Welcome to an extraordinary episode of our podcast,
where we're privileged to engage with Dr. Gerald
Kosinski, a beacon of innovation in the field
of fusion energy, with over 15 years dedicated
to the advancement of aneutronic fusion energy,
particularly helium -3. Dr. Kulcinski stands
at the forefront of a movement that could reshape
our entire energy paradigm. Dr. Kulcinski's journey
through the landscape of nuclear engineering
has been nothing short of remarkable. Holding
the esteemed position of Greener Professor of
Nuclear Engineering, Emeritus, and having directed
the Fusion Technology Institute, he has laid
foundational stones in the bridge toward sustainable
energy. His extensive career, decorated with
prestigious accolades such as his election to
the National Academy of Engineering and recognition
by NASA, underlines the critical role he has
played in pushing the boundaries of what's possible.
In today's conversation, we dive into the transformative
potential of helium -3 in neutronic fusion energy.
Dr. Kulsinski shares his visionary insights from
the early challenges of fusion research to the
modern -day feats that inches closer to a cleaner,
more efficient energy future. We explore the
innovative strategies and collaborative efforts
that have marked the evolution of this field.
But in the highlight of our discussion and indeed
the topic of monumental significance is the ambitious
goal of bringing helium -3 down from the moon
to enable large -scale fusion energy commercialization.
This audacious plan isn't just about sourcing
fuel. It's about unlocking a realm of possibilities
for energy production that could lead to unprecedented
levels of sustainability and efficiency. In an
era where the creators of destructive technologies
are often immortalized in Oscar -winning films,
despite later remorse, true heroes like Dr. Kulsinski
walk among us. Dr. Kosinski has devoted his exceptional
talent and energy, not to the instruments of
conflict, but to the pursuit of peace and sustainability
when presented with the same choices. Join us
as we delve into the mechanics of fusion energy,
the international collaboration shaping its future,
and the bold steps being taken towards harvesting
extraterrestrial resources. Dr. Kosinski enlightens
us on the technical and logistical challenges
involved in lunar mining, the potential applications
of helium -3 beyond just energy production, including
medical and industrial uses, and the broader
implications of all of this for humanity's future.
prepared to be inspired, informed, and invigorated
by a conversation that spans the gamut from atomic
particles to lunar landscapes and from current
realities to future possibilities. Here's Dr.
Gerald Kolsinski. Dr. Kolsinski, thank you so
much for doing this. We have a lot of people
asking questions and stories about fusion energy
and the history of fusion energy and where we
think fusion energy is going. So any insight
you can give us, we're very grateful. What inspired
you to start your career in nuclear engineering?
Well, I got my degrees in master's and PhD in
nuclear engineering, so that was a pretty easy
step. I worked a little bit, of course, as you
know, at Los Alamos on nuclear rockets. But when
I went to Hanford, which is a facility in the
state of Washington, I was working more with
the production of plutonium for nuclear weapons
and other needs. And we worked a lot with the
Hanford nuclear reactors, which were built during
World War II. As you know, that's where the plutonium
was made to be used in the bombs that they used
in World War II at the end, of course. They got
to a point when we started to think about fusion
in the late 1960s. We could make plutonium a
lot faster with fusion neutrons than we could
with fission neutrons. And I won't get into the
details of that. But we were very seriously thinking
about replacing the three or four operating units
at Hanford fission units with fusion units so
we could produce plutonium faster. but using
fusion to do that. And the key, of course, was
using 14 -MAV neutrons. So that's what got us
into the fusion side of the house. I left Hanford
in 1971, I think it was, yeah, 71. When I came
to the University of Wisconsin, I was in charge
of the Fusion Technology Institute, which is
different than the fusion physics side. The physics
side is where most of the effort had been, both
in the United States and at that time Russia
was the lead organization along with the United
States. So we had some very close relationships
with the Russians. And when I got to Wisconsin,
we started to look at the engineering side of
fusion reactors, not the physics. We're assuming
the physics would work. And then we had to translate
that into an engineering system that was both
reliable and made economic sense. And that engineering
system was that tokamak based? Well, at that
time it was. As you know, the fusion community
has gone through several configurations. Stellarators,
which was one of the early approaches from Princeton
and then Los Alamos did a lot of work in linear
systems and pulse systems. Los Livermore did
a lot of work in inertial confinement fusion,
but of course that was more weapons related because
that's how a nuclear weapon would work. So we
had a lot of projects that we actually ended
up designing or were partners in the design of
over 50 nuclear fusion power plants when I came
to Wisconsin. That effort in nuclear fusion engineering
has sort of gone by the wayside now and most
of the effort is still put into the plasma physics
side of the house. But you're never going to
make a system that's economical without having
an engineering that works. The physics is one
thing, but the engineering is where you make
your money. That's definitely the big frontier
now. I feel like more and more people recognize
that. When we talk about fusion energy commercialization,
a lot of the conversation is around materials
and engineering. I think we need to figure those
two things out. How did you even hear about nuclear
engineering? Did you know about it when you were
14? Did your parents tell you? No, actually I
found out about it when I was a chemical engineer
at the University of Wisconsin as an undergraduate.
