On February 6th, 2001, a ribbon-cutting
ceremony
was held for Electra, introducing the repetitively pulsed,
high
energy, krypton fluoride (KrF) laser under development in
the
Plasma Physics Division at NRL. The program is supported
by the
US Department of Energy Defense Programs.
The objective of Electra is to
develop the technologies needed for Fusion Energy and defense
applications. Fusion is the power source of the sun. A fusion
power plant would have an unlimited supply of fuel (the fuel
ingredients are deuterium, an isotope of hydrogen that comes
from seawater, and lithium, a plentiful element), no chemical
by-products, and no long term radioactive waste.
One of the more promising approaches
to fusion uses intense lasers to directly compress and heat a
small pellet of fuel. Experiments and computations at the Naval
Research Laboratory are encouraging and show this approach has
great promise. However, the specialized, high power laser used
in this research fires once every hour and requires periodic
maintenance. In contrast, a laser for a power plant would have
to fire five times per second, run for several years, and meet
stringent cost and efficiency requirements. Electra will develop
the science and technologies that can meet these requirements.
It will have a laser output of around 400-700 Joules, which is
large enough to be scalable to a power plant size, but small
enough to be a flexible research tool.
If Electra is successful, the
next step will be to build a laser module sized (50 -100 kJ)
for a fusion power plant.
The U.S. Naval Research Laboratory is the Navy's full-spectrum corporate laboratory, conducting a broadly based multidisciplinary program of scientific research and advanced technological development. The Laboratory, with a total complement of nearly 2,500 personnel, is located in southwest Washington, D.C., with other major sites at the Stennis Space Center, Miss., and Monterey, Calif. NRL has served the Navy and the nation for over 85 years and continues to meet the complex technological challenges of today's world. For more information, visit the NRL homepage or join the conversation on Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube.
Comment policy: We hope to receive submissions from all viewpoints, but we ask that all participants agree to the Department of Defense Social Media User Agreement. All comments are reviewed before being posted.