Don't panic, mum, i've built a nuclear reactor in my bedroom!

[Jacqui D]

Don't panic, Mum, but I've built a nuclear reactor in my bedroom
By Harry Mount
Last updated at 12:25 AM on 05th February 2009
Comments (5) Add to My Stories The mock Tudor terraces of south Wimbledon on a sunny winter's day could hardly be more peaceful. The flowerbeds in the front gardens are thoroughly weeded, the corners of the hedges trimmed back to right angles.

The hushed streets are empty, except for a pretty young woman walking her child back from school. Behind one of these leaded windows, though, something odd is happening - Christopher Strevens, a retired school lab technician, is building a nuclear reactor.


It's not rocket science: Retired school lab technician Christopher Strevens
'The experiment is quite dangerous,' says Christopher, 66, in a matter of fact way. 'It may be difficult to stop the nuclear reactions once they start. There is a danger from radiation and a possible nuclear explosion if the power runs away.'

It's with some trepidation, then, that I walk through Christopher's elegant front porch and up the stairs to the back spare bedroom, where he hopes he is on the verge of cracking the secret of nuclear fusion - the joining together of atomic nuclei.

'Please be careful not to disturb my mother - she's 96,' says Christopher, gently opening the door. 'A man's come to see my gadgets, Mum.'

On one side of the room sits the elderly Mrs Strevens in an armchair; and on the other rests the device that could solve the human race's energy problems for the rest of eternity - it's nuclear fusion that produces the sun's energy.

Nuclear fission - the splitting of nuclei - is what powers our nuclear plants, but fusion is more powerful, with no radioactive waste.

Laboratories across the world, packed with dozens of supreme eggheads, have spent millions trying to harness the power of nuclear fusion, but they have failed so far.

Is Christopher's home-made Doomsday machine - custom-built out of components from the High Street electronics shop Maplin's - the answer?

'I've only managed to get two watts out of it so far,' he says. 'But if I increase the power, I should be able to start a nuclear fusion reaction. Of course, I wouldn't want to do a really big experiment here - it's not an ideal place. And it could be dangerous.'

'I've no interest in blowing anybody up'With this, Christopher flicks a switch to start the process. I stand back a foot or two - not that that would help much if he ends up obliterating a good deal of South London.

'Don't worry - I don't want to be left with a hole in the wall or a hole in my body, either,' says Christopher, with a little chuckle.

'Yes, the design can be adapted to create a nuclear bomb. An extreme Christian terrorist group did approach me, but I've got no interest in blowing anybody up.

'The neighbours don't mind me doing all this - anyway, it's all perfectly safe at this power level. I did get a burn off one of the screws once, though, like a burn you get off a soldering iron.'

Gingerly, I step closer and look at the glass tube of hydrogen, wrapped in a coil of copper wire, on top of a little silver box, in a cage built of fence wire.

'There!' says Christopher, with a note of excitement in his voice as a pulse of electrical energy rushes through the machine.

'Can you see the hydrogen is being ionised?' Yes, something is definitely happening! The glass tube is glowing an alluring shade of bright bubblegum pink. And that's pretty much it.

I examine Christopher's wall, and then my body - no holes. Wimbledon Common, any attendant Wombles and that pretty young mother on the school run - they are fine, for now.

'I really need to get hold of a linear amplifier to increase the power if I'm going to get a fusion reaction,' says Christopher, mournfully. 'But they cost £2,000, which I can't really afford on my pension.'

In fact, Christopher has put an advert in this month's Radio Society of Great Britain members' magazine, desperately seeking one of these amplifiers.

He was perfectly frank in the ad - 'I want to use the output to test if I can initiate a thermonuclear fusion reaction,' he wrote.

If anything, he was too frank - the police were called by a worried reader. They eventually decided not to investigate after physicists assured them that the experiment cannot possibly result in a fusion reaction.

'Oh yes, I've seen a nuclear bomb'All that will happen is that the hydrogen will ionise and go that attractive pink colour, as it is now doing in front of my eyes.

Christopher, however, is not deterred by the cynics. 'Once I get it working, I'll get commercial backing - I've already patented it. It'll cost millions of pounds, but it'll have such wide application for domestic use, for powering cars, for example.

'I'm inspired by the green crisis - I'm a great fan of windmills, but they just don't produce enough power. I'm only worried that my idea could be stamped on by the petrol lobby.'

This is not the first time that Christopher has tried to achieve the Holy Grail of energy creation - much of his career was spent in the nuclear field before he became a hospital technician at St Thomas's Hospital and then a school lab technician in nearby Merton.

After a BSc in physics, maths and chemistry at Portsmouth Polytechnic and an Open University course in biology and ecology, he worked at Aldermaston Atomic Weapons Establishment in the Sixties.

'Oh yes, I've seen a nuclear bomb, or a good copy of one. It was green, about the size of an orange, with two levers - one to **** it, one to set the timer.'

Using his new-found expertise, Chris carried out a fusion experiment in 1967 while at Aldermaston - his device exploded, giving off neutrons and radioactive gamma photons.