And we built a fission system. in the confines
of the engineering campus in the early 1960s.
And so that's how I got into the nuclear side
of the house, but my undergraduate training was
in chemical engineering. And we have a very strong
program in Wisconsin at that time. So it was
an easy transfer from the chemical engineering
to nuclear. I think I was the second person to
graduate from the nuclear engineering program,
advanced degrees. So I got in on the ground floor,
you might say. Is nuclear energy, when we talk
about the nuclear rocket program, is that for...
ignition or thrust or sustainable like what what
at what stage of the rocket would something like
that be used is it fusion or fission sorry well
the the nuclear rockets originally were fission
and what they did was take liquid hydrogen which
is down around a few degrees Kelvin, pass it
through a graphite core that had uranium or plutonium
in it, and it would heat it up to about 2000
degrees Kelvin. And the exhaust from the rocket
would push the rocket much faster than you could
push it with chemical. approaches in rocketry.
And they were trying to cut down the time it
would take to get from the Earth to Mars. And
the fusion systems at that time would probably
get you to Mars two or three times faster than
chemical systems would. Can we build fusion generators
now for this? And would they be clean? Like how
do you harness the radiation from such a reaction?
Well, it depends on how you design it, obviously.
The original design was never really put into
operation. We actually ran reactors in the Nevada
desert to go to Mars and back, but we never actually
did it, of course. with a nuclear rocket. We
were using chemical rockets at the time. Now,
if you want to do it by converting fusion energy
to electricity and then using the electricity
to exhaust the propellant, that's another way
of getting to someplace faster than you can with
chemical systems. So, nuclear was really meant
in that regard to replace chemical rockets. But,
of course, nowadays we've got the chemical rockets
that get us to the moon and back, and some programs
that get us to Mars and back, but not much more
than that. I'd love to know the story of ITER.
You hear things about how during the Cold War,
there was a full -blown communications breakdown
between us and the Russians. They decided that
in order to keep the relationship, the doors
open for communication, they would work on just
one project together, and that was the ITER project.
And I know that you were there on day one. What
did that look like? What were those conversations
like? Well, there are two tracks here. One track
is the scientist to scientist, and that worked
out pretty well. The political side is a little
beyond my pay grade, so I'm not sure I would
be a good person to give you that side. But the
scientific side, we worked very close with the
Russians. Now, the Russians had a very strong
program at that time. They don't now. They've
slipped to third or fourth in the world. But
they were up near the top, and they declassified
their work and fusion. very early in the game,
they were the ones obviously that invented the
tokamak. And the tokamak actually was the survivor
of a bunch of different designs that we had worked
on in the United States. And then we could talk
in a lot of detail with the Russians and good
friendships with the Russians. And I traveled
to Russia several times. We had some Russians
that came to Wisconsin, and we were working on
the same programs. We don't anymore. That's all
gone by the road now. But in those days, well,
actually probably in the 1970s is where it really,
really flowered a lot. 70s and 80s. And that
was the beginning of ITER. Now, that turned into
a political thing because the collaboration between
the United States and Russia was very good. And
that was a good way to have good relations with
someone who we were antagonistic at times with.
