STAR POWER FOR HUMANITY

Nearly a dozen years ago I wrote an article for The Huffington Post on Star Power for Humanity.  The latest June issue of Scientific American featured Star Power: What is the future of fusion energy?  You can click on that link for the full article.  I'll summarize:

• This past December, the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNR) claimed a breakthrough in attaining net positive with their laser fusion system.  No one had ever done that before.

• 
  As an aside, I worked there in the 1970's on that project, and left because I could not envision the laser that would accomplish this task.  Can you believe that was around half a century ago?
• The bad news is that net positive is a long way from commercialization.  And certainly, that intriguing ultimate laser has not yet been invented.

• 
  Well anyway, this article was written by Philip Ball, a British science writer who is my same age.  He has a PhD in physics from Bristol University.  Easy to read Sci Am article with no equations.

• 
  His next book will be How Life Works, which has not yet been released.
• Says Ball, commercial fusion is 20 years away, or maybe 30 or 50...or more.
• But fusion is the answer to global warming.  The question is whether it will arrive in time.
• Enrico Fermi, who built the foundation for the first atomic bomb, envisioned a future for fusion reactors.

• 
  This I again add.  I worked for Edward Teller at LLNR.  He invented the Hydrogen Bomb.  That is also star power, but uncontrolled.
• Says Omar Hurricane of that lab, We're basically making stars on Earth.

• 
  The most popular fusion design does not use a laser,  A Tokamak reactor is currently being pursued by ITER in France.  Stands for International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor, and, appropriately enough, this acronym in Latin means "the way."  But the magnetic confinement process (a laser uses inertial confinement, which minimizes materials issues) is awesomely difficult to develop and there has been a series of delays.  A remarkable international alliance proceeds, but I don't see commercialization until after 2050, if ever.  That other pathway using a laser has the USA as the clear world leader.

• 
  Various private initiatives are also in the running, but with minimal funding.
• The Father of the Tokamak, Soviet fusion visionary Lev Artsimovich, once said that the world will have nuclear fusion when it decides it needs it.  

• 
  More recently, Ian Chapman of the UK has said, when we realize what climate change will do as an existential threat, the delivery of fusion will accelerate enormously.

So on the one hand we have fission power using heavy elements like uranium and plutonium which is rapidly gaining obsolescence for cost and a range of unknowns ranging from terrorism potential to radioactive waste storage to accidents.  Chernobyl and Fukushima feed those fears.

If only the U.S. government had chosen to develop thorium for power, we might not today be troubled by these problems.  More than a decade ago I had dinner with the undisputed champion of this pathway, Kirk Sorensen.  Watch his TED talk on this subject.

Then, on the other hand, we have Star Power, or fusion, which is inherently safer with fuel said to be available for many centuries, if not forever.

• But commercialization will take time...maybe too long.  

• 
  Further, there is the controversy about fuel availability.  
• Stars use hydrogen (also called protium) to produce energy.  
• Humanity cannot currently attain the conditions in the middle of these hot bodies, and require a combination of deuterium and tritium, two isotopes of hydrogen.  

• 
  Tritium might not be so readily available.  
• However, sufficient funds have historically been allocated to develop both forms of fusion, so those who know must be comfortable with the ultimate availability of the fuel for fusion.  
• I'm accept that viewpoint.
• 
  In any case, I still have not written off cold fusion, which remains sufficiently intriguing.
• Plus there can still be the Hydrogen Economy, a world someday operating with a combination of green electricity and hydrogen.  This gaseous fuel will especially be crucial for next generation aviation, articulated in my HuffPo of 14 years ago.

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DOODADS

I said yesterday that I would provide more details about China's new covid crisis today.  Well, I couldn't find anything more, so will continue my search and lay out the situation on Thursday, my day for this virus.

Instead, a little bit of everything to bring you up to date on even the most eclectic of topics, like the National Hockey League Stanley Cup Finals.  The only ice hockey games I watch are during some of the Winter Olympics.

I begin with what the New York Times sends me every morning, a summary of what happened and will.  To begin, this is their expectation of a very hot summer:

Hawaii looks to be great, so come over if you have a lot of money.  Also

Blowout win: The Miami Heat beat the Boston Celtics in Game 7. They will face the Denver Nuggets in the N.B.A. finals.

Golden Knights advance, too: Las Vegas is back in the Stanley Cup Final for the second time in the franchise’s six-year history after a 6-0 rout in Dallas.

The next Tiger? The world is ready for Rose Zhang, the golf wunderkind who makes her pro debut this weekend.

