Fusion power: The uncertain certainty
By Richard F. Post | October 1, 1971
An optimist's fusion power timetable, October 1971.
Fusion will be and needs to be achieved. But when? Its primary fuel, deuterium, exists in sufficient quantity to satisfy any conceivable energy demands for thousands of millions of years. The cost of obtaining it from water is less than one per cent the present cost of coal. Is fusion power a distant dream or a near-term possibility? The first applications could come in the 1980s. This report on progress in fusion research was adapted from physicist Richard F. Post’s presentation last April 26 to the National Academy of Sciences Symposium on “Energy for the Future.” Post is head of the magnetic mirror program in controlled thermonuclear research at the Lawrence Radiation Laboratory, Livermore, California.
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Keywords: Nuclear Fusion Energy, fusion
Topics: Fusion Energy
Richard F. Post
Richard F. Post (1918-2015) was a physicist and the head of the magnetic mirror program in controlled thermonuclear research at what was then the... Read More
The sales pitch for the holy grail dream of nuclear fusion energy electric power generation began with the initial experiments that began in the 1950s. Since then many dozens of machines have been built and experiments have been run on them. It’s likely that over $100-billion USD have been expended in the effort. Some of the researchers have become masters at snowing naive investors who have come to rely upon the experimenters for the investors ‘critical assessments.’ The sales pitchers have tended to omit key evaluation parameters while pitching misleading information. For example Richard F. Post stated the following. “Its… Read more »