'They don't harm you. The neutrons pass through you; the gamma photons, too. I've never suffered any radiation effects.'

He has continued to follow his dream ever since, carrying out further fusion experiments throughout the past 40 years - now doing his research on the internet.

The dream goes back even further, though, back to his childhood.

'When I was seven, I first discovered this effect - I was playing with a child's Tesla coil [a type of transformer] and a hydrogen tube. I put the tube inside the coil and the buzzing carried on after the battery was disconnected.

'My Uncle Arthur then made a big version. It ran on air and was pumped with a reversed bicycle pump. It was attached to a child's electric car constructed by my grandfather, who was an engineer.

'I drove around the streets of south Wimbledon, in about 1952, as an advertisement of this new source of power which no one understood.'

Half a century later, Christopher is still in Wimbledon and is still misunderstood. But he isn't bothered, as he tinkers away in the spare room, pondering his contribution to the survival of the human race, confident that the backing will one day come.

'I know a man in Poole who's interested,' he says cheerfully, as he sends another pulse of electric energy surging through the glowing pink reactor.

[sunflower]

Hi Jacqui, gotta get his mum out of that room if he gets a linear accelerator! Seriously though, he'll keep on with his experiments and get no public acclaim like so many others. Frustrating isn't it, to know that alternative energy is available and we can't get our hands on it.

[J_rod7]

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Nuclear Reactor in the basement - I LOVE the idea. Thank you for sharing.

For consideration here, a bit of change in direction, but valuable to the whole of Humanity. I received this from my good friend, RaKaR in the Netherlands, and will post his appeal here on his behalf...:
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Earth and Mankind: Appeal for a Worldwide Birth Control

Avalonians,

A wise man once wrote, " Planet Earth and its inhabitants are suffering from diverse ills caused singularly and exclusively by man himself. These already existing ills, however, will continue to proliferate until finally everything completely deteriorates.

The Earth's population is plagued by famines, energy shortages, epidemics, environmental pollution, degeneration, terrorism, dictatorship, anarchism, slavery, excessive increase of waste materials, racial hatred, food shortages, destruction of rain forests, the "greenhouse effect", pollution of lakes, streams and oceans, hatred towards asylum-seekers; radioactive emissions, chemical pollution of water, air, plants, food, human beings and animals.

In spite of many efforts, mankind's problems are not decreasing but, instead, continue to rise steadily in direct proportion to population increases.

Mankind's horrendous ills originate from and exist through overpopulation with its unrelenting, irresponsibly continuing escalation.

The situation dictates that any ill can only be fought and remedied by grasping it by its roots, ripping it out and destroying it: The numbers of terrestrial humankind must be drastically reduced.

The only humane method by which this reduction goal can be achieved, is through stringent birth control regulations that permit married couples, of a predetermined age, to have only a strictly specified number of children."

Avalonians,
A close and objective look reveals indeed that everything is connected:
Shortage of almost all first resources (drinking water, food, oil… other vital items) and the therefrom resulting poverty, inequality, hunger, spiritual stagnation, despair... and subsequently crime, massive immigration, economic migration and ecological refugees, 'hatred towards foreigners', terrorism, wars... not to mention the destruction of the whole environment.

Earth needs to recover; natural resources need also time to renew themselves. We impede both. Alas.

Overpopulation is hence likely to become one of the most important and - perhaps - the most decisive questions and challenges in the coming times for the whole humanity.

We certainly need to break that taboo hanging above the topic of human reproduction, population, resp. overpopulation.

More emphasis must be put on the crucial rol played by overpopulation in the current, terrible state of our global affairs.
We indeed all know that everything needs management; ourselves and our number are not and can not be an exception.
Nothing is endless and all requires rational use, care and maintenance - including earth's resources.
The shortages of clean water, food, minerals and other basic life's items, pollution and the destruction of the environment are nowadays more obvious that never before.
We, Humans, and the ways we go about life, put too much stress on Earth.

We are doomed, unless we drastically change our ways of thinking and doing; our days are counted, unless we truly understand and accept our responsibility, as leading species.

We need a worldwide, democratic - valid for all individuals, social classes and nations - rational, responsible, scientific and rigorously monitored birth control.

Some interesting and highly encouraging publications and analyses on population are recently hitting the net:
- Baby decisions - adding to the world's woes?

"How responsible is it to have children in a world whose environmental health is already under stress? That's the question Joanna Benn poses this week in the Green Room. On the other hand, she wonders, will a couple more hungry mouths make much difference?"

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7759845.stm

- POPULATION: The elephant in the room
"Uncontrolled population growth threatens to undermine efforts to save the planet, warns John Feeney. In this week's Green Room, he calls on the environmental movement to stop running scared of this controversial topic."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7865332.stm

- One last chance to save mankind
"With his 90th birthday in July, a trip into space scheduled for later in the year and a new book out next month, 2009 promises to be an exciting time for James Lovelock. But the originator of the Gaia theory, which describes Earth as a self-regulating planet, has a stark view of the future of humanity. He tells Gaia Vince we have one last chance to save ourselves - and it has nothing to do with nuclear power."

http://www.newscientist.com/article/...rue&print=true

New policy decisions have been taken on this sensitive matter:
- 'Obama reverses Bush abortion-funds policy', by LIZ SIDOTI and MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press Writers – Fri Jan 23.

"WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama on Friday struck down the Bush administration's ban on giving federal money to international groups that perform abortions or provide abortion information — an inflammatory policy that has bounced in and out of law for the past quarter-century. Obama's executive order, the latest in an aggressive first week reversing contentious Bush policies, was warmly welcomed by liberal groups and denounced by abortion rights foes."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090123/...a_abortion_ban

- Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi boldly defended a move to add birth control funding to the new economic "stimulus" package, claiming "contraception will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government."

http://www.drudgereport.com/flashpbc.htm

Avalonians,
Let' s keep the momentum!
Do please support our effort to put the important and so difficult issue of overpopulation and birth control on the national and international agendas.

Could you help us promote more awareness of overpopulation and of the threat of overpopulation to our well-being and to the self-sustainability of this planet - and ultimately to our survival as a species?

Could you also add your personal voice to our overpopulation awareness campaign and support our world wide birth control initiative?

The petition is at:

http://www.futureofmankind.co.uk/Billy_Meier/Special:Petition


This petition will be sent to the UN, the World Population Awareness Organization, The Earth Charter Initiative, the Earth Policy Institute; to other major international organizations dealing with development and population; to mister Nelson Mandela and Father Desmond tutu, to all responsible citizens of our world and to all those who make decisions directly influencing our daily life.

Please, advocate and promote a worldwide rational birth control.

Help us shape a responsible future now.
We owe that to our children and to the children of our children.

We owe it to Mother-Earth.

Peace and Wisdom.

RaKaR

www.futureofmankind.co.uk

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I fully support the intent of this initiative and petition, and ask all here to give your support.

Rod

In Peace

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[Jacqui D]

Originally Posted by sunflower

Hi Jacqui, gotta get his mum out of that room if he gets a linear accelerator! Seriously though, he'll keep on with his experiments and get no public acclaim like so many others. Frustrating isn't it, to know that alternative energy is available and we can't get our hands on it.

Thanx sunflower yeah totally agree, he must ahve a warped sense of humour
lol!

[J_rod7]

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An open letter to President Obama...:

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The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500

Phone Numbers

Comments: 202-456-1111
Switchboard: 202-456-1414
FAX: 202-456-2461

TTY/TDD

Comments: 202-456-6213
Visitors Office: 202-456-2121
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Sir,

In great concern for the "Energy Crisis," current oil reserves, and our National dependence on 'Foreign petroleum' imports.

Some consequences would be manageable if common sense prevailed among world governments. However it won't in the forseeable future, as there is a deliberate plan now in play where a controlled display of world economic collapse is being used as a tool and lever towards propelling governments & individuals into perpetual debt, slavery & fear by the notable criminals, those actually 'pulling-the-strings' from behind the scenes.

WHAT, you didn't KNOW about all the MANIPULATION. This is all pretty much 'common knowledge,' and not any 'delusional thinking' by 'Conspiracy Theorists.'

There is however, some information related to oil & energy which needs to be discussed.

Since 1964 the shadow US government has had at it's disposal a number of free energy generating devices of various type & design which are scalable regarding size & output, being suitable to run vehicles, homes, factories & buildings right up to large power plants. These generator devices have been HIDDEN from the public and, indeed, from the Worlds' people by this same 'Shadow Government.'

For ONE reference, see information at "The Orion Project" = info@theorionproject.org. This Project is the result of efforts from Dr. Steven Greer, in collaboration with numerous Engineering and Technical experts.

Such Generating devices are variations of scaler wave (otherwise known as zero point energy) devices, magnetic overunity devices, catalyctic crackers (hydrogen from water) devices.

Solar & wind whilst clean are not cost effective on a large scale or able to generate substantial outputs.

Human society could gradually convert to widespread use of clean free energy sources. However, the corporations won't permit it and have bought out, stolen or blocked through patent manipulation, many workable devices that have been invented over the past 45 years.

Control of energy is their most potent social lever in concert with banking.

In the event of a real oil shortage the multinational cartels would produce/license & release large devices to allow present power stations to operate, as this flow of electricity can be metered & sold. Business as usual minus the coal & oil tankers.
Many power stations & national electricity grids worldwide are already in private hands so selective conversion is possible.

However if small scale devices able to power homes & vehicles become widely available, society is then no longer controllable via traditional means. The capability to produce these Generating Units, the Schematics, and all relevant information SHOULD BE RELEASED TO THE ENTIRE WORLD.

Sir, will you PLEASE address this issue? You must be able to get this information released, and if you can do so, you will have the gratitude of all people on Earth.

Thank you for your consideration. We are all Proud to have you as our 44th President.

Respectfully,

Rod Morrill
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