WEBVTT 00:00:04.259 --> 00:00:07.860 Welcome to an extraordinary episode of our podcast, 00:00:08.359 --> 00:00:10.859 where we're privileged to engage with Dr. Gerald 00:00:10.859 --> 00:00:14.740 Kosinski, a beacon of innovation in the field 00:00:14.740 --> 00:00:18.579 of fusion energy, with over 15 years dedicated 00:00:18.579 --> 00:00:22.699 to the advancement of aneutronic fusion energy, 00:00:23.320 --> 00:00:28.179 particularly helium -3. Dr. Kulcinski stands 00:00:28.179 --> 00:00:31.359 at the forefront of a movement that could reshape 00:00:31.359 --> 00:00:36.119 our entire energy paradigm. Dr. Kulcinski's journey 00:00:36.119 --> 00:00:38.780 through the landscape of nuclear engineering 00:00:38.780 --> 00:00:42.820 has been nothing short of remarkable. Holding 00:00:42.820 --> 00:00:46.280 the esteemed position of Greener Professor of 00:00:46.280 --> 00:00:50.619 Nuclear Engineering, Emeritus, and having directed 00:00:50.619 --> 00:00:54.119 the Fusion Technology Institute, he has laid 00:00:54.119 --> 00:00:57.320 foundational stones in the bridge toward sustainable 00:00:57.320 --> 00:01:02.539 energy. His extensive career, decorated with 00:01:02.539 --> 00:01:05.400 prestigious accolades such as his election to 00:01:05.400 --> 00:01:09.840 the National Academy of Engineering and recognition 00:01:09.840 --> 00:01:13.599 by NASA, underlines the critical role he has 00:01:13.599 --> 00:01:16.700 played in pushing the boundaries of what's possible. 00:01:18.299 --> 00:01:22.390 In today's conversation, we dive into the transformative 00:01:22.390 --> 00:01:26.950 potential of helium -3 in neutronic fusion energy. 00:01:28.290 --> 00:01:31.730 Dr. Kulsinski shares his visionary insights from 00:01:31.730 --> 00:01:34.950 the early challenges of fusion research to the 00:01:34.950 --> 00:01:38.390 modern -day feats that inches closer to a cleaner, 00:01:38.530 --> 00:01:43.209 more efficient energy future. We explore the 00:01:43.209 --> 00:01:46.049 innovative strategies and collaborative efforts 00:01:46.049 --> 00:01:48.590 that have marked the evolution of this field. 00:01:49.739 --> 00:01:53.780 But in the highlight of our discussion and indeed 00:01:53.780 --> 00:01:57.859 the topic of monumental significance is the ambitious 00:01:57.859 --> 00:02:01.500 goal of bringing helium -3 down from the moon 00:02:01.500 --> 00:02:06.840 to enable large -scale fusion energy commercialization. 00:02:08.419 --> 00:02:11.479 This audacious plan isn't just about sourcing 00:02:11.479 --> 00:02:15.199 fuel. It's about unlocking a realm of possibilities 00:02:15.199 --> 00:02:19.689 for energy production that could lead to unprecedented 00:02:19.689 --> 00:02:24.990 levels of sustainability and efficiency. In an 00:02:24.990 --> 00:02:28.569 era where the creators of destructive technologies 00:02:28.569 --> 00:02:32.509 are often immortalized in Oscar -winning films, 00:02:33.310 --> 00:02:37.030 despite later remorse, true heroes like Dr. Kulsinski 00:02:37.030 --> 00:02:42.090 walk among us. Dr. Kosinski has devoted his exceptional 00:02:42.090 --> 00:02:45.270 talent and energy, not to the instruments of 00:02:45.270 --> 00:02:49.150 conflict, but to the pursuit of peace and sustainability 00:02:49.150 --> 00:02:54.349 when presented with the same choices. Join us 00:02:54.349 --> 00:02:57.550 as we delve into the mechanics of fusion energy, 00:02:58.550 --> 00:03:01.770 the international collaboration shaping its future, 00:03:02.569 --> 00:03:06.409 and the bold steps being taken towards harvesting 00:03:06.729 --> 00:03:12.270 extraterrestrial resources. Dr. Kosinski enlightens 00:03:12.270 --> 00:03:15.789 us on the technical and logistical challenges 00:03:15.789 --> 00:03:20.150 involved in lunar mining, the potential applications 00:03:20.150 --> 00:03:25.729 of helium -3 beyond just energy production, including 00:03:25.729 --> 00:03:29.370 medical and industrial uses, and the broader 00:03:29.370 --> 00:03:33.729 implications of all of this for humanity's future. 00:03:35.599 --> 00:03:40.460 prepared to be inspired, informed, and invigorated 00:03:40.460 --> 00:03:44.659 by a conversation that spans the gamut from atomic 00:03:44.659 --> 00:03:48.699 particles to lunar landscapes and from current 00:03:48.699 --> 00:03:54.340 realities to future possibilities. Here's Dr. 00:03:54.479 --> 00:04:03.659 Gerald Kolsinski. Dr. Kolsinski, thank you so 00:04:03.659 --> 00:04:06.960 much for doing this. We have a lot of people 00:04:06.960 --> 00:04:10.300 asking questions and stories about fusion energy 00:04:10.300 --> 00:04:13.939 and the history of fusion energy and where we 00:04:13.939 --> 00:04:17.240 think fusion energy is going. So any insight 00:04:17.240 --> 00:04:23.259 you can give us, we're very grateful. What inspired 00:04:23.259 --> 00:04:26.879 you to start your career in nuclear engineering? 00:04:28.389 --> 00:04:33.290 Well, I got my degrees in master's and PhD in 00:04:33.290 --> 00:04:35.649 nuclear engineering, so that was a pretty easy 00:04:35.649 --> 00:04:39.189 step. I worked a little bit, of course, as you 00:04:39.189 --> 00:04:44.329 know, at Los Alamos on nuclear rockets. But when 00:04:44.329 --> 00:04:47.930 I went to Hanford, which is a facility in the 00:04:47.930 --> 00:04:51.149 state of Washington, I was working more with 00:04:51.149 --> 00:04:54.949 the production of plutonium for nuclear weapons 00:04:54.949 --> 00:05:03.439 and other needs. And we worked a lot with the 00:05:03.439 --> 00:05:05.860 Hanford nuclear reactors, which were built during 00:05:05.860 --> 00:05:11.120 World War II. As you know, that's where the plutonium 00:05:11.120 --> 00:05:18.959 was made to be used in the bombs that they used 00:05:18.959 --> 00:05:26.129 in World War II at the end, of course. They got 00:05:26.129 --> 00:05:29.750 to a point when we started to think about fusion 00:05:29.750 --> 00:05:34.689 in the late 1960s. We could make plutonium a 00:05:34.689 --> 00:05:37.550 lot faster with fusion neutrons than we could 00:05:37.550 --> 00:05:40.449 with fission neutrons. And I won't get into the 00:05:40.449 --> 00:05:43.829 details of that. But we were very seriously thinking 00:05:43.829 --> 00:05:47.689 about replacing the three or four operating units 00:05:47.689 --> 00:05:51.829 at Hanford fission units with fusion units so 00:05:51.829 --> 00:05:55.110 we could produce plutonium faster. but using 00:05:55.110 --> 00:05:58.670 fusion to do that. And the key, of course, was 00:05:58.670 --> 00:06:03.370 using 14 -MAV neutrons. So that's what got us 00:06:03.370 --> 00:06:09.850 into the fusion side of the house. I left Hanford 00:06:09.850 --> 00:06:17.319 in 1971, I think it was, yeah, 71. When I came 00:06:17.319 --> 00:06:20.879 to the University of Wisconsin, I was in charge 00:06:20.879 --> 00:06:25.339 of the Fusion Technology Institute, which is 00:06:25.339 --> 00:06:29.079 different than the fusion physics side. The physics 00:06:29.079 --> 00:06:32.779 side is where most of the effort had been, both 00:06:32.779 --> 00:06:35.660 in the United States and at that time Russia 00:06:35.660 --> 00:06:42.660 was the lead organization along with the United 00:06:42.660 --> 00:06:47.139 States. So we had some very close relationships 00:06:47.139 --> 00:06:53.379 with the Russians. And when I got to Wisconsin, 00:06:53.480 --> 00:06:57.600 we started to look at the engineering side of 00:06:57.600 --> 00:07:00.060 fusion reactors, not the physics. We're assuming 00:07:00.060 --> 00:07:05.519 the physics would work. And then we had to translate 00:07:05.519 --> 00:07:10.220 that into an engineering system that was both 00:07:10.220 --> 00:07:19.029 reliable and made economic sense. And that engineering 00:07:19.029 --> 00:07:27.009 system was that tokamak based? Well, at that 00:07:27.009 --> 00:07:33.569 time it was. As