Path: ...!eternal-september.org!feeder3.eternal-september.org!news.eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail
From: Jeroen Belleman <jeroen@nospam.please>
Newsgroups: sci.electronics.design
Subject: Re: New fusion power system test creates 300,000 degrees C plasma
Date: Sat, 30 Nov 2024 21:12:23 +0100
Organization: A noiseless patient Spider
Lines: 79
Message-ID: <vifrbt$1tvm0$1@dont-email.me>
References: <vicdtb$62j1$1@solani.org> <vici9s$13umg$1@dont-email.me>
 <vicmgh$j28b$1@solani.org> <vid5og$17b08$1@dont-email.me>
 <1r3svpl.148oh3818kksy4N%liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid>
 <vidafk$18c6s$1@dont-email.me>
 <1r3t0yh.1en723hd56invN%liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid>
 <vidf2k$1933l$1@dont-email.me>
 <1r3tx4d.i621141x40wlcN%liz@poppyrecords.invalid.invalid>
 <vieqs4$1lb23$2@dont-email.me> <uohmkj55an5qsvsdmbj1agobke839p65na@4ax.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Injection-Date: Sat, 30 Nov 2024 21:08:30 +0100 (CET)
Injection-Info: dont-email.me; posting-host="4da290527ba93d799a52f49301aa8bf8";
	logging-data="2031296"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@eternal-september.org";	posting-account="U2FsdGVkX19hlckNcU0+N4ch8ImYcr+3"
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64; rv:102.0) Gecko/20100101
 Thunderbird/102.13.0
Cancel-Lock: sha1:CPFdW7TY1UwDpZi8EQcHzCO9LR0=
In-Reply-To: <uohmkj55an5qsvsdmbj1agobke839p65na@4ax.com>
Content-Language: en-US
Bytes: 4664

On 11/30/24 18:19, john larkin wrote:
> On Sat, 30 Nov 2024 11:57:50 +0100, Jeroen Belleman
> <jeroen@nospam.please> wrote:
> 
>> On 11/30/24 10:34, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
>>> Jeroen Belleman <jeroen@nospam.please> wrote:
>>>
>>>> On 11/29/24 23:03, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
>>>>> Jeroen Belleman <jeroen@nospam.please> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> On 11/29/24 21:04, Liz Tuddenham wrote:
>>>>>>> Jeroen Belleman <jeroen@nospam.please> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> [...]
>>>>>>>> It would be lovely to have 50kWTh or so of PU238 in the basement,
>>>>>>>> if it could be made cheaply enough. Power for a lifetime for the
>>>>>>>> whole house and then some.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> ...but the lifetime might not be very long if any got out.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> If, if. Such arguments can be used to prove anything.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I've got a diesel-powered car in the basement garage. Fully tanked,
>>>>>> it contains 60kg of fuel, good for 2.4GJ or so. Imagine the havoc
>>>>>> that could cause, if it got loose. For reference, a stick of dynamite
>>>>>> is about 1MJ.
>>>>>
>>>>> I've seen what happened when builders accidentally set fire to a tank of
>>>>> diesel far bigger than that.  It burned slowly and steadily until it set
>>>>> fire to the roof of the house - then the house burned down.  Nobody was
>>>>> injured or killed, the mess was easily cleaned up and a new house built
>>>>> on the site.
>>>>>
>>>>> It wasn't like the sudden release of energy you would get in a fuel-air
>>>>> explosion (quite difficult to initiate with diesel without specialist
>>>>> knowledge) and there wasn't a lot of residual toxic contamination.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> OK. Now back to small 238Pu fuelled units. Why would you expect
>>>> anything to go wrong if the Pu was contained in a hermetic canister?
>>>
>>> There's always an idiot (or a terrorist) who would challenge themself to
>>> open it.
>>>
>>>
>>
>> Yes, probably. There have been similar incidents in the past.
>> I'm convinced it can be made safe enough for widespread normal
>> use, but there will always be some fool somewhere. If we let
>> that stop us, no technology is safe enough.
>>
>> Jeroen Belleman
> 
> A kilogram, properly distributed, would make a city uninhabitable for
> centuries. Imagine such an active alpha emitter in a water supply.

There are myriad ways to create havoc, if we wanted to. I have castor
plants in the garden. They are very decorative. Properly distributed,
there is enough ricin in them to kill tens of thousands of people.
Nobody cares. Weaponizing noxious substances isn't so easy.

> 
> It would make some cool glow-in-the-dark gadgets.
> 
> Critical mass is around 10 Kg. Kids could make nukes.
> 

238Pu doesn't sustain a chain reaction, at least not in the quantities
we talk about. Nukes use 239Pu, the fissionable isotope. That's the
isotope that has a critical mass in the 10kg ballpark. Even then, it's
*very* hard to keep it together for long enough to create a sizable
explosion. No kid is going to pull that off, even if he could get his
hands on 239Pu in sufficient amounts.

Jeroen Belleman