So we worked together and the site that we worked
at was Vienna. And it was under the auspices
of the United Nations. And that's in the 70s
was where we had meetings with the Russians.
The Russians, Europeans, Japanese, and the United
States were the four. uh, people, uh, groups
that worked on the, uh, uh, initial design of
either it was called in tour was, was the name,
but it evolved into a eater later on. Nice. I
like in tour. It sounds like a robot. Um, When
you say we don't anymore, the U .S. and Russia
are still part of the 35 or 36 -eater countries.
We just don't actively do projects anymore together,
is what you mean. Yeah, the transfer of information
is not anywhere close to what it was in the 70s
when we were... really serious about building
ITER. We were going to build ITER by the turn
of the century. And Intor was the first design.
There were 16 people who spent, oh, I guess we
spent a month or two together in Vienna designing
the system. Made a lot of progress. Made a lot
of friends. And the scientific transfer in those
days was very good. Now it's not so good. It
was very good then. Wow. Was that before or after
you were the director of the Fusion Energy Technology
Institute? It was coincident at the same time.
Because when I moved from Hanford, I moved out
of the fission side of the house to the fusion
side of the house. And we had one of the strongest
programs, if not the strongest in the world,
in fusion engineering. We also had physics, a
lot of physics people who worked on fusion, but
the engineering side was really put into play
in the 70s and 80s. Would you say in terms of
physics for fusion energy all of the key components
have been proved out? So is it really just a
matter of engineering now or are there any outstanding
physics? How would you say that? Meaning, are
there anything that have remained theories and
not been proved out? Like, I know that we haven't
had a sustained plasma field for a long period
of time, but is there anything in the baseline
physics itself that stops you from doing that?
Or it's just possible if you throw more at it?
Well, it depends on what you use for fuel. The
original physics work on fusion was done with
deuterium and tritium. And that stems all the
way back to World War II because a lot of that
came out of that program. We didn't design systems
in World War II for making electricity. We were
designing things to end the war. So the biggest
difference there is the energy of the neutrons.
Now, we know a lot about radiation damage from
low energy neutrons, the lowest million electron
volts. When you get to fusion, the neutrons are
in the 14 MeV million electron volts. And the
reaction with the neutrons and the metallic structures
of the power plants is quite different than it
is in fission. It's not just a factor of seven
or eight, which would be 14 over two MAV. There's
a major difference in the physics of what goes
on with a 14 MAV neutron than what goes on with
a fission neutron. And the biggest difference
is with 14 MAV neutrons, you produce a lot of
N alpha reactions. That means neutron. helium
atom reactions. And helium is a bad actor in
this sense because it goes to the grain boundaries
and makes the material very, very brittle. You
get a lot more helium production in a fusion
reactor with DT than you do with a fission reactor
using uranium or plutonium. And that's the biggest
difference. And we have not solved that problem.
We thought we were going to solve it early if
we had built some test reactors. We never did
build them. And so that's still an uncharted
area. We know that there's going to be a real
problem with deuterium and tritium, but people
are, most of the money. and the investment is
going into the plasma physics side of the house.
And that determines whether you end up with a
toroidal system or a linear system or a pulse
system or versus steady state and so forth. So
99 % or so of the money that's invested in fusion
is invested in the physics side of the house.