you know, the fusion community 00:07:33.569 --> 00:07:38.389 has gone through several configurations. Stellarators, 00:07:38.490 --> 00:07:42.850 which was one of the early approaches from Princeton 00:07:42.850 --> 00:07:48.910 and then Los Alamos did a lot of work in linear 00:07:48.910 --> 00:07:54.610 systems and pulse systems. Los Livermore did 00:07:54.610 --> 00:07:57.769 a lot of work in inertial confinement fusion, 00:07:58.290 --> 00:08:01.670 but of course that was more weapons related because 00:08:01.670 --> 00:08:07.329 that's how a nuclear weapon would work. So we 00:08:07.329 --> 00:08:14.680 had a lot of projects that we actually ended 00:08:14.680 --> 00:08:18.240 up designing or were partners in the design of 00:08:18.240 --> 00:08:23.139 over 50 nuclear fusion power plants when I came 00:08:23.139 --> 00:08:30.319 to Wisconsin. That effort in nuclear fusion engineering 00:08:30.319 --> 00:08:32.639 has sort of gone by the wayside now and most 00:08:32.639 --> 00:08:36.159 of the effort is still put into the plasma physics 00:08:36.159 --> 00:08:40.730 side of the house. But you're never going to 00:08:40.730 --> 00:08:44.110 make a system that's economical without having 00:08:44.110 --> 00:08:47.590 an engineering that works. The physics is one 00:08:47.590 --> 00:08:49.370 thing, but the engineering is where you make 00:08:49.370 --> 00:08:53.070 your money. That's definitely the big frontier 00:08:53.070 --> 00:08:57.509 now. I feel like more and more people recognize 00:08:57.509 --> 00:09:01.769 that. When we talk about fusion energy commercialization, 00:09:02.370 --> 00:09:05.750 a lot of the conversation is around materials 00:09:05.750 --> 00:09:12.059 and engineering. I think we need to figure those 00:09:12.059 --> 00:09:16.179 two things out. How did you even hear about nuclear 00:09:16.179 --> 00:09:18.919 engineering? Did you know about it when you were 00:09:18.919 --> 00:09:24.659 14? Did your parents tell you? No, actually I 00:09:24.659 --> 00:09:26.879 found out about it when I was a chemical engineer 00:09:26.879 --> 00:09:29.720 at the University of Wisconsin as an undergraduate. 00:09:30.379 --> 00:09:40.429 And we built a fission system. in the confines 00:09:40.429 --> 00:09:49.750 of the engineering campus in the early 1960s. 00:09:49.889 --> 00:09:53.149 And so that's how I got into the nuclear side 00:09:53.149 --> 00:09:56.169 of the house, but my undergraduate training was 00:09:56.169 --> 00:10:00.679 in chemical engineering. And we have a very strong 00:10:00.679 --> 00:10:04.019 program in Wisconsin at that time. So it was 00:10:04.019 --> 00:10:07.460 an easy transfer from the chemical engineering 00:10:07.460 --> 00:10:11.659 to nuclear. I think I was the second person to 00:10:11.659 --> 00:10:14.539 graduate from the nuclear engineering program, 00:10:14.620 --> 00:10:18.000 advanced degrees. So I got in on the ground floor, 00:10:18.059 --> 00:10:22.580 you might say. Is nuclear energy, when we talk 00:10:22.580 --> 00:10:27.139 about the nuclear rocket program, is that for... 00:10:27.399 --> 00:10:32.240 ignition or thrust or sustainable like what what 00:10:32.240 --> 00:10:35.879 at what stage of the rocket would something like 00:10:35.879 --> 00:10:41.019 that be used is it fusion or fission sorry well 00:10:41.019 --> 00:10:45.919 the the nuclear rockets originally were fission 00:10:45.919 --> 00:10:52.899 and what they did was take liquid hydrogen which 00:10:52.899 --> 00:10:56.820 is down around a few degrees Kelvin, pass it 00:10:56.820 --> 00:11:00.740 through a graphite core that had uranium or plutonium 00:11:00.740 --> 00:11:03.299 in it, and it would heat it up to about 2000 00:11:03.299 --> 00:11:07.960 degrees Kelvin. And the exhaust from the rocket 00:11:07.960 --> 00:11:11.759 would push the rocket much faster than you could 00:11:11.759 --> 00:11:18.470 push it with chemical. approaches in rocketry. 00:11:18.929 --> 00:11:21.009 And they were trying to cut down the time it 00:11:21.009 --> 00:11:25.250 would take to get from the Earth to Mars. And 00:11:25.250 --> 00:11:30.389 the fusion systems at that time would probably 00:11:30.389 --> 00:11:33.529 get you to Mars two or three times faster than 00:11:33.529 --> 00:11:39.049 chemical systems would. Can we build fusion generators 00:11:39.049 --> 00:11:42.750 now for this? And would they be clean? Like how 00:11:42.750 --> 00:11:47.029 do you harness the radiation from such a reaction? 00:11:48.909 --> 00:11:51.909 Well, it depends on how you design it, obviously. 00:11:52.629 --> 00:12:00.330 The original design was never really put into 00:12:00.330 --> 00:12:05.409 operation. We actually ran reactors in the Nevada 00:12:05.409 --> 00:12:12.049 desert to go to Mars and back, but we never actually 00:12:12.049 --> 00:12:16.620 did it, of course. with a nuclear rocket. We 00:12:16.620 --> 00:12:21.799 were using chemical rockets at the time. Now, 00:12:22.059 --> 00:12:27.980 if you want to do it by converting fusion energy 00:12:27.980 --> 00:12:31.980 to electricity and then using the electricity 00:12:31.980 --> 00:12:36.399 to exhaust the propellant, that's another way 00:12:36.399 --> 00:12:41.039 of getting to someplace faster than you can with 00:12:41.039 --> 00:12:45.480 chemical systems. So, nuclear was really meant 00:12:45.480 --> 00:12:51.320 in that regard to replace chemical rockets. But, 00:12:51.399 --> 00:12:56.419 of course, nowadays we've got the chemical rockets 00:12:56.419 --> 00:13:03.179 that get us to the moon and back, and some programs 00:13:03.179 --> 00:13:07.480 that get us to Mars and back, but not much more 00:13:07.480 --> 00:13:14.080 than that. I'd love to know the story of ITER. 00:13:15.840 --> 00:13:21.139 You hear things about how during the Cold War, 00:13:21.440 --> 00:13:24.799 there was a full -blown communications breakdown 00:13:24.799 --> 00:13:32.059 between us and the Russians. They decided that 00:13:32.059 --> 00:13:34.580 in order to keep the relationship, the doors 00:13:34.580 --> 00:13:37.620 open for communication, they would work on just 00:13:37.620 --> 00:13:40.759 one project together, and that was the ITER project. 00:13:41.019 --> 00:13:45.000 And I know that you were there on day one. What 00:13:45.000 --> 00:13:47.580 did that look like? What were those conversations 00:13:47.580 --> 00:13:53.080 like? Well, there are two tracks here. One track 00:13:53.080 --> 00:13:55.799 is the scientist to scientist, and that worked 00:13:55.799 --> 00:13:59.799 out pretty well. The political side is a little 00:13:59.799 --> 00:14:02.559 beyond my pay grade, so I'm not sure I would 00:14:02.559 --> 00:14:07.159 be a good person to give you that side. But the 00:14:07.159 --> 00:14:09.940 scientific side, we worked very close with the 00:14:09.940 --> 00:14:12.799 Russians. Now, the Russians had a very strong 00:14:12.799 --> 00:14:15.639 program at that time. They don't now. They've 00:14:15.639 --> 00:14:19.200 slipped to third or fourth in the world. But 00:14:19.200 --> 00:14:22.899 they were up near the top, and they declassified 00:14:22.899 --> 00:14:27.840 their work and fusion. very early in the game, 00:14:28.299 --> 00:14:30.399 they were the ones obviously that invented the 00:14:30.399 --> 00:14:35.980 tokamak. And the tokamak actually was the survivor 00:14:35.980 --> 00:14:39.460 of a bunch of different designs that we had worked 00:14:39.460 --> 00:14:45.919 on in the United States. And then we could talk 00:14:45.919 --> 00:14:51.120 in a lot of detail with the Russians and good 00:14:51.120 --> 00:14:56.370 friendships with the Russians. And I traveled 00:14:56.370 --> 00:15:00.370 to Russia several times. We had some Russians 00:15:00.370 --> 00:15:04.950 that came to Wisconsin, and we were working on 00:15:04.950 --> 00:15:10.090 the same programs. We don't anymore. That's all 00:15:10.090 --> 00:15:16.970 gone by the road now. But in those days, well, 00:15:17.090 --> 00:15:21.450 actually probably in the 1970s is where it really, 00:15:21.450 --> 00:15:26.519 really flowered a lot. 70s and 80s. And that 00:15:26.519 --> 00:15:31.820 was the beginning of ITER. Now, that turned into 00:15:31.820 --> 00:15:37.860 a political thing because the collaboration between 00:15:37.860 --> 00:15:43.759 the United States and Russia was very good. And 00:15:43.759 --> 00:15:47.480 that was a good way to have good relations with 00:15:47.480 --> 00:15:52.080 someone who we were antagonistic at times with. 00:15:52.320 --> 00:15:57.539 So we worked together and the site that we worked 00:15:57.539 --> 00:16:02.840 at was Vienna. And it was under the auspices 00:16:02.840 --> 00:16:10.559 of the United Nations. And that's in the 70s 00:16:10.559 --> 00:16:16.179 was where we had meetings with the Russians. 