Australian Star Scientific Claims To Be Close To Sustainable Muon Catalyzed Fusion

From NextBigFuture.com
 

Scientists have been producing nuclear fusion reactions from muon catalysed fusion for decades – just not consistently, or in sufficient volumes for it to be considered a viable energy source – until now. Star Scientific Limited is perfecting a world-first technique to economically produce pions, and hence muon catalysed fusion, in a CONTROLLED and SUSTAINED way. They are developing a method to efficiently and consistently produce pions (which immediately decay to become muons) in their hundreds and thousands, meaning the loss of some muons is of no consequence.

(H/T Talk Polywell)

Energy input versus output is an issue with plasma fusion, not muon catalysed fusion. Plasma fusion consumes 18 times more energy than it produces. The Star Scientific system requires very little energy to run, which means 99% of the energy liberated by the fusion reaction is available for use.

They are claiming that they have a low energy input pion factory. If 100 times more heat is produced than the energy input, then the heat can be converted to electricity that is 30 times more than the input energy.

* The ONLY fuel Star Scientific Limited’s muon catalysed fusion uses is deuterium – a naturally occurring isotope of hydrogen which is abundantly available in sea water, and can be easily and economically extracted without harming or polluting the remaining water.

* Just one cubic kilometre of deuterium rich ocean contains the energy equivalent of the entire known oil reserves on Earth.

* The only “waste” produced is helium exhaust – a harmless, inert gas which is naturally occurring in the atmosphere and does not accumulate.

* For a power station to produce one gigawatt of power for one year continuously it would need:

– 4.4 million tonnes of black coal or
– 10.8 million tonnes of brown coal or
– 1.3 tonnes of uranium-235 (from 35 tonnes of uranium oxide or 210 tonnes of uranium ore)

This compares to only 150 kilograms of deuterium, extracted from two Olympic-size pools of sea water, to achieve the same output using Star Scientific Limited’s muon catalysed fusion process.

* A Star Scientific Limited designed muon energy generator can be built to virtually any size depending upon the requirement.

* In a conventional nuclear power plant, 75% of construction costs relate to safety precautions. As Star Scientific Limited’s muon catalysed fusion uses no fissionable materials, there is no risk of meltdown, leak or explosion – so power plant construction costs would fall by 75%.

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