And they're not haven't solved those problems
are getting close. getting close, but once they
solve those problems, they still have to get
over the engineering hurdle. And that really,
if they use deuterium, tritium is going to be
a big hurdle because what we know about the reaction
of 14 MeV neutrons versus two and a half MeV
neutrons is there's a big difference in the lifetime.
of metallic structures that get bombarded. Now
that also gives you radioactivity, but that's
not the biggest problem. The biggest problem
is keeping the material so it doesn't become
brittle. And 14 MAV neutrons are a bad actor
with respect to that. I was talking to somebody
on the Eater podcast or Eater communications
team yesterday and they wanted to know my thoughts.
thoughts on e -neutronic fusion fuels. And I
think one of the things that we've talked about
and we vehemently agreed on it was that for fusion
to be commercially viable, meaning if you're
going to build 1 ,000 generators over the next
50 years or so, it would have to be e -neutronic.
There's just no other way to go about it. So
do you think some of these challenges, definitely
the engineering, but then is the physics challenge
also something we have an answer for with a -neutronic
fuels? I know that a -neutronic fuels automatically
make the engineering aspects easier. Well, that's
true, but it's also harder. to make the reactions
take place. If you go from DT, deuterium tritium,
to say D helium -3, it's three times harder to
make that reaction go. And it might even require
a different configuration than a tokamak toroidal
system. But right now, that's one of the biggest
things. The pot of gold at the end of the rainbow
is the helium -3 -helium -3 reaction, which has
no neutrons. And that's the program that we were
enthusiastic about once we discovered, or we,
not we, but the Apollo program discovered the
million metric tons of helium -3 sitting on the
moon. Prior to that, people knew about the reaction
of deuterium, helium -3, but the answer always
was, well, you're not going to do anything with
a few tens of kilograms. And the real breakthrough
came through in 1986 when we put two and two
together between the Apollo program and the fusion
program. And that story is a very interesting
one. We had... In that time period, President
Reagan had a program called the SDI program.
They were going to try to shoot down missiles
carrying nuclear weapons with a X -ray laser,
and they needed power for the X -ray laser. And
we designed for the Air Force a 30 megawatt system
electric. that used D helium -3. And we had enough
helium -3 to do that because a war would only
last perhaps a few hours or a few days, but not
enough helium -3 for the production of electricity.
And so after we designed it for the Air Force,
we said, well, It's not our job to do the military
side. It's our job to try to help society, ours
meaning the University of Wisconsin. And so I
took the group off campus for about two weeks.
We went to a motel outside of Madison and we
tried to figure out where we could get enough
helium -3 to use helium -3. as a fusion fuel.
And we spent a week to two weeks going down a
lot of blind alleys until two of our people came
up with the idea that, well, the sun makes a
lot of helium -3. And where does it go? Well,
any place the solar wind would blow on our solar
system. would be affected if the body that they
were transported into either had a magnetic field
or an atmosphere, because a magnetic field would
cause the helium -3 to be moved outside the planet.
And the systems would be... with a gas environment,
couldn't penetrate that. So people would always
say, well, helium -3 is interesting, and you
don't make as many neutrons, or if you go to
helium -3, helium -3, you make none. But there's
not enough helium -3 to make any difference.
And because helium -3 comes from the decay of
tritium, and tritium is basically man -made,
as you know. So that was really how we got the
tie in between the lunar Helium -3 reserves,
which are about a million metric tons of Helium
-3, well documented from the Apollo and the Russian
programs. And now the Chinese are moving very
fast in that area. They've landed in the high
Helium -3 concentrations on the moon. They don't
advertise it very much, but we're in a race with
the Chinese. Right. It's become quite the global
thing. I was reading a story I think like yesterday
where they discovered rust on the moon. And in
order for that kind of oxidation, there needed
to be oxygen and there's obviously no oxygen.
So apparently they found out that every time
there's a lineup where the Earth is right between
the Sun and the Moon. The solar radiation from
the Sun kind of pushes oxygen past the magnetic
field of the Earth, and there's a little bit
of oxygen that gets on the Moon. And so it just
kind of blows on there and stays on there. So
it's kind of interesting. Well, there's a lot
of oxygen on the moon, but it's tied up in chemically.