00:16:17.799 --> 00:16:20.639 The Russians, Europeans, Japanese, and the United 00:16:20.639 --> 00:16:23.720 States were the four. uh, people, uh, groups 00:16:23.720 --> 00:16:28.259 that worked on the, uh, uh, initial design of 00:16:28.259 --> 00:16:31.960 either it was called in tour was, was the name, 00:16:32.259 --> 00:16:37.480 but it evolved into a eater later on. Nice. I 00:16:37.480 --> 00:16:43.960 like in tour. It sounds like a robot. Um, When 00:16:43.960 --> 00:16:48.940 you say we don't anymore, the U .S. and Russia 00:16:48.940 --> 00:16:53.840 are still part of the 35 or 36 -eater countries. 00:16:54.340 --> 00:16:58.240 We just don't actively do projects anymore together, 00:16:58.379 --> 00:17:03.340 is what you mean. Yeah, the transfer of information 00:17:03.340 --> 00:17:07.019 is not anywhere close to what it was in the 70s 00:17:07.019 --> 00:17:10.880 when we were... really serious about building 00:17:10.880 --> 00:17:13.660 ITER. We were going to build ITER by the turn 00:17:13.660 --> 00:17:19.259 of the century. And Intor was the first design. 00:17:20.240 --> 00:17:23.819 There were 16 people who spent, oh, I guess we 00:17:23.819 --> 00:17:26.680 spent a month or two together in Vienna designing 00:17:26.680 --> 00:17:30.539 the system. Made a lot of progress. Made a lot 00:17:30.539 --> 00:17:35.079 of friends. And the scientific transfer in those 00:17:35.079 --> 00:17:38.289 days was very good. Now it's not so good. It 00:17:38.289 --> 00:17:45.769 was very good then. Wow. Was that before or after 00:17:45.769 --> 00:17:49.369 you were the director of the Fusion Energy Technology 00:17:49.369 --> 00:17:53.970 Institute? It was coincident at the same time. 00:17:55.650 --> 00:17:59.390 Because when I moved from Hanford, I moved out 00:17:59.390 --> 00:18:02.470 of the fission side of the house to the fusion 00:18:02.470 --> 00:18:07.140 side of the house. And we had one of the strongest 00:18:07.140 --> 00:18:11.180 programs, if not the strongest in the world, 00:18:11.720 --> 00:18:17.759 in fusion engineering. We also had physics, a 00:18:17.759 --> 00:18:22.619 lot of physics people who worked on fusion, but 00:18:22.619 --> 00:18:29.880 the engineering side was really put into play 00:18:29.880 --> 00:18:44.779 in the 70s and 80s. Would you say in terms of 00:18:44.779 --> 00:18:49.119 physics for fusion energy all of the key components 00:18:49.119 --> 00:18:53.240 have been proved out? So is it really just a 00:18:53.240 --> 00:18:58.880 matter of engineering now or are there any outstanding 00:18:58.880 --> 00:19:08.099 physics? How would you say that? Meaning, are 00:19:08.099 --> 00:19:11.599 there anything that have remained theories and 00:19:11.599 --> 00:19:15.059 not been proved out? Like, I know that we haven't 00:19:15.059 --> 00:19:18.980 had a sustained plasma field for a long period 00:19:18.980 --> 00:19:22.779 of time, but is there anything in the baseline 00:19:22.779 --> 00:19:25.660 physics itself that stops you from doing that? 00:19:25.799 --> 00:19:28.240 Or it's just possible if you throw more at it? 00:19:29.319 --> 00:19:33.039 Well, it depends on what you use for fuel. The 00:19:33.039 --> 00:19:37.940 original physics work on fusion was done with 00:19:37.940 --> 00:19:40.400 deuterium and tritium. And that stems all the 00:19:40.400 --> 00:19:44.920 way back to World War II because a lot of that 00:19:44.920 --> 00:19:51.200 came out of that program. We didn't design systems 00:19:51.200 --> 00:19:53.819 in World War II for making electricity. We were 00:19:53.819 --> 00:19:59.880 designing things to end the war. So the biggest 00:19:59.880 --> 00:20:04.019 difference there is the energy of the neutrons. 00:20:04.430 --> 00:20:08.269 Now, we know a lot about radiation damage from 00:20:08.269 --> 00:20:12.549 low energy neutrons, the lowest million electron 00:20:12.549 --> 00:20:16.650 volts. When you get to fusion, the neutrons are 00:20:16.650 --> 00:20:22.029 in the 14 MeV million electron volts. And the 00:20:22.029 --> 00:20:27.309 reaction with the neutrons and the metallic structures 00:20:27.309 --> 00:20:31.150 of the power plants is quite different than it 00:20:31.150 --> 00:20:36.000 is in fission. It's not just a factor of seven 00:20:36.000 --> 00:20:42.579 or eight, which would be 14 over two MAV. There's 00:20:42.579 --> 00:20:45.880 a major difference in the physics of what goes 00:20:45.880 --> 00:20:50.400 on with a 14 MAV neutron than what goes on with 00:20:50.400 --> 00:20:52.920 a fission neutron. And the biggest difference 00:20:52.920 --> 00:20:57.319 is with 14 MAV neutrons, you produce a lot of 00:20:57.319 --> 00:21:02.220 N alpha reactions. That means neutron. helium 00:21:02.220 --> 00:21:09.079 atom reactions. And helium is a bad actor in 00:21:09.079 --> 00:21:12.299 this sense because it goes to the grain boundaries 00:21:12.299 --> 00:21:16.319 and makes the material very, very brittle. You 00:21:16.319 --> 00:21:20.579 get a lot more helium production in a fusion 00:21:20.579 --> 00:21:26.240 reactor with DT than you do with a fission reactor 00:21:26.240 --> 00:21:30.460 using uranium or plutonium. And that's the biggest 00:21:30.460 --> 00:21:32.819 difference. And we have not solved that problem. 00:21:33.539 --> 00:21:36.059 We thought we were going to solve it early if 00:21:36.059 --> 00:21:39.339 we had built some test reactors. We never did 00:21:39.339 --> 00:21:43.940 build them. And so that's still an uncharted 00:21:43.940 --> 00:21:47.579 area. We know that there's going to be a real 00:21:47.579 --> 00:21:51.140 problem with deuterium and tritium, but people 00:21:51.140 --> 00:21:54.440 are, most of the money. and the investment is 00:21:54.440 --> 00:21:56.980 going into the plasma physics side of the house. 00:21:57.000 --> 00:22:00.700 And that determines whether you end up with a 00:22:00.700 --> 00:22:03.779 toroidal system or a linear system or a pulse 00:22:03.779 --> 00:22:08.680 system or versus steady state and so forth. So 00:22:08.680 --> 00:22:12.960 99 % or so of the money that's invested in fusion 00:22:12.960 --> 00:22:16.180 is invested in the physics side of the house. 00:22:17.500 --> 00:22:20.859 And they're not haven't solved those problems 00:22:20.859 --> 00:22:25.269 are getting close. getting close, but once they 00:22:25.269 --> 00:22:27.490 solve those problems, they still have to get 00:22:27.490 --> 00:22:30.869 over the engineering hurdle. And that really, 00:22:31.690 --> 00:22:34.490 if they use deuterium, tritium is going to be 00:22:34.490 --> 00:22:39.970 a big hurdle because what we know about the reaction 00:22:39.970 --> 00:22:44.509 of 14 MeV neutrons versus two and a half MeV 00:22:44.509 --> 00:22:49.269 neutrons is there's a big difference in the lifetime. 