Conversation with rrguy

As BB has requested I start up a new thread to continue our discussion. Thanks for your thought on the potential attitude of the Russians (and Chinese) to what they may feel is US supremacy - i find it interesting. In 1993 I worked in Moscow on a contract and saw the disintegration of ther economy and trhen felt that the west missed an opportunity to bring Russia into the modern world - trouble was the Yeltsin was a Siberian drunk (but well meaning) and the west did not take them into the fold - they were a liability. I am UK born and i can understand their attitude to being "special" - the US and the UK have a similar attitude. As a kid I can well recall being shown a world map with lots of "pink" and "red" - those were "ours" - its was with a lot of angst that the US told the UK is was no longer a world power - the 1955 Suez crisis was the turning point - the US told Britain and France to "get out" - we had to obey. Fortunately the UK (and I also guess France) had the maturity to accept its role, although with BRexit I sometimes doubt that - I guess it's a hard road and fortunately the UK had sufficient maturity (also democracy and affinity to the USA) to endure it. In 1993 I could see that the west was "insensitive" to the sense of loss which sustained Russian "pride" - I think we missed an opportunity but that's now "water under the bridge". At that time (in 1993) Russia was chaotic - the rich (and influential) swindled working people, worker (and professionals) were not getting paid, corruption rife and alcoholism rampant (a meeting at 9.00am with my customer (A Russian state enterprise) started with rounds of Vodka - I couldn't join the party and was thus an "outsider" - luckily one of my (Russian) staff could drink 3 bottles of Vodka in an evening (hate to think what happened to his liver). Any rate I can understand (although not sympathies) with Russia's paranoia, however IMO it had to be managed rather than rejected- in this respect the west failed in the early 1990's and even now (although it's now more difficult). I guess what I'm getting around to is that Russia has to be invited into the fold rather than rejected. Part of inviting Russia (and China) into the fold is to share rather than reject - IMO we don't achieve that by rejecting innovation such as the Silex process and many other "innovations" - we share it with them and make sure they respect copyrights and patents - I don't know how we do that but it's not by rejecting and threatening them.

Thanks for pointing out the alternative explanations to the BCS with possibly semi-conductor laser systems - you may be correct but as you say that is likely the future my concern is how combining the lower power lasere beams (to get the require power levels) avoids "beating" and that all the lower powered "sub lasers) all synchronize at exactly the required frequency and phase - as you say that may be the role of the BCS - I don't know. but it appears that SLX have cracked the problem since Cameco did 8 months of testing and then signed it off.

I find the issue of the requirement for 2 lasers also interesting - as I suggested it could be a need for multiple stages in a cascade but it could also be that the separator operates in a "matrix" arrangement of Laval nozzles where there is a need to have separate horizontal and a vertical components - I would be interested in your thoughts. I would also be interested on your views on how the production of the separated (and v3 excited) ²³⁵UF₆ monomers would differ in mass from 238UF6/G (and G/G dimers) and thus separated in an aerodynamic separation cylinder simi8lar to that used by Klydon (see diagram below):


Please give me your thoughts.

In terms of whether to continue - we take different positions - to me the advancement of technology, climate change mitigation, energy security and I guess SLX/Cameco investors take priority over the remote possibility that this technology may be attractive to proliferators who have many other more attractive options to cause chaos. As far as Russia and China are concerned I am sure they will catch up with US technology over time whatever it is - if the US does not proceed they probably will and then have a lead.