Who is Rose Zhang?  20-year old from California who won the U.S. Women's Amateur when she was 17, and became the first woman to win the individual NCAA Championship two years in a row.  Last year and this year.  She will become a junior at Stanford.  She turns pro this week and will be at the Mizuho Open.  Thursday, 11AM EDT on the Golf Channel.

NBC News also sends me a morning run-down.  Like here, about the debt ceiling:

South Carolina Rep. Ralph Norman called the deal "insanity" and said the bill had "virtually no cuts." Texas Rep. Chip Roy (right) blasted the deal as a "turd-sandwich" in a torrent of tweets. And Sen. Rand Paul lamented the bill's "fake spending cuts," adding in a tweet, "Conservatives have been sold out again!" 

As I said, you will hear those and more.  Here is a sensible House Republican, which, I would imagine, will help carry the vote.  Not all of them are nuts.

"I've talked to dozens of members — and listen, not every single member is on board," South Dakota Rep. Dusty Johnson said. "But when is the last time that every single member of Congress agreed on anything?"

Similar statements lamenting the matter are rife from liberal Democrats.  But that's the plan to get re-elected in the fall of 2024.  The bill will pass, with McCarthy and Biden gaining credence.  No Great Recession and our Democracy will continue.  Want to read the details?  Here is a summary.

You will read about that weekend shooting of nine in Hollywood, Florida.  Big deal on the news channels.  All will live.  Nothing much on TV about the 44 shot this weekend in Chicago, 9 fatally.  And this is just for one city in Illinois.  Over the past two decades roughly two locals die from some kind of armed weapon EVERY DAY IN THIS CITY!

There was a time when films came out to theaters.  I must have watched from 25 to 50 of them every year, with a lot of popcorn or restaurant meals.  Had to drive there and back.  If wine with lunch, then a double-bill.  But that was before the Pandemic. The danger is supposedly over (except for that outbreak in China), and people have stopped wearing masks.  Yet, I still avoid theaters, but mostly because it's so easy to watch Netflix and Amazon Prime in the safe comfort of home.  And this is a lot cheaper.  My lifestyle has changed.

One problem is that the best films now are found on streaming channels to which I don't subscribe.   I can't afford paying a monthly bill to all of them.  Well, I think I can, but have difficulty just keeping up with what I have, so why.

This is why  THE BEE GEES:  HOW CAN YOU MEND A BROKEN HEART, released three years ago, is so monumental.  Only previously shown on HBO/Max, somehow, CNN worked out a deal and featured it this past weekend.  Watched the show.  Fabulous.  Rotten Tomatoes gave it sterling 96/93 ratings.  Did you know these brothers wrote over 1,000 songs, many you know sung by others, and themselves had 20 #1 hits?  Here are eleven of them by these others...and you can view Grease by Frankie Valli, If I Can't Have You by Yvonne Elliman and Woman in Love by Barbra Streisand, among them.

Back tonight is my favorite summer TV program.  Season 18 of America's Got Talent.

• Same judges:  Simon Cowell, Howie Mandel, Heidi Klum and Sofia Vergara, with Terry Crews moderating.
• More Golden Buzzers.

And speaking of Golden Buzzers, Simon has selected his for this season and he says she’s amazing.

“This is the start, I believe, of something very, very special for her,” he said. “And what’s so interesting about the show, is it does deliver on its promise. I think now everyone’s coming on the show because they really want to be in Vegas. And there’s so many people now who’ve actually had their dreams come true. So, I think that’s why people now fly in from all over the world to compete. Because if one of these auditions goes viral, which they do, everything changes.”

• 
  Six of the past eight winners started with this golden buzzer.
• Simon lost his voice in early episodes.
• The winner gets $1 million and the opportunity to headline the America's Got Talent live show in Las Vegas.
• Are you interested?

America’s Got Talent auditions have closed. You can find out more about virtual and in-person auditions for future seasons at www.AGTauditions.com. For more information, visit the FAQ section on the AGT website.

The all-time favorite performer, and certainly mine, after all these years, is Kodi Lee.  If you've never heard of him, watch THIS.  Approaching half a billion views.  Note the reaction of the judges.  He is autistic and blind.

Former Super Typhoon Betty (Mawar) is soon to lose hurricane strength and will skirt by Okinawa tomorrow, with a projection of further weakening and a track taking the storm far enough east of Japan.

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TURKEY, INDY 500 AND SPELLING BEE

Before I get into what you see above, first, China is back in covid crisis, and I'll have a full coverage tomorrow.  How bad?  Well, the whole world this past week (7 days) experienced around 300,000 new cases.  China will have 65 million new cases/per week for at least the month of June!!!  This is so shocking that I need more time to gather reputable information.

