China, Japan, US Race to Perfect and Deploy Railguns

China’s Navy researchers have claimed to have solved issues to make military relevant and useful railguns. China has mounted a single test railgun on a ship since about 2018-2019. China has talked about 32 megajoule power range tests and plans and future 100 megajoule systems. The US is now working with Japan to develop and …

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World’s Largest Operating Nuclear Fusion Reactor

Japan’s JT-60SA tokamak nuclear fusion reactor has achieved first plasma which makes it the world’s largest operating nuclear fusion reactor. The JT-60SA uses magnetic fields from superconducting coils to contain a blazingly hot cloud of ionized gas, or plasma, within a doughnut-shaped vacuum vessel, in hope of coaxing hydrogen nuclei to fuse and release energy. …

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Germany Passing Japan Aging Population as Third Largest World Economy

According to the IMF World Economic Outlook report, Japan’s nominal GDP — that is, unadjusted for inflation — is expected to fall 0.2%, year-on-year, to $4.23 trillion in 2023, while Germany’s is forecast to expand 8.4% to $4.42 trillion. The U.S., the world’s largest economy, is expected to grow 5.8% to $26.94 trillion. China’s economy, …

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Robin Hanson Proposes Using National Debt and Tax Holidays to Fix the Global Fertility Emergency

Robin Hanson has come up with a plan to use the massive national debt of most countries to fund the large enough payments to make $300,000 to $700,000 payments to encourage couples to have enough babies to stop population decline. The U.S. national debt is now officially $33T, but add in promises to pay social …

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Population Crisis Fix Means Getting Enough Babies Every Year Starting This Year

Japan and South Korea and many other countries are experiencing national demographic crisis due to falling birth rates. In 2023, Japan’s fertility rate was 1.367, which is far below the 2.1 children per woman needed for population stability. South Korea’s fertility rate dropped to a record low of 0.7 in the second quarter of 2023. …

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Markets and Future Costs of Superconducting Magnets and Superconducting Wire

Present-day volume prices of HTSs (high temperature superconducting) wire and tape range from $150 to $200/kA-m (kiloAmps per meter). Many analyses of the commercial viability of superconducting applications show that a conductor cost of $50/kA-m (kiloAmps per meter) is the tipping point for widespread application for electric power use. Jun 2023, Journal Science The prospects …

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