00:22:49.690 --> 00:22:53.809 of metallic structures that get bombarded. Now 00:22:53.809 --> 00:22:58.609 that also gives you radioactivity, but that's 00:22:58.609 --> 00:23:00.190 not the biggest problem. The biggest problem 00:23:00.190 --> 00:23:02.430 is keeping the material so it doesn't become 00:23:02.430 --> 00:23:06.769 brittle. And 14 MAV neutrons are a bad actor 00:23:06.769 --> 00:23:13.549 with respect to that. I was talking to somebody 00:23:13.549 --> 00:23:16.309 on the Eater podcast or Eater communications 00:23:16.309 --> 00:23:19.269 team yesterday and they wanted to know my thoughts. 00:23:19.150 --> 00:23:22.650 thoughts on e -neutronic fusion fuels. And I 00:23:22.650 --> 00:23:25.609 think one of the things that we've talked about 00:23:25.609 --> 00:23:30.589 and we vehemently agreed on it was that for fusion 00:23:30.589 --> 00:23:34.970 to be commercially viable, meaning if you're 00:23:34.970 --> 00:23:38.250 going to build 1 ,000 generators over the next 00:23:38.250 --> 00:23:42.509 50 years or so, it would have to be e -neutronic. 00:23:42.809 --> 00:23:45.869 There's just no other way to go about it. So 00:23:45.869 --> 00:23:52.539 do you think some of these challenges, definitely 00:23:52.539 --> 00:23:55.720 the engineering, but then is the physics challenge 00:23:55.720 --> 00:24:03.640 also something we have an answer for with a -neutronic 00:24:03.640 --> 00:24:08.980 fuels? I know that a -neutronic fuels automatically 00:24:08.980 --> 00:24:13.799 make the engineering aspects easier. Well, that's 00:24:13.799 --> 00:24:19.309 true, but it's also harder. to make the reactions 00:24:19.309 --> 00:24:25.650 take place. If you go from DT, deuterium tritium, 00:24:25.990 --> 00:24:30.970 to say D helium -3, it's three times harder to 00:24:30.970 --> 00:24:34.390 make that reaction go. And it might even require 00:24:34.390 --> 00:24:38.589 a different configuration than a tokamak toroidal 00:24:38.589 --> 00:24:45.569 system. But right now, that's one of the biggest 00:24:45.569 --> 00:24:48.950 things. The pot of gold at the end of the rainbow 00:24:48.950 --> 00:24:53.990 is the helium -3 -helium -3 reaction, which has 00:24:53.990 --> 00:25:02.630 no neutrons. And that's the program that we were 00:25:02.630 --> 00:25:07.589 enthusiastic about once we discovered, or we, 00:25:07.589 --> 00:25:11.450 not we, but the Apollo program discovered the 00:25:11.450 --> 00:25:14.130 million metric tons of helium -3 sitting on the 00:25:14.130 --> 00:25:18.079 moon. Prior to that, people knew about the reaction 00:25:18.079 --> 00:25:21.960 of deuterium, helium -3, but the answer always 00:25:21.960 --> 00:25:24.059 was, well, you're not going to do anything with 00:25:24.059 --> 00:25:29.140 a few tens of kilograms. And the real breakthrough 00:25:29.140 --> 00:25:32.339 came through in 1986 when we put two and two 00:25:32.339 --> 00:25:36.539 together between the Apollo program and the fusion 00:25:36.539 --> 00:25:40.920 program. And that story is a very interesting 00:25:40.920 --> 00:25:46.180 one. We had... In that time period, President 00:25:46.180 --> 00:25:51.380 Reagan had a program called the SDI program. 00:25:51.500 --> 00:25:56.660 They were going to try to shoot down missiles 00:25:56.660 --> 00:26:01.400 carrying nuclear weapons with a X -ray laser, 00:26:01.440 --> 00:26:04.599 and they needed power for the X -ray laser. And 00:26:04.599 --> 00:26:11.019 we designed for the Air Force a 30 megawatt system 00:26:11.019 --> 00:26:16.859 electric. that used D helium -3. And we had enough 00:26:16.859 --> 00:26:19.000 helium -3 to do that because a war would only 00:26:19.000 --> 00:26:25.980 last perhaps a few hours or a few days, but not 00:26:25.980 --> 00:26:29.720 enough helium -3 for the production of electricity. 00:26:30.539 --> 00:26:34.299 And so after we designed it for the Air Force, 00:26:35.299 --> 00:26:39.950 we said, well, It's not our job to do the military 00:26:39.950 --> 00:26:44.089 side. It's our job to try to help society, ours 00:26:44.089 --> 00:26:48.410 meaning the University of Wisconsin. And so I 00:26:48.410 --> 00:26:52.450 took the group off campus for about two weeks. 00:26:52.730 --> 00:26:58.069 We went to a motel outside of Madison and we 00:26:58.069 --> 00:27:01.309 tried to figure out where we could get enough 00:27:01.309 --> 00:27:07.000 helium -3 to use helium -3. as a fusion fuel. 00:27:08.059 --> 00:27:12.500 And we spent a week to two weeks going down a 00:27:12.500 --> 00:27:15.079 lot of blind alleys until two of our people came 00:27:15.079 --> 00:27:18.380 up with the idea that, well, the sun makes a 00:27:18.380 --> 00:27:23.200 lot of helium -3. And where does it go? Well, 00:27:24.220 --> 00:27:29.319 any place the solar wind would blow on our solar 00:27:29.319 --> 00:27:34.200 system. would be affected if the body that they 00:27:34.200 --> 00:27:38.019 were transported into either had a magnetic field 00:27:38.019 --> 00:27:40.759 or an atmosphere, because a magnetic field would 00:27:40.759 --> 00:27:48.599 cause the helium -3 to be moved outside the planet. 00:27:50.980 --> 00:28:00.480 And the systems would be... with a gas environment, 00:28:01.160 --> 00:28:04.740 couldn't penetrate that. So people would always 00:28:04.740 --> 00:28:07.220 say, well, helium -3 is interesting, and you 00:28:07.220 --> 00:28:09.720 don't make as many neutrons, or if you go to 00:28:09.720 --> 00:28:12.839 helium -3, helium -3, you make none. But there's 00:28:12.839 --> 00:28:14.779 not enough helium -3 to make any difference. 00:28:15.779 --> 00:28:18.579 And because helium -3 comes from the decay of 00:28:18.579 --> 00:28:21.960 tritium, and tritium is basically man -made, 00:28:22.660 --> 00:28:28.119 as you know. So that was really how we got the 00:28:28.119 --> 00:28:32.259 tie in between the lunar Helium -3 reserves, 00:28:32.519 --> 00:28:36.380 which are about a million metric tons of Helium 00:28:36.380 --> 00:28:40.920 -3, well documented from the Apollo and the Russian 00:28:40.920 --> 00:28:45.759 programs. And now the Chinese are moving very 00:28:45.759 --> 00:28:50.259 fast in that area. They've landed in the high 00:28:50.259 --> 00:28:53.519 Helium -3 concentrations on the moon. They don't 00:28:53.519 --> 00:28:56.700 advertise it very much, but we're in a race with 00:28:56.700 --> 00:29:00.920 the Chinese. Right. It's become quite the global 00:29:00.920 --> 00:29:05.519 thing. I was reading a story I think like yesterday 00:29:05.519 --> 00:29:10.519 where they discovered rust on the moon. And in 00:29:10.519 --> 00:29:14.920 order for that kind of oxidation, there needed 00:29:14.920 --> 00:29:17.720 to be oxygen and there's obviously no oxygen. 00:29:18.200 --> 00:29:20.920 So apparently they found out that every time 00:29:21.769 --> 00:29:27.309 there's a lineup where the Earth is right between 00:29:27.309 --> 00:29:30.970 the Sun and the Moon. The solar radiation from 00:29:30.970 --> 00:29:35.130 the Sun kind of pushes oxygen past the magnetic 00:29:35.130 --> 00:29:37.670 field of the Earth, and there's a little bit 00:29:37.670 --> 00:29:42.650 of oxygen that gets on the Moon. And so it just 00:29:42.650 --> 00:29:44.950 kind of blows on there and stays on there. So 00:29:44.950 --> 00:29:48.630 it's kind of interesting. Well, there's a lot 00:29:48.630 --> 00:29:53.210 of oxygen on the moon, but it's tied up in chemically. 