So it's hard to get it. Free oxygen is hard to
get. Breathable free oxygen. Gotcha. But is it
possible to then make with what's there? Can
we convert what's there to breathable oxygen
and create an atmosphere? Sure, sure, sure. Maybe
can we send robots to do that, or do we? Oh,
sure. I mean, the first application of lunar
resources will be for life support. And you will
use the solar energy to extract the solar wind
volatiles, nitrogen. hydrogen and oxygen and
others from the lunar regolith and there's a
lot of hydrogen and a lot of oxygen some nitrogen
and that will support life support on the moon
because you know it's very expensive to send
food to the moon yeah I mean it's fascinating
stuff I was watching a documentary on Netflix
on how the JWST telescope was sent up in a couple
of pieces and there were robots that kind of
brought themselves together and created it and
I was just, it inspired me to do the same thing
with the fusion energy generator. I know we've
kind of talked about that before but how would
we, I mean if there were ways like you know,
space elevators, you know, rail magnets to throw
it up there or rocket boosters to get it up there.
What would a fusion energy generator on the moon
then look like? Can it really just, could it
process what's already there, generate the electricity,
make us some water, make us some oxygen, grow
some plant, like power the robots to grow us
some plants and do that? Well, the answer to
that is yes, but of course, it's not as easy
as it sounds. And the early applications for
technology on the moon is going to be to extract
the oxygen, hydrogen, and other minerals that
you need for life support. And that'll happen
quickly. I would expect in the next five to ten
years, we will have units on the moon. We, meaning
the world, not necessarily the United States,
will be able to extract the elements that you
need for life support. That same technology can
be used to extract the helium -3, but you have
to do it at a bigger scale. And so we've been
doing experiments here on the earth to see how
we could get the helium -3 out of the regolith,
the very fine powder on the moon. And we found
that agitation can do it very well. So it reduces
the energy required to get the helium -3 out
of the regolith. It's not zero. but it's better
than thermal energy. But the thermal energy can
be used to get the components that you need for
life support. And that'll be the first application.
Once they do that, then they will be able to
have a lot of people on their own, have their
own food growing and so forth. And then that
technology can be used to start extracting the
helium -3. Would we put them in canisters and
send them back or is there a way to send it in
a solid form and we just you know We do the process
down here. What which one would happen? No, they
wouldn't do it on it. You'd do it on the moon.
I mean Well, you wouldn't send the gas down you'd
use it on the moon And, of course, you'd get
a lot of Helium -4, of course, and that'd be
great for propulsion. And the Moon would be a
very good place to stop before you go into Mars.
And so you wouldn't have to send things from
the Earth directly to Mars. You'd send a rocket
to the Moon, pick up your material that you need
for for propulsion and fusion propulsion will
will get you to the Mars very very quickly so
it'll be a two -stage process food first energy
second very cool very cool so so the moon is
just like a gas station it's like we're going
to be a big gas station yeah I think I'm selfishly
thinking about it from like a fusion energy perspective
on how we would be able to get that helium -3
down to Earth. That wouldn't be a problem. That
wouldn't be a problem getting it down because
you'd be sending rockets going up carrying a
lot more than carrying back the helium -3. And
you would drop it off at satellites around the
earth and then come down from the satellite.
So once you extract it, getting it back to the
earth is not going to be a big problem. Oh, right.
If you figured that out, this would be easier.
That makes sense. Oh, you know, by the way, the
helium three on the earth right now is worth
about four. $4 billion a ton. $4 billion. Yeah,
because it's a gas. So a ton would be a gigantic.
