12 of RadioNuclear, we discuss how fear-mongering stories about nuclear power plants in the path of a hurricane are irrelevant, the Oyster Creek Shutdown, and lastly, how nuclear power should be used geopolitically.
The National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California is the world's largest and most energetic laser system. The facility completed construction in 2009 and is designed to achieve fusion "ignition"-the achievement of a self-sustaining, burning plasma that releases a net amount of energy. If achieved, it would mark the culmination of more than 50 years of research into fusion. In 2012, the NIF laser met and exceeded its design criteria for energy and power, but it has not yet attained the goal of ignition of the fusion fuel.
Researchers at the National Ignition Facility in California announced this week that they had achieved a major milestone on the path toward nuclear fusion as an energy source, as described in a paper published in the science journal Nature. For the first time, the energy produced in a nuclear fusion reaction in a confined hydrogen fuel exceeded the energy put in to start the reaction. Science reporter Gautam Naik explains at the Wall Street Journal:
Charles Chase and his team at Lockheed Martin's "Skunk Works" made quite a splash recently by announcing that they are attempting to develop a truck-trailer-sized 100-MW fusion reactor-to be ready for operation in just a few years!
The March/April 2013 edition of the technical journal Fusion Science and Technology (FST) is available electronically and in hard copy for American Nuclear Society member subscribers and others.
A review of Search for the Ultimate Energy Source: A History of the U.S. Fusion Energy Program, by Stephen O. Dean
The November 2012 edition of the technical journal Fusion Science and Technology (FST) is available electronically and in hard copy for American Nuclear Society member subscribers and others. Non-subscribers click here to subscribe to FST and other ANS titles.
The October 2012 issue of the technical journal Fusion Science and Technology is available electronically and in hard copy for American Nuclear Society member subscribers and others. Non-subscribers click here to learn how to subscribe to FST and other ANS titles.