french win bid for ITER, what do you think? Options

[*kryogenix*]

The site for the international fusion reactor will be in France.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8385911/
http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/europe/06/28...reut/index.html
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?t...storyID=8913865

Your thoughts?

I'm a bit disappointed. I wanted Japan to build the reactor solely because I like Japan's mentality better (smaller, cheaper, better).

Plus, they said that if they didn't get their way, they would act unilaterally and design their own fusion reactor. I hate how they complained when the US acted unilaterally, but when they don't want to play with the other contries, it's ok.

[sadolakced acid]

sure, let's put itn in japan where it can hurt people and cars when it blows up.

better to put it in france, you know. less people would get killed.

[*mipadi*]

sure, let's put itn in japan where it can hurt people and cars when it blows up.

better to put it in france, you know.  less people would get killed.

Fusion reactors don't have the sort of safety issues associated with fission reactors like Chernobyl or Three Mile Island.

[*kryogenix*]

sure, let's put itn in japan where it can hurt people and cars when it blows up.

better to put it in france, you know.  less people would get killed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusion_power#...onmental_issues

Safety and environmental issues

Accident potential

The likelihood of a catastrophic accident in a fusion reactor in which injury or loss of life occurs is much smaller than that of a fission reactor. The primary reason is that the fuel contained in the reaction chamber is only enough to sustain the reaction for about a minute, whereas a fission reactor contains about a year's supply of fuel.

Effluents during normal operation

The natural product of the fusion reaction is a small amount of helium, which is completely harmless to life and does not contribute to global warming. Of more concern is tritium, which, like other isotopes of hydrogen, is difficult to retain completely. During normal operation, some amount of tritium will be continually released. There would be no acute danger, but the cumulative effect on the world's population from a fusion economy could be a matter of concern. The 12 year half-life of tritium would at least prevent unlimited build-up and long-term contamination.
[edit]

Waste management

The large flux of high-energy neutrons in a reactor will make the structural materials radioactive. The radioactive inventory at shut-down may be comparable to that of a fission reactor, but there are important differences. The half-life of the radioisotopes produced by fusion tend to be less than those from fission, so that the inventory decreases more rapidly. Furthermore, there are fewer different species, and they tend to be non-volatile and biologically less active. As opposed to nuclear fission, where there is hardly any possibility to influence the spectrum of fission products, the problems can be further reduced by careful choice of the materials used. "Low activation" materials like vanadium, for example, would become much less radioactive than stainless steel. Such materials would have half-lives of tens of years, rather than the thousands of years for radioactive waste produced from fission. This involves the design of new alloys with unusual chemical compositions; a complex process as the chemical composition also affects the materials' mechanical properties.

Nuclear proliferation

Although fusion power uses nuclear technology, the overlap with nuclear weapons technology is small. Tritium is a component of the trigger of hydrogen bombs, but not a major problem in production. The copious neutrons from a fusion reactor could be used to breed plutonium for an atomic bomb, but not without extensive redesign of the reactor, so that clandestine production would be easy to detect. The theoretical and computational tools needed for hydrogen bomb design are closely related to those needed for inertial confinement fusion, but have very little in common with (the more promising) magnetic confinement fusion.

As you can see, fusion is very much different from fission, and fusion is safer than fission.

[sadolakced acid]

The error returned was:

Flood control is enabled on this board, please wait 30 seconds before replying or posting a new topic

^ every time i get flood control i'm posting it.


ehhh. i know about fusion.

the problems with fusion reactors is that the magnetic field isn't uniform. every time they make a fusion reactor, there is a break. this reactor is large enough that a break would probably kill anyone in the close vicinity (let's say 50 ft). sure it's not actually harming the population, but with a device that has a history of spewing million degree ions out and killing a few people (and we're just making it bigger this time!), i'd feel safer if it were farther from populated areas.

kryo, your first part of the quote says that the fuel isn't enough for larger accidents. but this reactor is going to be larger than the previous ones.

[*kryogenix*]

^ every time i get flood control i'm posting it.
ehhh.  i know about fusion.

the problems with fusion reactors is that the magnetic field isn't uniform.  every time they make a fusion reactor, there is a break.  this reactor is large enough that a break would probably kill anyone in the close vicinity (let's say 50 ft).  sure it's not actually harming the population, but with a device that has a history of spewing million degree ions out and killing a few people (and we're just making it bigger this time!), i'd feel safer if it were farther from populated areas. 

kryo, your first part of the quote says that the fuel isn't enough for larger accidents.  but this reactor is going to be larger than the previous ones.

if the french want to be safe, they'd wouldn't build fission plants. something like 80% of their energy is produced by fission plants. and they're building more and more and more of them.

[*mipadi*]

the problems with fusion reactors is that the magnetic field isn't uniform.  every time they make a fusion reactor, there is a break.  this reactor is large enough that a break would probably kill anyone in the close vicinity (let's say 50 ft).  sure it's not actually harming the population, but with a device that has a history of spewing million degree ions out and killing a few people (and we're just making it bigger this time!), i'd feel safer if it were farther from populated areas. 

kryo, your first part of the quote says that the fuel isn't enough for larger accidents.  but this reactor is going to be larger than the previous ones.

Do you have any sources to support this claim?

[DizBukHahNi]

Can we trust the french with this sorta stuff? I doubt it, remember that one time they sold nuclear material to Saddam?

[sadolakced acid]

ehh. history.

can't find it online, but everytime they make a new reactor, it takes some time for them to get the magnetic field right, and there are minor breaks.

i'd think it doesn't kill anypeople anymore because of saftey precautions now...

and it's not really a big threat.

oh well

[*mipadi*]

Can we trust the french with this sorta stuff? I doubt it, remember that one time they sold nuclear material to Saddam?

Um...the ITER isn't designed to be a breeder for material used in nuclear weapons. Just because something is nuclear, doesn't mean it can automatically be used to make weapons-grade nuclear material.