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Re: Popular Mechanics August Issue - H-bombs and Cold Fusion
My objection to the idea of "cold" fusion has always been based on the law of conservation of energy. I haven.t seen the below argument anywhere, but that doesn.t mean I am the first or only one to propose it:
1. In order to fuse light nuclei, you must get them close together.
2. The nuclei both have a positive charge, so you somehow must overcome the Coulomb force to get them close together.
3. The Coulomb force is a conservative force, meaning that the amount of energy necessary to get the nuclei close enough to fuse is independent of the path you follow to get them there.
4. "Cold" fusion offers no way to input this required energy.
In other words, "cold" fusion appears to me to be a perpetual motion machine of the first kind (it violates the law of conservation of energy), which is impossible.
The two main contenders for commercial fusion power, lasers and inertial (magnetic) confinement, both input large amounts of energy to achieve fusion. If and when one or both of them is commercially successful (as an optimist, I prefer "when"), the energy output from fusion will exceed the energy input. So far, this only occurs in stars and the hydrogen bomb. I predict that it will never occur on a tabletop at room temperature.
Bob Cherry
>
> From: Jeffrey Leavey <leaveyja@us.ibm.com>
> Date: 2004/08/02 Mon AM 10:06:10 EDT
> To: radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu
> Subject: Popular Mechanics August Issue - H-bombs and Cold Fusion
>
>
>
>
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> The August issue of Pop Mechanics has a rather sensationalistic cover
> proclaiming that cold fusion "enables anyone to build a nuke from commonly
> available materials". The article inside, however, spends most of it's
> words mashing several somewhat related topics together: low DOE stockpiles
> of tritium, a process called TCAP for separating H-1 and H-2, a positive
> history of Fleischmann and Pons, and the deaths of two people at SRI from
> exploding experiments and of Gene Mallove, founder of the New Energy
> Foundation and proponent of cold fusion, who died 4 days after the
> interview, apparently from a robbery. The article also says the DOE has
> quietly re-opened cold fusion as a source of H-3 as a backup to TCAP and
> Savannah River; the explanation is a bit lacking in the article.
>
> The article then ends with an overview of U separation processes and
> finally with the statements: "that scores of cold fusion experiments have
> revealed the production of enriched uranium, plutonium and tritium. If, as
> much of this research suggests, cold fusion can be used to produce
> weapons-grade materials...." Can someone please explain how cold fusion
> can enrich U and Pu? The article has no references and sites several
> sources that can't be checked (the Pop Mech web site didn't have any
> additional info or references I could find).
>
> Overall, IMHO, the article portrays cold fusion as a real energy generating
> process that also enriches U and Pu while, as a bonus, making the H-3 you
> need to grow your own H-bomb - right in your very own backyard! Just what
> we need now.....
>
> Thanks,
> Jeff
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> Jeff Leavey, CHP
> leaveyja@us.ibm.com
>
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