Is it from tritium capture that they're letting
it decay for 12 years? They're not letting it
decay. Tritium decays with a 12 .3 year half
-life. Tritium, of course, is a major component
of hydrogen bombs. And the Russians make a lot
of that, but they can't stop the tritium from
being converted into helium -3. And so I think,
and I don't know the details, but I think the
French are actually getting the helium -3 from
the Russians, buying it and then selling it at
a larger price around the world. And that's where
our helium -3 would come from. And by the way,
We have a neighbor north of us who makes a lot
of helium -3 and their canduria. I think there
is a percentage of power plants that have the
tritium capture systems and then there are the
older generation ones that don't. I mean, you
would know better than I do, but I'm just, you
know, when you look at the numbers of fission
generators being built in Russia, China versus
Canada and the US. If I put tritium capture systems
on all of the new generators I was building,
then I would think that China and Russia would
have a surplus of it, just as waste from their
fission systems. But I wouldn't know. Well, it
depends whether they're using deuterium. at moderator,
and the Kando reactors use deuterium. And our,
the United States reactors, it comes from the
making of tritium in the fission system. And
you don't make a lot. You make some, and of course
it's stable. So once you make it and if you extract
it, it'll sit there. It won't go away. But the
demand for Helium -3 is only in a few kilograms
per year level, and that doesn't last you very
long in the power plant. Right. None of this
is sustainable for fusion energy, large -scale
commercialization. The only way to do it is go
to the moon, but it's possible. Yeah. That's
what the reserve is. Yeah. Yeah. There will be
a convergence of the two technologies in terms
of when fusion energy generators have passed
the research stages and gotten to the point where
helium -3 is useful, then the helium -3 will
be available. Anyway, so just moving on, I guess.
You've worked in a lot of countries. Dr. Kulsinski,
who? What are the top four countries do you think
will have the first fusion energy commercialization
like is? Is Germany ahead of China No That's
an interesting question because it depends on
what time frame you're talking about if you were
talking about 20 or 30 years ago It was the United
States and Russia. If you're talking about today,
it's China and we're number two. That causes
a lot of debate, of course, but we're maybe at
best tied with the Chinese. The Russians have
dropped down to third or fourth. Korea and Japan
are probably passing up Russia right now. So
the Russians have really dropped out of the main
picture. The Chinese are taking it over. So there's
a big difference. The standard will be 10, 20,
30 years from now is things that people can speculate
on, but we don't know. It depends on a lot of
things. Right now, the Chinese are vying for
number one. I have faith in some of the commercial
endeavors in America and I feel like it'll be
a SpaceX situation where I feel like America
will win. But maybe that's because I'm an American,
so maybe it's more hopeful. So other than it's
harder to fuse, but the physics has been proved
out. In less than a decade, we'll be able to
fetch the helium -3 from the moon. What are some
of the other things then that are technological
stop gaps for achieving a steady state helium
-3 aneutronic fusion? Well, there are lots of
alternate applications. So one, not necessarily
the top one, but one that you might want to consider
is using the helium -3 to make 14 MeV protons,
which can burn up the fission waste that we're
burying in the ground right now. That doesn't
really contribute a lot to the... might say business
world, but it certainly would solve a problem
of getting rid of nuclear waste. Is that transmutation?
Is that nuclear transmutation? Yes. To make a
cheap source of 14 MeV protons, not nutrients.
And I mean, that's one thing, but it's probably
not a commercial thing, but it has a big impact
on society. What would the protons... Sorry.
What would we be using those protons for? Is
it possible to have some sort of direct energy
conversion connect to that? Or, okay, is that
where we're going? Well, the proton, 14 MeV protons,
if you bombard a long -lived radioactive material,
you can change it to a very short -lived radioactive
material and it'll go away. Depending on the
half -life, of course. But some things that we're
bearing right now have a half -life in the thousands
to an even longer time, a time half -life, thousands
of years, and a half -life, and they're gonna
be around for a lot longer than we are. So if
you can convert them to very short -lived half
-life, well... half -life materials that have
half -lives on the order of a year or so, then
it'll go away in about 10 years. So that would
be, that'd be one application. The other is you
can use it to make very short time scale half
-life materials for medical use. There's a process
now that people can detect whether somebody is
going to go into an epileptic fit on an operating
table, but it requires oxygen 15, which has a
two -minute half -life. And two -minute half
-life is something you can't make and transport
very much because it goes away too quick. But
if you made it in the next room to the operating
table and piped it in and combined it with a
certain molecule. Yeah, they can get a forewarning
of when somebody is going to go into an epileptic
fit on the operating table. And of course, they
can be prepared for it. Now, that's probably
I don't know about the economics of that. But
the social impact of that is pretty substantial.
