Reply #8: What does the "tonnage" refer to?

[Dogmudgeon]

Some time ago, I myself thought of calculating the energy in a thermonuclear blast, but figured I'd have to find the formula to convert kilo- or megatons to joules (or in this case, exajoules). And I was thinking of the twin 20-MT blasts that knocked the Earth off its orbit in The Day The Earth Caught Fire, a movie I strongly recommend, in spite of the scientific errors.

However, my understanding of how -- and how efficiently -- nuclear blasts convert matter to explosive energy is poor. There the some simplified math to deal with, which I could have handled, but there are at least three methods of exploding radioactive material, as far as I know, and they're all different.

I'm also happy that the weaponized stuff is being beaten into plowshares, but I never cease to be amazed by just how much energy we really use, and how much more we will need in just a decade. Heating my house is one thing, but powering an entire civilization like ours seems to even challenge the potential output of the current stocks of nuclear material.

And if we have 20 years to figure out how to do it -- will we be able to?

--p!