00:29:53.829 --> 00:29:57.730 So it's hard to get it. Free oxygen is hard to 00:29:57.730 --> 00:30:05.450 get. Breathable free oxygen. Gotcha. But is it 00:30:05.450 --> 00:30:09.950 possible to then make with what's there? Can 00:30:09.950 --> 00:30:12.509 we convert what's there to breathable oxygen 00:30:12.509 --> 00:30:16.359 and create an atmosphere? Sure, sure, sure. Maybe 00:30:16.359 --> 00:30:19.460 can we send robots to do that, or do we? Oh, 00:30:19.460 --> 00:30:28.680 sure. I mean, the first application of lunar 00:30:28.680 --> 00:30:33.000 resources will be for life support. And you will 00:30:33.000 --> 00:30:39.619 use the solar energy to extract the solar wind 00:30:39.619 --> 00:30:45.599 volatiles, nitrogen. hydrogen and oxygen and 00:30:45.599 --> 00:30:48.319 others from the lunar regolith and there's a 00:30:48.319 --> 00:30:52.220 lot of hydrogen and a lot of oxygen some nitrogen 00:30:52.220 --> 00:30:56.200 and that will support life support on the moon 00:30:56.200 --> 00:30:59.619 because you know it's very expensive to send 00:30:59.619 --> 00:31:06.859 food to the moon yeah I mean it's fascinating 00:31:06.859 --> 00:31:11.119 stuff I was watching a documentary on Netflix 00:31:11.119 --> 00:31:15.839 on how the JWST telescope was sent up in a couple 00:31:15.839 --> 00:31:18.160 of pieces and there were robots that kind of 00:31:18.160 --> 00:31:21.720 brought themselves together and created it and 00:31:21.720 --> 00:31:25.160 I was just, it inspired me to do the same thing 00:31:25.160 --> 00:31:29.019 with the fusion energy generator. I know we've 00:31:29.019 --> 00:31:34.579 kind of talked about that before but how would 00:31:34.579 --> 00:31:38.380 we, I mean if there were ways like you know, 00:31:38.519 --> 00:31:42.099 space elevators, you know, rail magnets to throw 00:31:42.099 --> 00:31:45.539 it up there or rocket boosters to get it up there. 00:31:46.339 --> 00:31:49.819 What would a fusion energy generator on the moon 00:31:49.819 --> 00:31:53.839 then look like? Can it really just, could it 00:31:53.839 --> 00:31:57.480 process what's already there, generate the electricity, 00:31:58.839 --> 00:32:01.720 make us some water, make us some oxygen, grow 00:32:01.720 --> 00:32:04.519 some plant, like power the robots to grow us 00:32:04.519 --> 00:32:10.799 some plants and do that? Well, the answer to 00:32:10.799 --> 00:32:14.359 that is yes, but of course, it's not as easy 00:32:14.359 --> 00:32:22.519 as it sounds. And the early applications for 00:32:22.519 --> 00:32:25.960 technology on the moon is going to be to extract 00:32:25.960 --> 00:32:31.819 the oxygen, hydrogen, and other minerals that 00:32:31.819 --> 00:32:36.140 you need for life support. And that'll happen 00:32:36.140 --> 00:32:39.690 quickly. I would expect in the next five to ten 00:32:39.690 --> 00:32:43.170 years, we will have units on the moon. We, meaning 00:32:43.170 --> 00:32:46.789 the world, not necessarily the United States, 00:32:48.170 --> 00:32:53.990 will be able to extract the elements that you 00:32:53.990 --> 00:32:57.930 need for life support. That same technology can 00:32:57.930 --> 00:33:01.849 be used to extract the helium -3, but you have 00:33:01.849 --> 00:33:06.470 to do it at a bigger scale. And so we've been 00:33:06.470 --> 00:33:10.289 doing experiments here on the earth to see how 00:33:10.289 --> 00:33:14.809 we could get the helium -3 out of the regolith, 00:33:15.190 --> 00:33:19.150 the very fine powder on the moon. And we found 00:33:19.150 --> 00:33:26.490 that agitation can do it very well. So it reduces 00:33:26.490 --> 00:33:29.930 the energy required to get the helium -3 out 00:33:29.930 --> 00:33:35.059 of the regolith. It's not zero. but it's better 00:33:35.059 --> 00:33:37.940 than thermal energy. But the thermal energy can 00:33:37.940 --> 00:33:42.380 be used to get the components that you need for 00:33:42.380 --> 00:33:44.960 life support. And that'll be the first application. 00:33:45.559 --> 00:33:50.099 Once they do that, then they will be able to 00:33:50.099 --> 00:33:52.700 have a lot of people on their own, have their 00:33:52.700 --> 00:33:56.980 own food growing and so forth. And then that 00:33:56.980 --> 00:34:01.339 technology can be used to start extracting the 00:34:01.339 --> 00:34:08.050 helium -3. Would we put them in canisters and 00:34:08.050 --> 00:34:11.590 send them back or is there a way to send it in 00:34:11.590 --> 00:34:15.269 a solid form and we just you know We do the process 00:34:15.269 --> 00:34:18.769 down here. What which one would happen? No, they 00:34:18.769 --> 00:34:20.409 wouldn't do it on it. You'd do it on the moon. 00:34:20.409 --> 00:34:26.489 I mean Well, you wouldn't send the gas down you'd 00:34:26.489 --> 00:34:30.880 use it on the moon And, of course, you'd get 00:34:30.880 --> 00:34:33.300 a lot of Helium -4, of course, and that'd be 00:34:33.300 --> 00:34:38.420 great for propulsion. And the Moon would be a 00:34:38.420 --> 00:34:44.380 very good place to stop before you go into Mars. 00:34:45.119 --> 00:34:48.820 And so you wouldn't have to send things from 00:34:48.820 --> 00:34:54.079 the Earth directly to Mars. You'd send a rocket 00:34:54.079 --> 00:34:58.150 to the Moon, pick up your material that you need 00:34:58.150 --> 00:35:02.909 for for propulsion and fusion propulsion will 00:35:02.909 --> 00:35:07.530 will get you to the Mars very very quickly so 00:35:07.530 --> 00:35:12.610 it'll be a two -stage process food first energy 00:35:12.610 --> 00:35:17.269 second very cool very cool so so the moon is 00:35:17.269 --> 00:35:20.889 just like a gas station it's like we're going 00:35:20.889 --> 00:35:27.420 to be a big gas station yeah I think I'm selfishly 00:35:27.420 --> 00:35:30.699 thinking about it from like a fusion energy perspective 00:35:30.699 --> 00:35:33.920 on how we would be able to get that helium -3 00:35:33.920 --> 00:35:40.300 down to Earth. That wouldn't be a problem. That 00:35:40.300 --> 00:35:44.780 wouldn't be a problem getting it down because 00:35:44.780 --> 00:35:48.800 you'd be sending rockets going up carrying a 00:35:48.800 --> 00:35:54.969 lot more than carrying back the helium -3. And 00:35:54.969 --> 00:35:57.530 you would drop it off at satellites around the 00:35:57.530 --> 00:35:59.710 earth and then come down from the satellite. 00:36:01.369 --> 00:36:06.050 So once you extract it, getting it back to the 00:36:06.050 --> 00:36:10.489 earth is not going to be a big problem. Oh, right. 00:36:10.590 --> 00:36:12.750 If you figured that out, this would be easier. 00:36:13.110 --> 00:36:17.530 That makes sense. Oh, you know, by the way, the 00:36:17.530 --> 00:36:20.170 helium three on the earth right now is worth 00:36:20.170 --> 00:36:24.210 about four. $4 billion a ton. $4 billion. Yeah, 00:36:24.210 --> 00:36:27.090 because it's a gas. So a ton would be a gigantic. 00:36:27.530 --> 00:36:30.489 Is it from tritium capture that they're letting 00:36:30.489 --> 00:36:36.289 it decay for 12 years? They're not letting it 00:36:36.289 --> 00:36:42.489 decay. Tritium decays with a 12 .3 year half 00:36:42.489 --> 00:36:47.449 -life. Tritium, of course, is a major component 00:36:47.449 --> 00:36:51.659 of hydrogen bombs. And the Russians make a lot 00:36:51.659 --> 00:36:55.820 of that, but they can't stop the tritium from 00:36:55.820 --> 00:37:00.840 being converted into helium -3. And so I think, 00:37:01.340 --> 00:37:04.039 and I don't know the details, but I think the 00:37:04.039 --> 00:37:07.079 French are actually getting the helium -3 from 00:37:07.079 --> 00:37:09.800 the Russians, buying it and then selling it at 00:37:09.800 --> 00:37:15.420 a larger price around the world. And that's where 00:37:15.420 --> 00:37:18.199 our helium -3 would come from. And by the way, 00:37:18.599 --> 00:37:21.199 We have a neighbor north of us who makes a lot 00:37:21.199 --> 00:37:27.519 of helium -3 and their canduria. I think there 00:37:27.519 --> 00:37:31.800 is a percentage of power plants that have the 00:37:31.800 --> 00:37:34.719 tritium capture systems and then there are the 00:37:34.719 --> 00:37:38.880 older generation ones that don't. I mean, you 00:37:38.880 --> 00:37:44.099 would know better than I do, but I'm just, you 00:37:44.099 --> 00:37:47.449 know, when you look at the numbers of fission 00:37:47.449 --> 00:37:51.769 generators being built in Russia, China versus 00:37:51.769 --> 