Because they can't do that. So that's another
use. Right. So there will be multiple multiple
uses for everything fusion, eventually, like
every aspect of it. Yeah, there will be. And
I'm sure we haven't really more than scratched
the surface of that because right now that's
not what people are worried about. But if you
had a fusion system, operating on different fuels
anywhere from DT to DD to D Helium -3 to P -BORN11,
you know, all the ones that we were considering.
You can start thinking about the non -electrical
producing systems which can affect the human
society. That's down the road. Some of them can
be very near -term. Some of them will take a
lot longer. But there isn't much money going
into that research right now. But there's money
in other things, you know. I'm in the process
of writing an article for just like a LinkedIn
article on using fusion energy, how you would
need fusion energy for something like cryptocurrency,
how cryptocurrency, just the plans that people
have, it's just not possible without fusion energy.
The drain on the grid is too much. I think cryptocurrency
last year used more energy than Idaho or something.
So it's really just not sustainable. And even
things like the advent of AI and quantum computing
and just the energy that all of that takes, I
think it's almost not even possible to do. at
a sustainable scale if we don't figure out fusion.
So there are a lot of lucrative things that fusion
will bring about that would offset the social
causes, so to speak. I think the use in space
is another one where we have very long duration
space trips and You're going to need diagnostics
if somebody has a cancer or something in the
years that they will be traveling from the earth
to someplace else. And you can make those isotopes
that can be combined with imaging systems to
show whether you have abnormalities in the human
person. But I'm not sure that's an economic thing,
but it certainly will keep people who have 10
-year, 20 -year travels much healthier. But they're
not going to make any money out of that. I think
it's just saving lives. If one system is breeding
the right word when we talk about these isotopes
and elements we're going to make, when we create
these systems to do them, is it possible to use
fusion for more than one isotope, whether it
be medical isotope, like so could we make deuterium,
tritium, helium -3, helium -4, all with a inertial
or magnetic confinement fusion energy unit, but
it would be the one unit that makes all of them.
Is that is the physics? Yeah, that's right. That's
right. Because it depends on what you bombard.
It do things. One, what are you making to cause
a nuclear change? Is it a neutron? Is it a gamma
ray or some other form of radiation? and what
is the half -life and what is this chemical proclivity
so that you can combine it with certain molecules
that will give you a diagnostic. I mean, there's
a whole medical area here that is untapped that
would be, at least from a science standpoint,
be very interesting. Economically, I can't really,
really project that. I mean, if we can make a
system where we can breed things like tritium,
and tritium is incredibly expensive, and so is
deuterium. If we can build a system that can
do 10 different isotopes, then it would automatically
be commercially viable, I would think. I mean,
if you make two things that... the pharma and
the DOD industry can use, then you can make eight
things at a loss and still come up with a profit
at the end of the day. We talk about making industrial
heating units. I've been kind of beating down
the idea of using fusion energy industrial heat
for liquid fuel manufacturing, steel manufacturing,
and cement manufacturing. And we recently spoke
with a company that wants to make jet fuel with
biomass. And all of that requires you to have
heat of above 1 ,200 degrees centigrade. We've
had a lot of conversations around hydrogen, H2
production. But if we could have a clean heat
source for it at 1 ,200 degrees, we could power
cars. Hydrogen is almost better and more sustainable
for cars. So these are all conversations in the
ethos. Well, and I'm sure we really haven't gotten
very deep into this because people have been
99 .9 % focused on making electricity with fusion,
but about 10 to 20 years ago, we started to think
about near -term applications, and we identified
36 near -term applications. But we don't have
the bandwidth to cover them all. So. Yeah. Yeah.
I think it's coming. I think... We live in a
time where, you know, we just have to do it.
