Robert Bussard, one of the giants of the field, claimed to his dying day he had cracked the problem
![Homemade_fusion_reactor[1]](https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2015/03/homemade_fusion_reactor1.jpg?quality=83)
Above: a homemade “fusor” similar to the Polywell nuclear fusion reactor
Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Not many people have heard of Robert Bussard, but he was one of the giants of nuclear fusion research. But if an engineering solution for viable small, household size nuclear fusion reactors is ever discovered, they will almost certainly be largely based on Bussard’s work.
Bussard’s focus was on a field of Nuclear fusion research known as electrostatic confinement. Unlike the better known magnetic bottle reactors, such as the $20 billion ITER project, electrostatic confinement can be applied to fusion plasmas which are the size of a small glass fish tank.
Electrostatic confinement has been well known since the 1930s. Small electrostatic nuclear fusion devices are sold commercially – as neutron sources. A small nuclear fusion reactor is an incredibly convenient way to produce a dense stream of neutron radiation, because as soon as you switch off the power, the plasma cools, and the radiation stops.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neutron_generator
The problem is nobody has figured out how to extract more energy out of an electrostatic fusor, than you put into it. There is a long list of problems to be solved. One of the big problems with viable nuclear fusion is keeping the plasma hot enough – when you heat something to millions of degrees, it really wants to shed some of its heat. In electrostatic confinement systems, the violent acceleration / deceleration, as charged plasma particles bounce off the high intensity electric fields, causes a significant cooling of the core. There are also problems with the electrodes – keeping an electrode from melting, when it is in close contact with a superheated gas, is a significant engineering challenge.
Bussard at the end of his life, claimed to have solved these problems. He built a small prototype using a grant from the US Navy. Right up to his dying day, he was trying to raise funds, to build a full scale prototype, of his Polywell nuclear fusion reactor design.
The late physicist Robert Bussard worked for decades to try to show Polywell fusion could work, using a variety of Wiffle-Ball configurations. Just before his death in 2007, he claimed that he was getting close to solving the challenge with his WB-6 device.
After Bussard passed away, other researchers picked up the baton at EMC2 Fusion in New Mexico and continued building test devices. Most recently, Park and his colleagues used a redesigned Wiffle-Ball test device in a San Diego lab to show the Navy that their configuration could enhance plasma confinement even under incredibly high pressure — pressure levels that could not be achieved by, say, the ITER reactor.
Bussard’s prototype might not have worked. However Bussard was an extremely credible fusion researcher – unlike some rather dodgy characters in the “bubble” fusion field, Bussard really might have made that crucial breakthrough. When you consider the eye watering sums which are wasted on renewables, such as the huge loss sustained by the Federal Government when Solyndra collapsed, it really seems a shame that Bussard never got a chance to take the final step, to realise his dream of seeing his ideas tested in a full scale prototype.
More: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_W._Bussard
Here is a nice intro to the Focus Fusion project by the head scientist of the project. It explains where they’re at, some of the problems they have, and why it’s a particularly interesting approach.
Problems Problems!
It may be that we find desktop fusion somehow or another in the short or longer time frame, but what we know at present isn’t all that great. If one looks at the Sun and the fusion going on there, super high pressures and 10 – 15 million K temperatures, achieving those conditions without having gravity from something the size of the Sun are going to be really difficult. Granted that the sheer force of gravity is far weaker than that of the electrostatic field by around 10^38, but other things are happening such as the trapping of the energy produced. THE kicker though is that even with these conditions, the rate of conversion in the core is around 0.2mW/kg. Put another way, heating up hydrogen to 10million K will mean that the energy produced will be a small fraction of a milliWatt in a kg of material. you’ll need many thousands of kg of hydrogen this hot and dense to have enough power to light a single light bulb. Granted it would run for 10 billion years but to get greater power yields, one has to go to much higher temperatures.
OK, conspiracy theory time.
Bussard’s reactor really did work. The US Government knows all about it, along with most of it’s allies. The entire global warming scam is a huge piece of misdirection designed to keep the public from finding out, because,
a) They’re afraid of the economic chaos the sudden appearance of virtually free energy would entail,
or
b) They’re afraid of the boost that it would give to individual freedom, particularly since a Bussard fusion reactor is something you could keep in your garage,
or,
c) They know that true prosperity would render them utterly irrelevant,
or,
d) All of the above.
Whatever we use to build a controlled nuclear fusion reactor would automatically be useful as a defense against H-bombs.
The personal computer gave us so much freedom and prosperity, now all we need is a personal power unit in every house.
I was very excited when I first heard of the Polywell concept. It made so much more sense than the huge ITER, which even if it breaks even will never be cost effective. I believe our energy future lies with fusion both hot and cold. Hot fusion in the form of the polywell or dense plasma focus will have it’s place along with cold fusion(LENR). I see far too many rejecting these approachs because some so-called expert used the word impossible. Many of these so-called experts have a vested interest in the current centralized control of
our sources of energy. Time for a change!! Be willing to question the word impossible.
Several years ago Analog did a science fact article on Bussard’s work and it amounts to finding a way to construct the magnets in such a way that there were no cracks for the gas being compressed to leak out. The question still remains about how much compression can be achieved but with Bussard’s design there won’t be a pinhole leak.
My friend Tom Ligon wrote that. He was Dr. Bussard’s EE for a few years. I have given him a heads up. But he spends a lot of time in the woods these days so no telling when he will show up.
Guys, consider the following…the predominate “atom” in the universe is HYDROGEN. Or a single proton.
The solar wind is HYDROGEN NUCLEI.
Whence comes all the DEUTERIUM which is what they are fixed on, because H+H+H+H fusion is nigh onto impossible, even at the center (alledged) of the sun.
Could it be, barking up the wrong tree? I.e. the sun is NOT a fusion reactor? Let’s say, at the core, the pressures are great enough..and the conditions that a composite, “super heavy nuclei is formed”. See the work of Walter Grinier on neutron stars and “islands of nuclear stability”.