Posted on 10/16/2014 7:37:27 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Lockheed Martin has announced that their celebrated engineers in their hi tech Skunk Works technology shop have created a design for a small fusion reactor that could fit in the back of a large truck. The breakthrough could mean that clean, nearly unlimited energy might be just over the horizon.
The discovery could virtually reinvent the world in the same way that the telephone, the jet engine, and the silicon chip have done over the years.
Or not. They don't expect to have a working commercial reactor for a decade and there's no guarantee of success. Still, the Skunk Works has a track record of innovation that is the envy of the world and some of the smartest people on the planet work there.
Lockheed Martin Corp said on Wednesday it had made a technological breakthrough in developing a power source based on nuclear fusion, and the first reactors, small enough to fit on the back of a truck, could be ready for use in a decade.
Tom McGuire, who heads the project, said he and a small team had been working on fusion energy at Lockheed's secretive Skunk Works for about four years, but were now going public to find potential partners in industry and government for their work.
Initial work demonstrated the feasibility of building a 100-megawatt reactor measuring seven feet by 10 feet, which could fit on the back of a large truck, and is about 10 times smaller than current reactors, McGuire told reporters.
In a statement, the company, the Pentagon's largest supplier, said it would build and test a compact fusion reactor in less than a year, and build a prototype in five years.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
I think pretty high odds on disruptive but not soon. This will be done. It is not impossible.
I wrote this early this morning and this Lockheed technology or something like it was part of the information.
I sincerely hope I am overreacting to the Ebola outbreak but I fear I am not since this government does not inspire me with confidence. I pray my fears are hopelessly unfounded and irrational. In cases of significant risk I have been taught to hope for the best but prepare for the worst as best you can. I do not see this in action.
For oil in the short term I do expect that overproduction will combine with falling consumption and global economic decay. In our present circumstances the decay could become a disaster. We have seen overproduction before but not so technologically driven as it is now. As operators rationalize the events and deal with obligatory drilling with the expectation of future recovery work will taper off progressively in the next year.
The overproduction of the 80s was largely driven by enhanced production. Drilling gains were small and inefficient and not new technology driven. The current gains are from disruptive sources and technologies that have not even begun to be fully implemented. The production / consumption imbalance will probably take a long long time to work out, much like the gas bubble that has really not ever gone away. The gas bubble was saved in part by cogen demands and will continue to be propped up by loss of coal generation capacity but this too will be dampened by economic decline for some time.
A global economic decay will not be permanent. When the oil field starves all others generally get fat. I expect a period of economic distress will last up to three years or so if there is no global disaster. There will be no recovery inspiring actions by this administration.
Long term does not concern us much in the present circumstance, however there are disruptive technologies coming and some already here only to be moved forward by uptake.
1. LEDs instead of CFLs have the real and present potential to reduce global electricity consumption by 18%. That alone is huge. Prices for LEDs are falling rapidly.
2. Lockheed just announced break through in self-contained, single truck transportable, low maintenance, terrorist resistant light reactors. http://aviationweek.com/technology/skunk-works-reveals-compact-fusion-reactor-details
3. This company is very close to commercialization of a ultra efficient diesel engine that meets all emission requirements. http://www.achatespower.com/two-stroke-diesel-engine.php
Oil will not go away but will probably become increasingly less significant but probably not before our lives are over.
As for Ebola: This is as unemotional, factual, non-hype resource on the subject that I have found.
http://www.sciencemag.org/site/extra/ebola/
If the world were to suffer an economic collapse. A viable fusion reactor, if and when it is ready, would probably be the one thing that might pull us from recovery into boom.
Thanks America, your free enterprise just transformed human civilization.
Unlimited energy will now be allowed by several groups. Governments will lose control of many sectors. Environmentalists will attack it to stop people from having freedom of movement. I suppose some small wars would be fought relating to and with unlimited energy.
Or not. They don’t expect to have a working commercial reactor for a decade ...
...
Ten years seems to be the magical number for scammers.
I agree. Like solar power, fusion always seems to be 10 years away. I wonder how much tax money they want to continue their development?
“..... reinvent the world in the same way that the telephone, the jet engine, and the silicon chip have done over the years.” I can’t believe that they left out clipboards on the list. Hmmmm. As an LM retiree, would I get a discount on one of them there fusion reactors? :>}
Environmentalists will attack it to stop people from having freedom of movement.
I’m going to put a finer point on this. Fascists will attack it using the excuse/cover of environmentalism.
Fascists know that a people with affordable abundant energy is a people that isn’t easy to control.
5 years for scammers. Ten years for dreamers.
The location of power generation has always been dictated by geography - proximity to rivers for hydros, close to population and transportation centers for coal, close to bodies of water for cooling (nukes), and in the best wind resource areas. This concentration of assets creates vulnerability and incurs high added costs for transmission lines - there are many advantages to distributed generation. Today the best example are natural gas peaker plants, but these comprise a small fraction of total generation. The LM development (or something like it) holds the potential of not only new sources of generation but the ability to completey change how generation has always been done. Thorium reactors and cold fusion LENR also hold this potential, but the LM brand carries high credibility.
10 years does sound familiar.
A university researcher I know sold his advanced battery technology he developed to GM for 3 million dollars. It was supposed to triple capacity of storage batteries above the best lead/acid technology, and be rechargeable in a fraction of the time required for anything on the market. The batteries were also lighter in weight than current available batteries.
It was going to revolutionize the battery industry and make electric cars cheaper than gasoline powered cars. Gm said they would have consumer versions available in about 10 years. This was in 1982.
At least the check cleared the bank.
IIRC when GM had the electric car in the early 90s they bought a battery company and subsequently sold it to Mobil oil. This just after they cancelled all of the car leases and picked up the cars.
What are the odds of new nuke plants in the next 10 years or so?
The only problem is with Obama, he would turn it on the Tea Party and invite ISIS in the WH for Ramadan.
Don’t bet against the skunk works operations.
I think you meant to write “not” in your first sentence. A nickname for this could be “Tuckering the tech”.
why it’ll be too cheap to meter....where have we heard this before?
deja vu all over again
Just a wild guess, but -— No big deal!
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