Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site utastro.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxl!ihnp4!zehntel!hplabs!hao!seismo!ut-sally!utastro!nather From: nather@utastro.UUCP (Ed Nather) Newsgroups: net.followup,net.politics Subject: Re: alternate, hopefully safe, energy sources Message-ID: <329@utastro.UUCP> Date: Sun, 5-Aug-84 18:20:54 EDT Article-I.D.: utastro.329 Posted: Sun Aug 5 18:20:54 1984 Date-Received: Wed, 8-Aug-84 19:37:35 EDT References: <9368@gatech.UUCP> Organization: UTexas Astronomy Dept., Austin, Texas Lines: 22 [] Fusion power has some serious technical problems -- the main one is that of "containment" -- how to keep things together long enough to extract more energy than it takes to mash them together. Physicists have been working at solving this problem since 1947, and haven't solved it yet; still, there is *one* simple way to do it: gravity containment. Unfortunately there are a few side effects: the reactor has to be *very* large, about the size of the sun. You wouldn't want to have one in your basement. It might be useful, though, located at some safe distance, where all the neutron-induced isotopes are safely contained, and all that reaches you is pure, clean, thermal energy. Recommended distance: about 93 million miles. Of course, all this is just theory ... -- Ed Nather {allegra,ihnp4}!{ut-sally,noao}!utastro!nather Astronomy Dept., U. of Texas, Austin