00:37:57.289 Canada and the US. If I put tritium capture systems 00:37:57.289 --> 00:38:00.130 on all of the new generators I was building, 00:38:01.010 --> 00:38:03.050 then I would think that China and Russia would 00:38:03.050 --> 00:38:07.989 have a surplus of it, just as waste from their 00:38:07.989 --> 00:38:12.429 fission systems. But I wouldn't know. Well, it 00:38:12.429 --> 00:38:17.030 depends whether they're using deuterium. at moderator, 00:38:18.030 --> 00:38:22.550 and the Kando reactors use deuterium. And our, 00:38:23.329 --> 00:38:27.969 the United States reactors, it comes from the 00:38:27.969 --> 00:38:32.610 making of tritium in the fission system. And 00:38:32.610 --> 00:38:36.650 you don't make a lot. You make some, and of course 00:38:36.650 --> 00:38:39.389 it's stable. So once you make it and if you extract 00:38:39.389 --> 00:38:46.829 it, it'll sit there. It won't go away. But the 00:38:46.829 --> 00:38:51.090 demand for Helium -3 is only in a few kilograms 00:38:51.090 --> 00:38:55.269 per year level, and that doesn't last you very 00:38:55.269 --> 00:38:58.530 long in the power plant. Right. None of this 00:38:58.530 --> 00:39:01.610 is sustainable for fusion energy, large -scale 00:39:01.610 --> 00:39:04.750 commercialization. The only way to do it is go 00:39:04.750 --> 00:39:07.849 to the moon, but it's possible. Yeah. That's 00:39:07.849 --> 00:39:14.139 what the reserve is. Yeah. Yeah. There will be 00:39:14.139 --> 00:39:16.840 a convergence of the two technologies in terms 00:39:16.840 --> 00:39:20.079 of when fusion energy generators have passed 00:39:20.079 --> 00:39:23.139 the research stages and gotten to the point where 00:39:23.139 --> 00:39:25.559 helium -3 is useful, then the helium -3 will 00:39:25.559 --> 00:39:32.739 be available. Anyway, so just moving on, I guess. 00:39:35.980 --> 00:39:39.539 You've worked in a lot of countries. Dr. Kulsinski, 00:39:39.960 --> 00:39:46.460 who? What are the top four countries do you think 00:39:46.460 --> 00:39:50.420 will have the first fusion energy commercialization 00:39:50.420 --> 00:40:01.059 like is? Is Germany ahead of China No That's 00:40:01.059 --> 00:40:03.420 an interesting question because it depends on 00:40:03.420 --> 00:40:05.860 what time frame you're talking about if you were 00:40:05.860 --> 00:40:10.679 talking about 20 or 30 years ago It was the United 00:40:10.679 --> 00:40:14.360 States and Russia. If you're talking about today, 00:40:14.800 --> 00:40:20.300 it's China and we're number two. That causes 00:40:20.300 --> 00:40:26.420 a lot of debate, of course, but we're maybe at 00:40:26.420 --> 00:40:31.440 best tied with the Chinese. The Russians have 00:40:31.440 --> 00:40:37.460 dropped down to third or fourth. Korea and Japan 00:40:37.460 --> 00:40:42.619 are probably passing up Russia right now. So 00:40:42.619 --> 00:40:45.920 the Russians have really dropped out of the main 00:40:45.920 --> 00:40:52.139 picture. The Chinese are taking it over. So there's 00:40:52.139 --> 00:41:02.809 a big difference. The standard will be 10, 20, 00:41:02.869 --> 00:41:06.929 30 years from now is things that people can speculate 00:41:06.929 --> 00:41:12.190 on, but we don't know. It depends on a lot of 00:41:12.190 --> 00:41:15.690 things. Right now, the Chinese are vying for 00:41:15.690 --> 00:41:26.849 number one. I have faith in some of the commercial 00:41:26.849 --> 00:41:30.789 endeavors in America and I feel like it'll be 00:41:30.789 --> 00:41:33.469 a SpaceX situation where I feel like America 00:41:33.469 --> 00:41:37.230 will win. But maybe that's because I'm an American, 00:41:37.550 --> 00:41:45.170 so maybe it's more hopeful. So other than it's 00:41:45.170 --> 00:41:49.030 harder to fuse, but the physics has been proved 00:41:49.030 --> 00:41:52.340 out. In less than a decade, we'll be able to 00:41:52.340 --> 00:41:55.360 fetch the helium -3 from the moon. What are some 00:41:55.360 --> 00:42:00.019 of the other things then that are technological 00:42:00.019 --> 00:42:08.639 stop gaps for achieving a steady state helium 00:42:08.639 --> 00:42:17.199 -3 aneutronic fusion? Well, there are lots of 00:42:17.199 --> 00:42:23.500 alternate applications. So one, not necessarily 00:42:23.500 --> 00:42:27.159 the top one, but one that you might want to consider 00:42:27.159 --> 00:42:31.699 is using the helium -3 to make 14 MeV protons, 00:42:31.800 --> 00:42:35.260 which can burn up the fission waste that we're 00:42:35.260 --> 00:42:39.380 burying in the ground right now. That doesn't 00:42:39.380 --> 00:42:44.690 really contribute a lot to the... might say business 00:42:44.690 --> 00:42:47.610 world, but it certainly would solve a problem 00:42:47.610 --> 00:42:51.309 of getting rid of nuclear waste. Is that transmutation? 00:42:51.530 --> 00:42:55.090 Is that nuclear transmutation? Yes. To make a 00:42:55.090 --> 00:42:58.550 cheap source of 14 MeV protons, not nutrients. 00:42:59.929 --> 00:43:03.429 And I mean, that's one thing, but it's probably 00:43:03.429 --> 00:43:06.849 not a commercial thing, but it has a big impact 00:43:06.849 --> 00:43:11.050 on society. What would the protons... Sorry. 00:43:11.550 --> 00:43:14.550 What would we be using those protons for? Is 00:43:14.550 --> 00:43:17.670 it possible to have some sort of direct energy 00:43:17.670 --> 00:43:21.309 conversion connect to that? Or, okay, is that 00:43:21.309 --> 00:43:27.190 where we're going? Well, the proton, 14 MeV protons, 00:43:27.230 --> 00:43:32.190 if you bombard a long -lived radioactive material, 00:43:32.489 --> 00:43:35.530 you can change it to a very short -lived radioactive 00:43:35.530 --> 00:43:39.449 material and it'll go away. Depending on the 00:43:39.449 --> 00:43:44.570 half -life, of course. But some things that we're 00:43:44.570 --> 00:43:48.050 bearing right now have a half -life in the thousands 00:43:48.050 --> 00:43:53.969 to an even longer time, a time half -life, thousands 00:43:53.969 --> 00:43:57.469 of years, and a half -life, and they're gonna 00:43:57.469 --> 00:44:01.869 be around for a lot longer than we are. So if 00:44:01.869 --> 00:44:05.829 you can convert them to very short -lived half 00:44:05.829 --> 00:44:09.949 -life, well... half -life materials that have 00:44:09.949 --> 00:44:13.909 half -lives on the order of a year or so, then 00:44:13.909 --> 00:44:17.889 it'll go away in about 10 years. So that would 00:44:17.889 --> 00:44:20.829 be, that'd be one application. The other is you 00:44:20.829 --> 00:44:27.909 can use it to make very short time scale half 00:44:27.909 --> 00:44:33.909 -life materials for medical use. There's a process 00:44:33.909 --> 00:44:38.199 now that people can detect whether somebody is 00:44:38.199 --> 00:44:41.780 going to go into an epileptic fit on an operating 00:44:41.780 --> 00:44:46.320 table, but it requires oxygen 15, which has a 00:44:46.320 --> 00:44:49.199 two -minute half -life. And two -minute half 00:44:49.199 --> 00:44:52.739 -life is something you can't make and transport 00:44:52.739 --> 00:44:55.539 very much because it goes away too quick. But 00:44:55.539 --> 00:44:57.719 if you made it in the next room to the operating 00:44:57.719 --> 00:45:01.019 table and piped it in and combined it with a 00:45:01.019 --> 00:45:05.230 certain molecule. Yeah, they can get a forewarning 00:45:05.230 --> 00:45:07.969 of when somebody is going to go into an epileptic 00:45:07.969 --> 00:45:10.309 fit on the operating table. And of course, they 00:45:10.309 --> 00:45:14.090 can be prepared for it. Now, that's probably 00:45:14.090 --> 00:45:17.550 I don't know about the economics of that. But 00:45:17.550 --> 00:45:21.909 the social impact of that is pretty substantial. 