Farming with Plasma Technology

Hello all. Has anyone here heard of this: http://fusionfarming.com/fusion-farming/fertilizer-and-food/

What they seem to be doing is using plasma (the fourth state of matter) treated water, which is very high in nitrogen, as an "organic" fertilizer. The plasma treated water also supposedly has very positive results when mixed with chicken manure and then used with fertilizer. From what I can tell, there hasn't been much testing of this in the field.

Has anyone heard that plants grow better after a lightening storm? I ask because that is essentially what they are doing here: running water through artificial, controlled lightening (plasma).

I'd really like to see what people on here have to say on this and how a process such as this would fall in regard to permaculture and organic farming practices.

Looks like an expensive technological solution to a problem nature has already solved. Nitrogen fixing is performed by plants (eg legumes) and good nutrient cycling within farms in a permaculture system makes chemical fertilisers (whatever the source) obsolete.

I'm thinking an electric arc in a fusion reactor has nothing whatsoever to do with permaculture, organic, or natural growing.
Seems to me the whole idea is still focused on maximizing production through mechanical processes rather than using holistic methods mimicking nature.
This arc process is simply a technology to substitute for the Haber-Bosch process. A more natural way to increase nitrogen availability would be to promote legumes.

Thread moved to Meaningless Drivel.

Ken Peavey wrote:I'm thinking an electric arc in a fusion reactor has nothing whatsoever to do with permaculture, organic, or natural growing.
Seems to me the whole idea is still focused on maximizing production through mechanical processes rather than using holistic methods mimicking nature.
This arc process is simply a technology to substitute for the Haber-Bosch process. A more natural way to increase nitrogen availability would be to promote legumes.

I get what you're saying.

But is the natural way feasible on as large of a scale as is needed to feed the world?

Yes!

Vadim Fedorovsky wrote:But is the natural way feasible on as large of a scale as is needed to feed the world?

Sure, there is plenty of energy there - even a lot that is wasted. My apple trees run from a large scale fusion reactor and do just fine. In fact they would have trouble if this reactor didn't direct 99.99999999999% of its energy away from the planet...

Eric Thompson wrote:

Vadim Fedorovsky wrote:But is the natural way feasible on as large of a scale as is needed to feed the world?

Sure, there is plenty of energy there - even a lot that is wasted. My apple trees run from a large scale fusion reactor and do just fine. In fact they would have trouble if this reactor didn't direct 99.99999999999% of its energy away from the planet...

Please elaborate. I am not sure if I understand you completely. Your apple trees run from a large scale fusion reactor? What do you mean?

Vadim Fedorovsky wrote:
But is the natural way feasible on as large of a scale as is needed to feed the world?

Industrial agriculture as developed over the last 2 centuries measures yield produced in relation to inputs required. It does not account for pollution sinks, environmental impact, or the health and well being of humans and wildlife. While industrial agriculture has made incredible leaps forward in yield as a result of the Green Revolution and mechanization, the negative aspects are overlooked. Nitrate runoff, oceanic dead zones, soil salinization, the effects of pesticides on the bee population, dustbowls, pesticide and herbicide resistant weeds and insects, loss of biodiversity, contamination of processing plants requiring massive product recalls, and aquifer depletion are all problems looking us square in the face. Long term viability of industrial agriculture is in question with more problems on the horizon: peak resource issues, stability and dependability of just-in-time distribution, monopolistic corporations controlling entire species, monocrop succeptibility to disease, increased use of ever more marginal land, diminishing returns, climate destabilization, and an aging farmer population. I could rail on about food production being entirely dependent on financing structures and corporate solvency in the face of a potential financial collapse. The interdependency of industrial agriculture, global distribution, and economics is rushing headlong into the wall of finite resources. Our current food production paradigm is absolutely dependent on these resources.

Industrial agriculture is not sustainable. This means that at some point, it will end. It is not feasible to rely on industrial agriculture to feed the world.

Way back in the day, ALL agriculture was organic. Everyone in the world lived on organic food. Granted, there were the problems of illness and being eaten by dinosaurs, but for the most part, developments in education, germ theory, sanitation, and indoor air improvements helped to extend lifespan as well as quality of life. Renewable energy and muscle power was all that was needed. Nobody had strawberries in December and they got by just fine. Granted, there were not as many mouths to feed back then. The Green Revolution resulted in a population explosion by converting those finite resources into more humans. There is much debate as to whether or not natural growing can feed 7 Billion + humans. I've seen figures of around 2 billion being the limit of the carrying capacity of the Earth. It is a certainty that industrial agriculture will eventually fail to feed the population. As long as industrial agriculture continues, the carrying capacity of the planet will continue to degrade.

Natural growing is the only alternative.

Vadim Fedorovsky wrote:

Please elaborate. I am not sure if I understand you completely. Your apple trees run from a large scale fusion reactor? What do you mean?

I believe he is talking about his apple trees being able to chemically fuse much of what it needs to grow by using the energy of the Sun, which is a large fusion reactor - the largest in our solar system in fact.

Can you heat water enough from sunlight to bring it into a plasma state? in other words, if you took a mirror solar array and instead of giving the water space to make steam you kept it contained and kept heating it, would it eventually gather nitrogen?

short answer--no, no you can't.  Plasma state of water reached at 12,000 Kelvin, melting point of glass about 1700.  

but water also does something weird when under more pressure...maybe we'll never have a final answer.