Second, this is Memorial Day, a national holiday, and time for circumspection and forethought.

Actually, there is a sixth branch of the military, the U.S. Space Force, which was created on 20December2019, and reports to the U.S. Air Force, a similar relationship as the Marine Corps and Navy.  The USSP currently has 8600 active duty personnel with access to 77 spacecraft.   This was Trump's doing, but Biden apparently has decided to continue operations.  The current issue is whether SpaceCom moves from Colorado Springs to Huntsville, Alabama.  Lots of politics involved.

Recep Erdogan beat his opposition in a run-off election yesterday  First time he has been anywhere close to being unseated.  But he'll be leading Turkey as president until 2028, something he has been doing since 2014.  He was also prime minister from 2003-2014 and mayor of Istanbul from 1994-8.  He is 69-years old.

Turkey plays Russia off against the Western World.  Erdogan likes being in NATO, and plays an important balancing act, supplying drones to Ukraine and negotiation continuing grain shipments, while purchasing Russian oil and gas, cheaply.  But maybe this is because the country is located between East and West.  But will he join the European Union?

Josef Newgarden of the U.S. driving for Team Penske, became the first American since 2016 to win the Indianapolis 500.  Only three have been winners since 2007.  I don't remember watching this race in decades.  However, I happened to click on this channel when a crash occurred with 16 laps to go.  Red flag.  Then, another red flag with 6 laps to go.  Finally, a third red flag with only 3 labs left.  All drivers walked away uninjured.  What particularly drew my interest were cameras in the cockpit and also outside the car.  You see everything that happens, in split screen, in real time.  Amazing.  They need to keep split-second control for three hours.  Watch this.   Another You Tube near the end. Extended highlights.

Turns out that those Indy cars now have a good safety record.  42 drivers have died (plus 32 others, like crew, etc.)  Fifty years ago, 1973, saw a range of deaths.  Since then, cars and tracks have been improved so that only one Indianapolis 500 driver has since died in this race.  Yes, he waved the green flag, and Jewel sang the national anthem.  Did you know Driver's (the actor) past included the University of Indianapolis, Juillard and three years in the Marines?  Then won two Oscars.

These cars can produce up to 700 horsepower, have a top speed of 240 MPH and zoom from zero to 200 in about 8 seconds.  In case you were wondering, Formula F1 cars are a few pounds heavier and have a top speed slightly lower than Indy vehicles.  However F1s can accelerate faster.

Indy cars race in the U.S.  The F1 calendar this year will include 23 races in 20 countries, traveling 75,000 miles and transporting 1500 tons of equipment/entry.  The final race will be on November 26 in Abu Dhabi, and our tour bus zoomed through the track where these cars will race when we visited the country late last year.  There will be three in the U.S.:  #5 Miami (that was on May 7), #19 Austin (October 22) and #22 Las Vegas (November 19).

Indianapolis 500 winners generally get $3 million.  But it's more complicated than that because this sum is shared with the crew and company.  F1 racers supposedly earn from $1 million to $55 million/year, with Max Verstappen at the high end.  He won the #7 F1 race this weekend in Monaco in 1:48:52, 28 seconds faster than the #2.  That was his 4th victory this season, and was able to survive two wall clips.

There is also the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR), which uses stock cars pretty much off the manufacturing line, with minor variation, around twice the weight of the other two, with a V-8 engine, going up to 200 MPH, and from 0 to 60 in 3.4 seconds.  You too can buy the almost Toyota Camry, Ford Mustang and Chevrolet Camaro.  Would look identical to NASCARs, except with those slight internal improvements.  They are pondering a switch some day to electric or hydrogen fuel cell cars.  Nah, not the latter.

The entire NASCAR Cup Series has seen 28 driver deaths, but the last one was in 2001, Dale Earnhardt.  52 F1 drivers have died since 1952, but safety measures have helped so that the latest was in 2017.  And I've mentioned the recent good record of the Indy 500.

One final note about racing, NASCAR has their Coca Cola 600 at the Charlotte Motor Speedway today.  Rain caused a delay to a 3PM EDT start and will be on Fox.  It's sold out if you live there.  It will take 4 hours for a 400 lap race.  Have you noticed, by the way, that Coke now has almost too many sodas?  Certainly you missed Starlight and Dreamworld, both super sweet, but the latest is Coke Move,  Ready for this?  Sort of tastes like bubblegum, or maybe banana.

One more item to watch, the 7th game, Heat at Celtics.  On TNT, 7PM EDT.  If Boston wins, that will be the first time any NBA team recovers after three losses.  Betting houses say there is a 75% chance they will.  However, if Gabe Vincent is fully healthy, and Duncan Robinson again comes through at the end, those are reasons why you watch.

