Part 2 of 2 Parts (Please read Part 1 first)
      The LLNL hydrogen target implodes in a nanosecond which is one billionth of a second. First, the explosion of plasma is driven by the laser beams and then continues to compress on its own inertia. Finally, the plasma expands because of the increasing central pressure of the compression. Bose said, “Getting a self-heated fusion chain reaction to start is called ignition.” Researchers at LLNL reported on their impressive new gains in their efforts on August 8th of this year.
      Rochester’s OMEGA laser facility is smaller and uses a more direct-drive approach to achieve fusion. They do not use a gold can. Instead, the laser beams are aimed directly at the target sphere.
      Bose and his team are pursuing a promising version of inertial confinement. They recently published their research in the journal Physical Review. They have applied extremely powerful magnets to the laser driven implosion. This may allow them to steer fusion reactions in ways that have not yet been explored.
      The innovation of Bose and his team is to use a powerful magnetic field of fifty Tesla to control the charged particles in the plasma. Magnetic resonance imaging uses magnets than can produce a three Tesla field. The magnetic field of the Earth that shields us from the solar wind of charged particles is between twenty-five billionths of a Tesla and sixty-five billionths of a Tesla. Bose said, “You want the nuclei to fuse. The magnetic fields trap the charged particles and make them go around the field lines. That helps create collisions and that helps boost fusion. That’s why adding magnetic fields has benefits for producing fusion energy.”
     Fusion requires very extreme conditions, but Bose and his team have achieved them. The ultimate challenge is to get more energy output than input. The magnetic fields provide the push that can make this approach transformative. The experiments published in the journal Physical Review Letters were accomplished while Bose was doing postdoctoral research at MIT’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center. He continues to collaborate with that laboratory.
      Bose said that he was attracted to the University of Delaware partly because of the focus on plasma physics in the Department of Physics and Astronomy where William Matthaeus, Michael Shay and Ben Maruca. He said, “They do studies and analysis of data coming from the NASA solar program and all its missions. We conduct laboratory astrophysics experiments where these phenomena are scaled down in space and time to the lab. This gives us a means to unravel some of the intricate physics questions posed by NASA missions.”
     Students are an important part of Bose’s work. Their careers can see great advancement in this new field of study. Bose said, “It is a fascinating part of science and students are a very important part of workforce development for the national labs. Students experienced in this science and technology often end up as scientists and researchers at the national labs. We won’t have a solution tomorrow. But what we’re doing is contributing to a solution for clean energy.”

Is NY Suddenly More Scared of Nuclear Attack? ‘Fallout Shelter Near Me’ Searches Boom nbcnewyork.com

Construction of Egypt’s first nuclear power plant under way world-nuclear-news.org

IAEA Nuclear Security Training and Demonstration Centre Nears Completion iaea.org

Equipment installation under way at Russian ISL project world-nuclear-news.org

 

