FUSION TODAY

  From Worldometer (new deaths yesterday):

        DAY  USA  WORLD   Brazil    India    South Africa

June     9     1093     4732       1185        246        82

July    22     1205     7128        1293      1120       572

Aug    12     1504     6556       1242       835       130

Sept     9      1208    6222        1136      1168        82

Oct     21     1225     6849         571       703         85

Nov    11     1479     10178         564       550        60

           25     2304     12025       620       518       118

           30     1238       8291        317       482        58

Dec       1     2611     11891          697      500       109

             2     2833     12356        669      498        65

             3     2918     12660        776       570        94

             4     2718     12142         674       509      160

             8     2913     11714         796       404      183

Summary:  Another terrible day, and it will get worse.

But one piece of good news is that the Dow Jones Industrials will most probably today again break its all time high.  I guess our Congress must be closer to finding a resolution to the next package of economic relief funds.  Then again, I just checked, and the market is down today.

This is science day, and today I will summarize the ultimate energy process, fusion, used by our Sun and all the stars in the sky, to produce heat and light:

• The core of the Sun is at 27 million degrees Fahrenheit.  At the surface, only 10,000 F.
• While a lot more complicated than this, essentially two parts of hydrogen undergo a series of reactions, producing radiant energy and helium. 

• 
  This sunlight takes 150,000 years to get from the core to the surface, but only a little over eight minutes to travel the 93 million miles to Earth.
• One-billionth of this energy hits our globe, and of that which strikes us, 30% gets reflected back into space.
• Other internal solar reactions (even more arcane) produce an equal amount of energy, so it's more than hydrogen.
• The mass loss is only 0.7% for each reaction, but in the 4.5 billion year lifetime of the Sun, it has lost the mass of Saturn.  The Sun will stop shining in 5 billion years.

About nuclear reactors and weapons, an Atomic Bomb or conventional nuclear reactor uses large molecules like Uranium and Plutonium, which undergo fission, or splitting into other elements, converting a small amount of mass into energy.  A Hydrogen Bomb uses an A-bomb and isotopes of Hydrogen, Deuterium and Tritium.  To simplify the fusion process, we also use Deuterium and Tritium so you won't need so high a temperature/pressure combination in the reactor.

Of course, you are aware that fission power plants are dangerous, for they blow up, like at Chernobyl and Fukushima.  Plus, the waste products, one, can be used for an A-bomb, and second, need to be carefully stored for millions of years.  The half-life is in the order of 100,000 years and more.  For strategic reasons (which was to make A-bombs), we chose this pathway and bypassed Thorium, which would have been much safer.  In that photo is Kirk Sorensen, a friend of mine, who is the world authority on this subject.

The standard joke about fusion energy is that it is 30 years away.  I worked on the laser fusion project at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in the mid-70's.  That was 45 years ago.  At best, commercial fusion is 30 years away.  

The reason why I even dabbled into this field is that just a few years before, I had built a tunable laser for my PhD dissertation to catalyze or sterilize E. coli in a microreactor.  Interestingly enough, this tunability factor also in that follow-up period enabled me to partner with Nobel Laureate Charles Townes on a concept to detect extrasolar planets when I spent some time at the NASA Ames Research Center.  

It took another two decades for the first extraterrestrial planet, 51 Pegasi, to be found, and I just read that Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz subsequently won a Nobel Prize for their achievement.  If NASA had allowed for optical frequencies instead of only focusing in the microwave, we probably would have been able to find that first extrasolar planet and my career would have taken another path.

There are two major pathways to fusion:  intertial confinement (using lasers) and magnetic confinement (the current focus).  The ITER project in southern France is the one major world effort at fusion.  The current five-year phase to produce the first ultra-hot plasma began this spring, the most complex engineering endeavor in history.

• 
  The idea of this project began in in the 1980's.  The first guess on cost was $6 billion in 1998.
• The project itself was initiated in France in 2007 with seven partners:  European Union, China, U.S., India, Japan, South Korea and Russia.
• Success was expected to occur in 2016 for $11 billion.
• Two years ago, the project said the whole thing would eventually cost $22 billion for first ignition in 2035.
• The U.S. Department of Energy thought it would be $65 billion, and just for construction.

• 
  But ITER is just an early stage.  
• Then comes the first fusion reactor, DEMO to produce electricity, expected for operation in the 2040's.  
• The size will be on the order of 2000-4000 MW, with a goal of 25 times the power for breakeven. 
• Electricity demonstration is being planned for 2048.
• COST?
• There will be radioactive wastes, but nowhere near as bad as for fission reactors.
• And yes, there is another stage called PROTO, for beyond DEMO.  Cost?  When?  The thinking is that by then companies and countries will pursue their own commercial ventures 

So if you're waiting for fusion to be the ultimate solution for global warming, don't.  

• The good news, though, is that there should be enough deuterium and tritium to last for millions of years.  
• Further, there are occasional breakthoughs, such as as this one from the Department of Energy.  Don't get too excited about most of them.
• Perhaps laser fusion will make a comeback.
• Or...cold fusion.  I'll have a posting on this subject soon.

Song #19 will come from:

• Hi'ilawe by Gabby Pahinui
• Waipio by my Army basic training platoon

Gabby was born in 1921 as Charles Kahahawai Jr., and hanaied to Philip and Emily Pahinui.  We have a few things in common.  We grew up in Kakaako, where he learned slack-key guitar, and we went to  Pohukaina School, he dropping out in the 5th grade.  Got into entertainment, and his standard wear included gabardine pants.  Hence his name.  He had ten children.  Spent most of his family life in Waimanalo.  Weekend jam sessions there were legendary.  He worked for the City and County of Honolulu road crew alongside Eddie Kamae, and they formed Sons of Hawaii.  They added Sonny Chillingworth and Ry Cooder.  

Passed away in 1980 at the age of 59.  I probably caught his final performance.  At that time I was working in Washington, DC, for Senator Spark Matsunaga, and was beseeched by lobbyists, news reporters and the like.  One person in particular kept pestering me for an appointment with the senator.  I finally gave in, she showed me the first draft of her article, and I was stunned at how poorly it was written.  Then the magazine arrived, and it was perfect.  The lesson I learned was that you need all kinds of people, and her role was to get inside to gain the story.  Someone else would edit the draft.  Found out she lived in New York City and on her offer, spent a night with her for dinner.  Totally platonic.  However, we found ourselves in Honolulu soon thereafter, and her lifelong dream was to see Gabby Pahinui.  That was in 1980.  Otherwise, I would never have seen him perform.

His first recording was Hi'ilawe in 1946, and might well have been the first Hawaiian record in slack-key.  Iz further immortalized him at the opening moments of my song #23 with Kay, this one's for Gaby.  Hi'ilawe Falls as seen from Waipio is to the left.

Even with those stories, I chose Waipio as my song #19.  Why?  The toughest few weeks of my life was in  Army boot camp at Helemano.  Our sergeant insisted that we sing Waipio in Hawaiian, regularly.  Says something about how life conditions can influence your consciousness.  Of course, never recorded our platoon's version.

The song was written in 1923 by Mekia Kealakai and George Allen about the Oahu home of Irene Kahalelaukoa Holloway.  In 1958 Webley Edwards and Leon Pober provided English lyrics and called the song Beyond the Rainbow.

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