We just have to do it. There is no other way
out. And I think more and more people are recognizing
that. And luckily for humanity, the science is
lining up, meaning the work that folks like you
have been doing for the last like 50, 60 years
without any proper vision of fruition, so to
speak. I think all of that, there's like a culmination
of all of that work right now. And I feel like
there's funding available for it from new sources
that didn't exist before. And by that I mean
the private equity and the venture capital world
is taking a more serious look at fusion. So I
feel like It's really going to happen. I'm hopeful,
obviously, like that's my job. That's part of
my job. But I feel from a very pragmatic perspective,
the world recognizes that technologically, some
of the larger things that we hope for in terms
of space exploration or cryptocurrencies or any
of these things, we need some large fuel sources
and we cannot do it the same way that we've been
doing it before. And from a step back even, we
feel like we've really been using fuels like
this for 150 years. That's like a blip of time
in humanity. So there's nothing we cannot fix.
I feel like if the next two or three generations
can build a proper foundation for fusion energy
commercialization, then anything is possible.
Anyway, I have two last questions. One is, what
was the largest fusion energy challenge that
you have ever seen and how did you overcome it?
Well, again, it falls into physics versus engineering
because they're quite different. but they're
both, you have to solve both problems otherwise
it doesn't work. And I can only speak from the
engineering side at this point. And the largest
problem, of course, is how do you control the
radiation damage and the large amount of radioactivity
that you generate using deuterium tritium fuels?
That's a big challenge. It's one that's not very
well thought out yet by the community. But one
way to get rid of that, of course, is to go to
advanced fuels, aneutronic systems, or at least
systems that have very small amounts of nutrients
emitted, because the neutrons cause radiation
damage, which limits the life. And these designs
for fusion reactors are so complex, but if you
have to change out the structures in a fusion
reactor, it's gonna take you months if not years
to do that. And you can't make any money out
of that. The electricity production would not
be economical. So radiation damage from 14 MAV
neutrons is probably the biggest issue. from
an engineering side. The handling of heat and
electricity production and distribution are things
that the fission community is pretty well fixed
for us. And the fission community has also come
up with pretty good regulations on radioactivity,
what you can handle and what you can't. I remember
when I, in the sixties, when I worked at Hanford,
we had a 14 MB neutron generator and we had it
inside a building that was about a hundred yards
from a road. Every time we turned it on, we had
to close the road because the 14 MB neutrons
are right through the... graphite moderator and
out to the concrete walls and into the end of
the road. So it's not an easy problem to handle.
And we can learn a lot from the fission community
because they've had some pretty good regulations.
And so I think the key word here is a neutrality.
You're probably going to have to use deuterium
tritium to get to breakeven and beyond. But beyond
that, to make an economical fusion system, you're
probably going to have to go to aneutronic fusion.
I 100 % agree. It's just not scalable otherwise.
Were your parents scientists? No, no they were
not. No, they were not. They worked in the public
sector, farmers as well, fishermen on the Mississippi
River, commercial fishermen when that was a viable
occupation. Nowadays, I don't think you could
do it. But yeah, I spent a lot of time in my
youth working with them. on the rivers, and we
used to drive cars across the Mississippi River
in the winter. Wow. It freezes over that much?
With water, with water on both sides of us. And
I tell you, if you weren't, I always used to
stand on, when cars had running boards, I always
used to stand on the running board because I
didn't want to be inside the car. And we only
lost two cars. Oh. Just two. But, you know, people
did that sort of stuff. So you could jump off
easier. What's a running board? Is that the thing
on the side that you would stand on? Never seen
a running board. Okay. I don't know anything
about cars, so it might not be a typing thing.
Yeah, they don't have it. They don't have them
anymore. But they had a little step on the door.
And yeah, you used to stand on the running boards.
That's how we got across the river. But they
were not scientists or educators, although my
children are in the education business and audiologists
and so forth. But things change. Yeah, so that
was going to be my last question like you you
are more than a researcher and a fusion energy
pioneer You are you're a teacher How how? What
can we? To close this off. What can we say to
the young people that? Need to get into this
field because more than technology and physics
and engineering We need driven human beings who
are willing to research this stuff and bring
it to fruition. How do we get them to do it,
Dr. Kosinski?