I noticed that 15 Craigside is competing in the Kupuna spelling bee this summer.  Sponsored by Hawaiian and Alaskan Air Lines, so the winner will win up to 50,000 miles and free trips.  However, the major one is the Scripps National Spelling Bee, where the finals will be broadcast on Thursday, June 1, on the Ion Channel.  Why?  Ion is owned by Scripps.  If you check, some sources say the Ion Channel is at 1539.  No such channel in Honolulu Spectrum.  However, I called, and if you live where I live, I will get it on Channel 27, KPXOHD.  I see the programming beginning at 7PM on June 1, so recorded it.  Then, I thought if the station is KPXOHD, it was be also at a high definition channel, and surely enough, also at 1027, so that is where I will record the two-hour show.  So when I went to 1027 it was already on record mode.  Hmmm.

I've been watching Mawar since she was a super typhoon approaching Guam, strength went as high as 185 MPH.  The latest worry is the approach of Typhoon Mawar towards Okinawa.  While the eye has dropped to "only" 105 MPH, The Japan Times has some information, with tracking provided by Accuweather.

Tomorrow:  the new China covid crisis.  Incidentally, Shanghai today recorded its highest May temperature ever, hitting 97 degrees.  Yes, global warming.

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HAVE I FAILED IN MY PROFESSIONAL LIFE? OR SET THE STAGE FOR FUTURE SUCCESS?

First of all, good news.  There has been sufficient agreement on increasing the national debt ceiling.

• The next new ceiling will again become a crisis point in early 2025 after the next presidential election.
• Appears that there will be some Democrat concessions regarding work requirements and standards on recipients of food stamps.  Medicaid will remain untouched.
• 
  As Janet Yellen has more recently indicated an absolute deadline of Thursday, June 8, there will be some discussions in the House on Tuesday, where there will be grudging approval, followed by action in the Senate, probably on Wednesday.  Then the President signs on Thursday and the world will be saved from a Great Recession.  Might take a day later than Yellen's warning, but everything seems at this point  to be okay.
• I guess there will not be a fatal Act Two by Republicans.  What's that?  Read my posting of 26May2023.

So my take:

• Speaker Kevin McCarthy said that he has 95% of the his members happy, and while a few ultra conservations will moan, a lot, they don't add to 10 votes.  McCarthy will be admired for showing good sense and control.
• A lot off progressive Democrats will scream and rant, and they are being told to do so to show the necessary liberal colors for the next congressional season, which kind of makes Biden look good for working out a compromise.
• President Joe Biden has in his pocket at least 10 Democrats who will vote as needed, and probably 20.  These are the ones in safe seats and can come up with the reason for such a noble act.  What do they get?  Sure funding bargains for their state in the future.
• The House will pass the agreement, and so will the Senate.
• The Republicans will claim victory for they got a few key concessions.
• Biden will tout the two-year agreement, meaning this won't happen again until after the 5 November 2024 presidential election.
• The fact of the matter is that the debt ceiling will be increased, for the defense budget will again go up, with almost everything else remaining fixed for the next fiscal year.
• This was a standard political stalemate.  Both sides won and lost.
• There will be no fiscal default.

I was reading the May 2023 issue of STANFORD magazine this weekend, featuring The Breakout Bunch, or research to reach the world, which convinced me that failure can well be a necessary step for ultimate success.  Or, at least that can well rationalize the success of my professional life.

• 
  It starts with Stanford Assistant Professor of Chemical Engineering Chaitan Khosla in 1999 learning of his 3-year old's celiac disease, for which there was then no drug treatment.  
• I of course immediately thought back to my undergraduate days in the Chemical Engineering department more than 60 years ago.
• Anyway he early on received the National Science Foundation's top award for early-career researchers, and was able to use those funds to work on finding a solution to celiac disease.

Khosla wrote to celiac research supporters in 2002. “I have a dream that when he goes to college in the fall of 2014, he takes with him a refillable prescription for a pill he can take whenever he finds himself in a situation where he cannot avoid, or does not wish to avoid, a gluten-containing meal. 

• Today, two decades later, Khosla is a full professor, his son is five years out of college...and there is still no medication for celiac disease.
• Did he fail?

• 
  Nope, it took him that long to create two promising therapies.  
• This was just the start of a longer quest for funding, development, approval and cost-effective availability
• He says, for every project like his, there are ten others just on his campus in similar position.  They have not yet even written the first chapter.

