I would rather spend billions working on Fusion power than warring with terrorists

[LtHans]

If we were out from under control of foreign oil we wouldn't be in such a predicament.

Any time something big happens in the middle east the United States gets involved.  It is ALWAYS messy, because there is never a clear choice of what to do.  Whatever we do, we piss of some small group and they try to bomb Americans as often as possible.  We're sticking our neck out for what?

If President Bush anounced in the next State of the Union address that the United States is working on Fusion Power in a very serious way, I would be alot happier than having to wage some impossible war on terrorism.  We need to be out of the Middle East and self suficient.  The region is costing us too much.

Hans.

[Dowding]

Reposted from a reply I gave to that other thread of yours:

Firstly, fusion power research has been happening for decades with no real progress. Check out the Joint European Torus project. Fusion has occured, but only for virtually immeasurable instants of time. There has been very little progress in actually making nuclear fusion a viable energy source, despite much investment and effort.

The next 'best' option is nuclear power which is far from 'clean' and is very, very expensive to commission. Combined with the long-term problems associated with de-comissioning and the day-to-day process waste, it is far more economical to generate electricity using modern, efficient gas turbines (for example). This might change in the future, but for next few decades (in the UK at least) using natural gas is by far the best option, both economically and environmentally.

[Sandman]

Don't forget hydrogen, another source of fuel that we shy away from simply because a certain rigid airship blew up in the U.S.

Funny thing is, most people don't realize that gasoline is far more volatile.

[ 09-20-2001: Message edited by: Sandman_SBM ]

[AKDejaVu]

Actually Sandman.. I think you are going to see hydrogen appear in more and more small items.  A company has created a hydrogen battery setup that can power a cell fone for 4 months.  It also has to capability to power things such as small scooters and such.  Very interesting stuff.

As for where anyone would "rather our money be spent"... personally, I'd rather see money spent to ensure safe skies while flying.  There is only so much of 6000 people being killed, 100,000 layoffs occuring and general paranoa that should be tollerated.  Steps need to be taken to either prevent it to happening in the first place and/or ensure that those acting against us understand that there will be consequences.

AKDejaVu

[Pepe]

Dowding,

Cheapest electricity comes from nuclear fission reactors, even if you take into consideration de-comissioning costs and recycling/disposing of waste products.

Environmentally, we don't know yet. Fossil energy is not environmentally friendly. It's long-term impact is yet to be addressed. Probably Natural Gas is cleanest among them, but still not cleaner than a nuclear plant, in direct environmental terms. The main (I would say only) concerns about nuclear energy are safety and disposal of waste products. Safety has improved from 3mile island and western one is years ahead chernobyl. Radioacive by-products and even waste ones can be recycled. It's a matter of money. The problem lies in the tons of demagogic, apocaliptic messages threw to the masses when accidents occurred. More or less like Sandman's post about hydrogen. The sad thing is that you can mention them as teething problems, but technology was not given a chance to grow.

As for substituting oil, I'm rather skeptical/cynical about this, bearing in mind that are U.S.A. companies the ones making most of the money out of this business. Not only Oil companies, but the world's economy is based on Oil, and it's ruled by the U.S.A.  

Cheers,

Pepe

[Toad]

I'd like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony, myself.

I hate this idea of going to war. I've got two sons of military age and I'll wager this is going to last for decades.

Unfortunately, HANS, the other side in this conflict would probably hate you EVEN MORE if we managed to rapidly wean ourselves from Arab oil.

Figure this out.  Suddenly US born Professor Eyekew figures out how to use hydrogen from seawater to power all of our cars, electricity generating plants, cell phones, etc. Almost overnight the US and the rest of the world convert to hydrogen from seawater.

The US and Europe are sharing Coca Cola and siging together on TV again.

Tell me now... what would that do to the economies of the Arab/Islamic nations? Big boost yah think?

Or maybe they're eating oil soup now because no nation needs their product?

This would make the Islamic radicals our friends, right?

[Pepe]

Toad,

Gulf States families (yes, we are talking about feudal states) and wealthy muslims around the world woud buy HUGE stakes in those companies. Probably through proxies. So you wouldn't notice. Unless you change regulations first. Some of them would continue funding mulsim fundamentalists.

Unless we make a major regulatory change, on an all-broad western countries scope, that Eyekew   wonder would not do us any good in terms of terrorism. You are right.  

Cheers,

Pepe

[Zigrat]

how do you use hydrogen for fuel

where do we get hydrogen? electrolosys. how do we get the power for that? fossil fules most likely. wheres the benefit?

besides the specific chemical energy of hydrogen is terribly low. and the volume required is very very high, since hydrogen is such a light element. fossil fuels are just a much much better solution for mobile power generation.

[Ripsnort]

Back to the topic..to let this just go, you invite more terrorism, so, while we're building some big Cold Fusion reactor (granted *if* we did by chance jump the many hurdles to get there) then you'd just have another terrorist attack on that Cold Fusion reactor.

You must fix the problems of threat, before peace can be achieved.  I don't think theres a soul alive that can think of better ways to spend the money, but when it comes right down to security, Globally speaking, how can you move forward without it?

[batdog]

Heh... they'd attack us and hate us regardless.


xBAT