00:45:22.889 --> 00:45:25.530 Because they can't do that. So that's another 00:45:25.530 --> 00:45:30.289 use. Right. So there will be multiple multiple 00:45:30.599 --> 00:45:34.840 uses for everything fusion, eventually, like 00:45:34.840 --> 00:45:38.440 every aspect of it. Yeah, there will be. And 00:45:38.440 --> 00:45:42.139 I'm sure we haven't really more than scratched 00:45:42.139 --> 00:45:45.139 the surface of that because right now that's 00:45:45.139 --> 00:45:48.840 not what people are worried about. But if you 00:45:48.840 --> 00:45:53.269 had a fusion system, operating on different fuels 00:45:53.269 --> 00:45:58.730 anywhere from DT to DD to D Helium -3 to P -BORN11, 00:45:59.010 --> 00:46:00.849 you know, all the ones that we were considering. 00:46:01.610 --> 00:46:04.590 You can start thinking about the non -electrical 00:46:04.590 --> 00:46:08.730 producing systems which can affect the human 00:46:08.730 --> 00:46:13.050 society. That's down the road. Some of them can 00:46:13.050 --> 00:46:16.809 be very near -term. Some of them will take a 00:46:16.809 --> 00:46:20.139 lot longer. But there isn't much money going 00:46:20.139 --> 00:46:22.659 into that research right now. But there's money 00:46:22.659 --> 00:46:26.199 in other things, you know. I'm in the process 00:46:26.199 --> 00:46:29.380 of writing an article for just like a LinkedIn 00:46:29.380 --> 00:46:35.139 article on using fusion energy, how you would 00:46:35.139 --> 00:46:37.900 need fusion energy for something like cryptocurrency, 00:46:38.599 --> 00:46:41.139 how cryptocurrency, just the plans that people 00:46:41.139 --> 00:46:44.780 have, it's just not possible without fusion energy. 00:46:44.920 --> 00:46:48.940 The drain on the grid is too much. I think cryptocurrency 00:46:48.940 --> 00:46:52.400 last year used more energy than Idaho or something. 00:46:53.480 --> 00:47:00.000 So it's really just not sustainable. And even 00:47:00.000 --> 00:47:03.780 things like the advent of AI and quantum computing 00:47:03.780 --> 00:47:11.139 and just the energy that all of that takes, I 00:47:11.139 --> 00:47:15.739 think it's almost not even possible to do. at 00:47:15.739 --> 00:47:22.960 a sustainable scale if we don't figure out fusion. 00:47:23.099 --> 00:47:25.940 So there are a lot of lucrative things that fusion 00:47:25.940 --> 00:47:31.139 will bring about that would offset the social 00:47:31.139 --> 00:47:35.639 causes, so to speak. I think the use in space 00:47:35.639 --> 00:47:40.400 is another one where we have very long duration 00:47:40.400 --> 00:47:46.539 space trips and You're going to need diagnostics 00:47:46.539 --> 00:47:50.460 if somebody has a cancer or something in the 00:47:50.460 --> 00:47:53.460 years that they will be traveling from the earth 00:47:53.460 --> 00:47:58.079 to someplace else. And you can make those isotopes 00:47:58.079 --> 00:48:03.880 that can be combined with imaging systems to 00:48:03.880 --> 00:48:07.920 show whether you have abnormalities in the human 00:48:07.920 --> 00:48:13.840 person. But I'm not sure that's an economic thing, 00:48:13.860 --> 00:48:18.179 but it certainly will keep people who have 10 00:48:18.179 --> 00:48:30.000 -year, 20 -year travels much healthier. But they're 00:48:30.000 --> 00:48:31.800 not going to make any money out of that. I think 00:48:31.800 --> 00:48:41.869 it's just saving lives. If one system is breeding 00:48:41.869 --> 00:48:46.590 the right word when we talk about these isotopes 00:48:46.590 --> 00:48:49.289 and elements we're going to make, when we create 00:48:49.289 --> 00:48:53.809 these systems to do them, is it possible to use 00:48:53.809 --> 00:48:58.050 fusion for more than one isotope, whether it 00:48:58.050 --> 00:49:01.030 be medical isotope, like so could we make deuterium, 00:49:01.130 --> 00:49:06.340 tritium, helium -3, helium -4, all with a inertial 00:49:06.340 --> 00:49:09.239 or magnetic confinement fusion energy unit, but 00:49:09.239 --> 00:49:11.800 it would be the one unit that makes all of them. 00:49:12.000 --> 00:49:15.539 Is that is the physics? Yeah, that's right. That's 00:49:15.539 --> 00:49:18.639 right. Because it depends on what you bombard. 00:49:19.440 --> 00:49:23.800 It do things. One, what are you making to cause 00:49:23.800 --> 00:49:28.440 a nuclear change? Is it a neutron? Is it a gamma 00:49:28.440 --> 00:49:34.380 ray or some other form of radiation? and what 00:49:34.380 --> 00:49:39.119 is the half -life and what is this chemical proclivity 00:49:39.119 --> 00:49:43.099 so that you can combine it with certain molecules 00:49:43.099 --> 00:49:46.400 that will give you a diagnostic. I mean, there's 00:49:46.400 --> 00:49:51.800 a whole medical area here that is untapped that 00:49:51.800 --> 00:49:54.159 would be, at least from a science standpoint, 00:49:54.599 --> 00:49:59.639 be very interesting. Economically, I can't really, 00:49:59.639 --> 00:50:05.539 really project that. I mean, if we can make a 00:50:05.539 --> 00:50:08.199 system where we can breed things like tritium, 00:50:08.239 --> 00:50:13.239 and tritium is incredibly expensive, and so is 00:50:13.239 --> 00:50:16.079 deuterium. If we can build a system that can 00:50:16.079 --> 00:50:20.360 do 10 different isotopes, then it would automatically 00:50:20.360 --> 00:50:23.139 be commercially viable, I would think. I mean, 00:50:23.280 --> 00:50:27.559 if you make two things that... the pharma and 00:50:27.559 --> 00:50:30.739 the DOD industry can use, then you can make eight 00:50:30.739 --> 00:50:33.800 things at a loss and still come up with a profit 00:50:33.800 --> 00:50:41.139 at the end of the day. We talk about making industrial 00:50:41.139 --> 00:50:47.119 heating units. I've been kind of beating down 00:50:47.119 --> 00:50:51.440 the idea of using fusion energy industrial heat 00:50:51.440 --> 00:50:55.719 for liquid fuel manufacturing, steel manufacturing, 00:50:55.980 --> 00:51:00.659 and cement manufacturing. And we recently spoke 00:51:00.659 --> 00:51:05.699 with a company that wants to make jet fuel with 00:51:05.699 --> 00:51:08.699 biomass. And all of that requires you to have 00:51:08.699 --> 00:51:15.280 heat of above 1 ,200 degrees centigrade. We've 00:51:15.280 --> 00:51:19.219 had a lot of conversations around hydrogen, H2 00:51:19.219 --> 00:51:25.630 production. But if we could have a clean heat 00:51:25.630 --> 00:51:30.510 source for it at 1 ,200 degrees, we could power 00:51:30.510 --> 00:51:34.630 cars. Hydrogen is almost better and more sustainable 00:51:34.630 --> 00:51:40.449 for cars. So these are all conversations in the 00:51:40.449 --> 00:51:46.570 ethos. Well, and I'm sure we really haven't gotten 00:51:46.570 --> 00:51:50.619 very deep into this because people have been 00:51:50.619 --> 00:51:55.880 99 .9 % focused on making electricity with fusion, 00:51:57.079 --> 00:52:00.599 but about 10 to 20 years ago, we started to think 00:52:00.599 --> 00:52:03.000 about near -term applications, and we identified 00:52:03.000 --> 00:52:09.000 36 near -term applications. But we don't have 00:52:09.000 --> 00:52:15.280 the bandwidth to cover them all. So. Yeah. Yeah. 00:52:15.400 --> 00:52:19.590 I think it's coming. I think... We live in a 00:52:19.590 --> 00:52:25.829 time where, you know, we just have to do it. 00:52:25.849 --> 00:52:29.329 We just have to do it. There is no other way 00:52:29.329 --> 00:52:31.769 out. And I think more and more people are recognizing 00:52:31.769 --> 00:52:36.530 that. And luckily for humanity, the science is 00:52:36.530 --> 00:52:40.329 lining up, meaning the work that folks like you 00:52:40.329 --> 00:52:43.530 have been doing for the last like 50, 60 years 00:52:43.530 --> 00:52:50.300 without any proper vision of fruition, so to 00:52:50.300 --> 00:52:54.000 speak. I think all of that, there's like a culmination 00:52:54.000 --> 00:52:57.260 of all of that work right now. And I feel like 00:52:57.260 --> 00:53:00.539 there's funding available for it from new