Stanford has created various "accelerators" in several fields, like medicine, learning, sustainability and so on, to help academics convert their research findings into products and policies for the world.  The chasm between lab bench and clinical testing, let alone the marketplace, is so vast, the costs so high, the odds so low, that this challenge is lamented as the Valley of Death.  The combine science, engineering, law, business and other needed disciplines to spur success.

Also recently, the National Science Foundation came to the same conclusion, and created a major convergence accelerator.  

National-scale societal challenges cannot be solved by a single discipline. Instead, these challenges require convergence: the merging of innovative ideas, approaches, and technologies from a wide and diverse range of sectors and expertise. 

Launched in 2019, the NSF Convergence Accelerator builds upon basic research and discovery to accelerate solutions toward societal impact. The program funds teams to solve societal challenges through convergence research and innovation. To enhance its impact, the Accelerator also places teams together in cohorts, synergizing their work through facilitated collaboration.

To address those two questions at the top, while nothing I did at the University of Hawaii has made me a billionaire, all my failures await success.  I remember in 1982--that was more than 40 years ago--new Dean of Engineering Paul Yuen of the UH College of Engineering visiting me in my U.S. Senate office, and we pondered over how we could build that bridge from academic research to the marketplace.  As Stanford has only recently realized, most of their research does not go far.  There is this gap that needs a bridge.

Right then and there we invented such a structure, the Pacific International Center for High Technology Research, which more than 40 years later, still exists, and seems to be focusing on accelerators.  Click on that lead to read the story of PICHTR.  I have lost track of their recent doings, but went to their web page and was impressed with the high quality of the board members, some I have closely worked with before.

So have I failed in my professional life?  On the basis of the above, I was a remarkable success.  Will my work set the state for future successes.  Absolutely.  Unfortunately, not for me.  

Around six years ago I was asked by MENSA to provide two talks on my ideas.  The title can be combined into HOW TO BECOME RICH OR FAMOUS...AND MAYBE BOTH.  Thus, here is the opportunity of your lifetime.

• Peace:  10% Simple Solution for World Peace
• Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence:  Worked at the NASA Ames Research Center in this area...wow, almost half a century ago.
• Eternal Life:  how to live forever (my PhD dealt with DNA/RNA)
• 
  
• There is the standard way...by going to Heaven.
• But what if there is no such place.  What if religion is a con job?  Wonder why there is no proof of an afterlife?
• Well, there are ways science should be able to lengthen your life.  You'll still die because of accident or gamma ray burst or something else as awfully final, but there is no reason why we need to be stuck with a life expectancy of 80 or so.

• 

  Global Warming
•  Geoengineering solutions
•  5 cents/pound carbon dioxide credit
• Venus Syndrome

• 
  Energy
• Fusion:  Star Power for Humanity (I spent two assignments with the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory on laser fusion)

• 
  Transportation:
• Ground:  Direct Methanol Fuel Cell (a fuel cell car will take it five times further than any battery-powered vehicle, and methanol is a lot cheaper than  hydrogen)
• Air:  Hydrogen Jetliner
• 
  OTEC and the Blue Revolution (I drafted the first OTEC and hydrogen legislation when I spent three years in the U.S. Senate, both of which became laws)

• 
  Enterprises (I formed companies on the following ventures)
  • Rainbow Pearls International (not white or black pearls, but colored ones)
  • Hawaii Geo-Spa (an eco-tourism attraction using the geothermal effluents)
  • The Ultimate Ocean Ranch

What exactly should you do?  Just click on the entry that interests you, and you're on your way.  I can be helpful if you wish, but the whole purpose of this posting is to make you rich and/or famous.  I want to do as little as possible, and fade into the sunset.

I should recognize, as I do annually, that tomorrow is Memorial Day.  My posting of 2022.  

The 34th annual 1.5 hour Memorial Day Concert on the National Mall begins at 8PM, and will be televised in Hawaii at 7PM, tonight, not on Memorial Day.  Not much of a truly sterling cast this year, but it's all about patriotism, and looks like most Republicans are regaining their senses.

Got to show again Iam Tongi in his first American Idol audition.  This led to he being voted winner last week.  Note his rubbah slippahs.

Super Typhoon Mawar is know as Super Typhoon Betty in the East Pacific.  First appeared on May 20 at 30 MPH, shot up to 155 MPH three days later.  On the 24th, brushed by and seriously damage Guam at 140 MPH.  Intensified to 185 MPH on May 26, and today weakened to 120 MPH.  Not sure about intensity, but the current path is away from the Philippines, sufficiently east of Taiwan, but the eye is currently projected to fly right over Okinawa.

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