Ambient office = 100 nanosieverts per hour

Ambient outside = 131 nanosieverts per hour

Soil exposed to rain water = 129 nanosieverts per hour

Carrot from Central Market = 82 nanosieverts per hour

Tap water = 106 nanosieverts per hour

Filter water = 84 nanosieverts per hour

Part 1 of 2 Parts
      I post about nuclear fusion although it is not yet a source of energy for our civilization. It holds the promise of being cheaper, safer and smaller than the huge nuclear fission power plants in operation. There are multiple design approaches to the creation of a fusion reactor and many laboratories exploring and developing prototypes. It used to be a running joke that nuclear fusion is always forty years away. Given all the effort and money being put into fusion, that joke may have to be retired.
     Some companies hope to have a prototype of a commercial fusion reactor in five years. That may be overly optimistic, but I believe fusion power will be available soon. Two main approaches to nuclear fusion are the use of extreme magnetic fields to confine and heat a plasma and the use of powerful lasers to blast a pellet of fuel. Today’s post will be about a new approach that employs both lasers and power magnets.
     The main goal of fusion research is to be able to construct a reactor which can generate more energy than it consumes. Researchers have used intense lasers and millimeter pellets of hydrogen fuel to create extreme conditions like those that exist in the core of the Sun. This approach is referred to as “inertial confinement.” This is exceedingly difficult because it requires high-precision experiments at extreme conditions. However, researchers have made major advances in the science and technology required to produce controlled fusion in the laboratory in recent decades.
     Arijit Bose is a fusion researcher at the University of Delaware. He is an assistant professor in the University’s Department of Physics and Astronomy who started his fusion research during graduate school at the University of Rochester. After a tour of the Laboratory for Laser Energetics at Rochester where lasers are used to implode spherical capsules of hydrogen isotopes to create plasmas, he decided to devote his research to fusion. He said, “Fusion is what powers everything on Earth. To have a miniature sun on Earth—a millimeter-sized sun—that’s where the fusion reaction would happen. And that blew my mind.”
     Inertial confinement research started at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) in the Seventies. LLNL now hosts the biggest laser system in the world. It is the size of three football fields. An indirect approach is used for their fusion research. First, lasers are fired into a small four inch sized can made of gold. The laser beams hit the inner surface of the can and produce X-rays. These X-rays bombard the real target which is a tiny sphere made of frozen deuterium and tritium which are isotopes of hydrogen containing neutrons. The X-rays heat the capsule of hydrogen to temperatures that are close to the those found in the core of the Sun. Bose said that “Nothing can survive that. Electrons are stripped from the atoms and the ions are moving so fast that they collide and fuse.”
Please read Part 2 next

California proposes to extend life of last nuclear plant at cost of $1.4 billion politico.com

Global nuclear industry states its support of the NPT world-nuclear-news.org

Niger government increases stake in Dasa uranium project world-nuclear-news.org

Covra seeks permit change for new waste storage facility world-nuclear-news.org

Ambient office = 72 nanosieverts per hour

Ambient outside = 94 nanosieverts per hour

Soil exposed to rain water = 95 nanosieverts per hour

Blueberry from Central Market = 126 nanosieverts per hour

Tap water = 100 nanosieverts per hour

Filter water = 77 nanosieverts per hour

Part 2 of 2 Parts (Please read Part 1 first)
     Some analysts have been quick to point out that nuclear plants such as Zaporizhzhia are designed to withstand terrorist attacks and natural disasters.
      Several Western and Ukrainian officials believe that Russia has chosen to use the giant nuclear facility as a fortress to protect their troops and stage attacks. They understand that Ukraine will not risk retaliation that could lead to a crisis.
     Antony Blinken is the U.S. Secretary of State. On Monday, he accused Russia of using the plant to shield its forces. Ukraine has warned that the shelling at the plant could be disastrous. The Ukrainian foreign ministry said on Friday that “The possible consequences of hitting an operating reactor are equivalent to the use of an atomic bomb.”
     The United Kingdom (UK) has stated that the actions at the plant have undermined the safety of the plant’s operation. Britain’s ministry of defense issued an intelligence update on Friday. They said, “Russian forces have probably used the wider facility area, in particular the adjacent city of Enerhodar, to rest their forces, utilizing the protected status of the nuclear power plant to reduce the risk to their equipment and personnel from overnight Ukrainian attacks.”
      Dmytro Orlov is the Ukrainian mayor of Enerhodar. He said in late July that Russian forces had been observed using heavy weaponry near the plant because “they know very well that the Ukrainian Armed Forces will not respond to these attacks, as they can damage the nuclear power plant.”
     Dmitry Medvedev is the deputy head of the Russian security council and a close advisor of Russian president Putin. He told the President that the West wants to “destroy Russia”. According to local media reports, he has portrayed the West as acting in an “extremely aggressive” geopolitical assault of Russia. He added that “This is the root cause of the aggressive Russo phobic geopolitical process initiated by the West. “As in the case of Georgia, the Americans deliberately strengthened the feeling of impunity in Kyiv, pumped him with weapons, encouraged the killing of civilians in Donbas. And now they continue to exercise with Ukraine, the fate of which they absolutely do not care. The goal is the same – to destroy Russia.”
     Medvedev claims came as a Russian opposition source said that warmonger President Putin has not abandoned “the options for using nuclear weapons in the war with Ukraine.
     The Putin supporting General SVR Telegram TV channel also claimed that President Putin has “given direct orders to prepare such options.” They went on to say that “Putin usually gives orders to prepare several options for the implementation of a number of decisions. And after preparing all the options, he chooses the one that he likes best, immediately before the implementation of this plan. One of the scenarios for the development of the conflict is being actively prepared, when Putin will be able to realize the possibility of using tactical nuclear weapons. The recent shelling by Russian troops of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant occupied by them in Enerhodar is part of the implementation of this scenario. When this plan is implemented, part of the facilities at the station will be blown up and the power unit damaged, while Putin will speak accusing the leadership of Ukraine of nuclear terrorism, blaming Ukraine for the explosions and equating ‘nuclear terrorism’ with the use of nuclear weapons by Ukraine, giving the order to use tactical nuclear weapons as a ‘response’ measure.”