sources 00:53:00.539 --> 00:53:03.340 that didn't exist before. And by that I mean 00:53:03.340 --> 00:53:05.639 the private equity and the venture capital world 00:53:05.639 --> 00:53:09.260 is taking a more serious look at fusion. So I 00:53:09.260 --> 00:53:14.280 feel like It's really going to happen. I'm hopeful, 00:53:14.280 --> 00:53:16.920 obviously, like that's my job. That's part of 00:53:16.920 --> 00:53:20.880 my job. But I feel from a very pragmatic perspective, 00:53:22.760 --> 00:53:26.099 the world recognizes that technologically, some 00:53:26.099 --> 00:53:28.420 of the larger things that we hope for in terms 00:53:28.420 --> 00:53:32.260 of space exploration or cryptocurrencies or any 00:53:32.260 --> 00:53:36.500 of these things, we need some large fuel sources 00:53:36.500 --> 00:53:39.139 and we cannot do it the same way that we've been 00:53:39.139 --> 00:53:46.650 doing it before. And from a step back even, we 00:53:46.650 --> 00:53:50.190 feel like we've really been using fuels like 00:53:50.190 --> 00:53:53.050 this for 150 years. That's like a blip of time 00:53:53.050 --> 00:53:57.110 in humanity. So there's nothing we cannot fix. 00:53:58.050 --> 00:54:04.269 I feel like if the next two or three generations 00:54:04.269 --> 00:54:07.130 can build a proper foundation for fusion energy 00:54:07.130 --> 00:54:09.250 commercialization, then anything is possible. 00:54:10.190 --> 00:54:18.510 Anyway, I have two last questions. One is, what 00:54:18.510 --> 00:54:21.929 was the largest fusion energy challenge that 00:54:21.929 --> 00:54:27.769 you have ever seen and how did you overcome it? 00:54:29.590 --> 00:54:36.230 Well, again, it falls into physics versus engineering 00:54:36.230 --> 00:54:39.550 because they're quite different. but they're 00:54:39.550 --> 00:54:42.269 both, you have to solve both problems otherwise 00:54:42.269 --> 00:54:48.369 it doesn't work. And I can only speak from the 00:54:48.369 --> 00:54:53.650 engineering side at this point. And the largest 00:54:53.650 --> 00:54:57.590 problem, of course, is how do you control the 00:54:57.590 --> 00:55:01.170 radiation damage and the large amount of radioactivity 00:55:01.170 --> 00:55:04.650 that you generate using deuterium tritium fuels? 00:55:07.199 --> 00:55:11.440 That's a big challenge. It's one that's not very 00:55:11.440 --> 00:55:18.599 well thought out yet by the community. But one 00:55:18.599 --> 00:55:21.000 way to get rid of that, of course, is to go to 00:55:21.000 --> 00:55:24.460 advanced fuels, aneutronic systems, or at least 00:55:24.460 --> 00:55:27.099 systems that have very small amounts of nutrients 00:55:27.099 --> 00:55:32.300 emitted, because the neutrons cause radiation 00:55:32.300 --> 00:55:36.920 damage, which limits the life. And these designs 00:55:36.920 --> 00:55:39.500 for fusion reactors are so complex, but if you 00:55:39.500 --> 00:55:43.579 have to change out the structures in a fusion 00:55:43.579 --> 00:55:46.980 reactor, it's gonna take you months if not years 00:55:46.980 --> 00:55:50.360 to do that. And you can't make any money out 00:55:50.360 --> 00:55:54.219 of that. The electricity production would not 00:55:54.219 --> 00:55:59.960 be economical. So radiation damage from 14 MAV 00:55:59.960 --> 00:56:03.469 neutrons is probably the biggest issue. from 00:56:03.469 --> 00:56:10.389 an engineering side. The handling of heat and 00:56:10.389 --> 00:56:15.550 electricity production and distribution are things 00:56:15.550 --> 00:56:18.389 that the fission community is pretty well fixed 00:56:18.389 --> 00:56:21.610 for us. And the fission community has also come 00:56:21.610 --> 00:56:26.190 up with pretty good regulations on radioactivity, 00:56:26.650 --> 00:56:32.539 what you can handle and what you can't. I remember 00:56:32.539 --> 00:56:36.079 when I, in the sixties, when I worked at Hanford, 00:56:36.539 --> 00:56:43.280 we had a 14 MB neutron generator and we had it 00:56:43.280 --> 00:56:45.599 inside a building that was about a hundred yards 00:56:45.599 --> 00:56:49.000 from a road. Every time we turned it on, we had 00:56:49.000 --> 00:56:54.900 to close the road because the 14 MB neutrons 00:56:54.900 --> 00:56:58.420 are right through the... graphite moderator and 00:56:58.420 --> 00:57:02.719 out to the concrete walls and into the end of 00:57:02.719 --> 00:57:08.639 the road. So it's not an easy problem to handle. 00:57:09.460 --> 00:57:12.039 And we can learn a lot from the fission community 00:57:12.039 --> 00:57:16.780 because they've had some pretty good regulations. 00:57:17.639 --> 00:57:21.900 And so I think the key word here is a neutrality. 00:57:22.380 --> 00:57:25.199 You're probably going to have to use deuterium 00:57:25.199 --> 00:57:29.500 tritium to get to breakeven and beyond. But beyond 00:57:29.500 --> 00:57:35.639 that, to make an economical fusion system, you're 00:57:35.639 --> 00:57:37.760 probably going to have to go to aneutronic fusion. 00:57:39.980 --> 00:57:44.760 I 100 % agree. It's just not scalable otherwise. 00:57:47.780 --> 00:57:52.000 Were your parents scientists? No, no they were 00:57:52.000 --> 00:57:59.250 not. No, they were not. They worked in the public 00:57:59.250 --> 00:58:06.389 sector, farmers as well, fishermen on the Mississippi 00:58:06.389 --> 00:58:11.650 River, commercial fishermen when that was a viable 00:58:11.650 --> 00:58:14.530 occupation. Nowadays, I don't think you could 00:58:14.530 --> 00:58:18.170 do it. But yeah, I spent a lot of time in my 00:58:18.170 --> 00:58:23.179 youth working with them. on the rivers, and we 00:58:23.179 --> 00:58:26.420 used to drive cars across the Mississippi River 00:58:26.420 --> 00:58:30.159 in the winter. Wow. It freezes over that much? 00:58:30.159 --> 00:58:34.900 With water, with water on both sides of us. And 00:58:34.900 --> 00:58:39.920 I tell you, if you weren't, I always used to 00:58:39.920 --> 00:58:42.719 stand on, when cars had running boards, I always 00:58:42.719 --> 00:58:44.559 used to stand on the running board because I 00:58:44.559 --> 00:58:47.559 didn't want to be inside the car. And we only 00:58:47.559 --> 00:58:54.110 lost two cars. Oh. Just two. But, you know, people 00:58:54.110 --> 00:58:57.130 did that sort of stuff. So you could jump off 00:58:57.130 --> 00:58:59.389 easier. What's a running board? Is that the thing 00:58:59.389 --> 00:59:01.489 on the side that you would stand on? Never seen 00:59:01.489 --> 00:59:04.710 a running board. Okay. I don't know anything 00:59:04.710 --> 00:59:07.530 about cars, so it might not be a typing thing. 00:59:08.170 --> 00:59:09.869 Yeah, they don't have it. They don't have them 00:59:09.869 --> 00:59:15.170 anymore. But they had a little step on the door. 00:59:16.489 --> 00:59:18.349 And yeah, you used to stand on the running boards. 00:59:20.449 --> 00:59:25.690 That's how we got across the river. But they 00:59:25.690 --> 00:59:31.949 were not scientists or educators, although my 00:59:31.949 --> 00:59:38.449 children are in the education business and audiologists 00:59:38.449 --> 00:59:43.719 and so forth. But things change. Yeah, so that 00:59:43.719 --> 00:59:46.559 was going to be my last question like you you 00:59:46.559 --> 00:59:49.280 are more than a researcher and a fusion energy 00:59:49.280 --> 00:59:55.380 pioneer You are you're a teacher How how? What 00:59:55.380 --> 01:00:00.199 can we? To close this off. What can we say to 01:00:00.199 --> 01:00:03.820 the young people that? Need to get into this 01:00:03.820 --> 01:00:06.639 field because more than technology and physics 01:00:06.639 --> 01:00:11.780 and engineering We need driven human beings who 01:00:11.780 --> 01:00:14.679 are willing to research this stuff and bring 01:00:14.679 --> 01:00:18.480 it to fruition. How do we get them to do it, 01:00:18.599 --> 01:00:19.400 Dr. Kosinski?