Carbon-Carbon Fusion

Arrow · Post by **Arrow** » 2003-07-07 06:13pm

I've done a quick Google for this, but came up empty.

How much energy, per kilogram, does carbon-carbon fusion produce? While we're at it, how about helium-helium fusion?

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-07-07 07:30pm

its likely to be negative net energy.

Stormin · Post by **Stormin** » 2003-07-07 07:36pm

kojikun wrote:its likely to be negative net energy.

if it was done inside a star, the energy would be positive since, iirc, iron is the first material on the periodic table that will not create a self-sustaining fusion reaction.

Gil Hamilton · Post by **Gil Hamilton** » 2003-07-07 07:48pm

kojikun wrote:its likely to be negative net energy.

It would be positive net energy, since iron is the line where you begin to get net negative energy for fusion.

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-07-07 08:30pm

ah ok. then atleast its going to be very difficult to achieve.

SyntaxVorlon · Post by **SyntaxVorlon** » 2003-07-08 02:32am

Unless you are able to produce the sort of energies that the force of star gravity does in a labratory setting you aren't going to get jack squat.

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-07-08 02:40am

exactly. its going to be a hard and useless process. you could do it with an accelerator, but why? its easier to use hydrogen and helium.

victorhadin · Post by **victorhadin** » 2003-07-11 10:23am

Graphs for binding energy per nucleon can help with this.

Some simple binding energy graphs:

http://fusedweb.pppl.gov/CPEP/Chart_Pag ... Works.html

More graphs, some better, some worse:

http://www.physics.hereford.ac.uk/binding_energy.htm

http://cosmos.colorado.edu/cw2/courses/ ... _be_1.html

The net energy yield per nucleon is the difference between the binding energies of the two sides of the fusion equation.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2003-07-11 03:06pm

Why do trhis anyway unless you were running out of a fuel in a fusion powered spacecraft?

H + H = g00dness.

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-07-11 03:11pm

Admiral Valdemar wrote:H + H = g00dness.

no, H + H = impossibleness. He-3 + De-2 = goodness.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2003-07-11 03:17pm

kojikun wrote:
Admiral Valdemar wrote:H + H = g00dness.
no, H + H = impossibleness. He-3 + De-2 = goodness.

Bah, I was trying to avoid technical details.

All that supposed He-3 on the Moon would be a great refuel station for future fusion powered craft.

*Awaits Moonbase Alpha to be made*

kojikun · Post by **kojikun** » 2003-07-11 04:08pm

Admiral Valdemar wrote:
Bah, I was trying to avoid technical details. All that supposed He-3 on the Moon would be a great refuel station for future fusion powered craft.

*Awaits Moonbase Alpha to be made*

Pah. Moon. Feh. Figure this:

If you took the entire planet earth, and made every nation equally modern and hightech and industrial and energy consuming as the United States, then multiplied it by one million, the amount of Helium-3 in Jupiter would be able to power those million hightech earths for 4 or 5 billion years. There are enough asteroids and enough material in them to build enough world-ships to carry all those humans out of the solar system in relative comfort.

We don't need to go to other starsystems, we have so many resources here. But who wants to stay in one solar system, eh?