Seabrook nuclear plant ends probe on ‘human error’ false alarm seacoastonline.com

Cooperative effort sees Japanese HEU transfer completed world-nuclear-news.org

Trump denies report that FBI sought nuclear documents during Mar-a-Lago nbcnews.com

Ohio Lt. Gov. pushed for even larger nuclear bailout energynews.us

 

 

 

Trump denies report that FBI sought nuclear documents during Mar-a-Lago search

 

Ambient office = 84 nanosieverts per hour

Ambient outside = 104 nanosieverts per hour

Soil exposed to rain water = 105 nanosieverts per hour

Avocado from Central Market = 89 nanosieverts per hour

Tap water = 100 nanosieverts per hour

Filter water = 87 nanosieverts per hour

Part 1 of 2 Parts
     For months, the world has been concerned that fighting around the huge Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in southern Ukraine poses a risk for all of Europe. Earlier this week, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), a global nuclear watchdog, said that the situation was getting worse.
     Last Friday, there were explosions at the Zaporizhzhia plant spurring fears of a nuclear disaster. Russia and Ukraine have blamed each other for the shelling of the plant which was seized by Russian forces early in March. Ukraine president Zelensky called the attacks a “brazen crime” and an “act of terror”. He added that “Today, the occupiers created another extremely risky situation for everyone in Europe.
     The Russian Ministry of Defense denied the Ukraine claim. They said that Ukraine had carried out three artillery strikes on the plant. The Ministry also said that the generating capacity of one reactor at the plant had been reduced and the power being supplied to another reactor had been cut off.
     The Ukrainian state-run nuclear power operator, Energoatom, accused Russian forces of hitting the Zaporizhzhia plant and using the nuclear plant as a staging ground for attacking nearby targets which include many in the occupied city of Enerhodar and the nearby city of Nikopol.
     When fierce fighting first broke out near the nuclear power plant in the early days of the Ukrainian war, it triggered fears of a nuclear disaster and prompted condemnations from the international community.
     Russian troops forced the managers of the plant to work at gun point. A week after the Russian occupation, Kremlin sent officials and technicians from Russia’s state nuclear agency to assist with repairs and manage the facility. Ukrainian and Russian staff have been working with each other ever since. Communication with the outside world have been intermittent.
      Energoatom said last Friday that the Russian shelling had hit in and around the nuclear plant and had damaged a water intake which cut off power and water to much of the city of Enerhodar. The Ukrainian agency said, “Three hits were recorded directly at the site of the station,” one of which was “near one of the power units where the nuclear reactor is located.”
     International media companies were unable to verify damage claims at the plant which covers a large site. Much of the recent Russian artillery fire in that area has originated from near the plant. It is unclear if parts of the nuclear plant were hit accidentally. Energoatom said on Saturday that the plant was operational. They also said that the Ukrainian staff at the plant continued to work to ensure radiation safety. Ukrainian prosecutors have started an investigation into the incident. It has been claimed that the explosions happened within seconds of Russian artillery being fired.
     The exact danger posed by the explosions in and around the Zaporizhzhia plant are unclear. Rafael Grossi is the head of the IAEA. He said in an interview last Tuesday, that the situation at the plant was “completely out of control”. He added that “Every principle of nuclear safety has been violated. What is at stake is extremely serious and extremely grave and dangerous.”
Please read Part 2 next