It's cool that cheap money means that there's investment in stuff like fusion. I just hope when they inevitably go bankrupt when the money dries up the knowledge does not just get lost.
Nuclear fusion is close enough to start dreaming
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Re: Nuclear fusion is close enough to start dreaming
#22Think of all the fusion powered direct air CO2 capture we could have <3
>Think of all the fusion powered direct air CO2 capture we could have Oh, trees? ;-)
This popped up on HN reasonably recently https://caseyhandmer.wordpress.com/2021/05/04/so-you-want-to... - basically "it's not necessarily as simple as that, where are you getting the water from?".
Re: Nuclear fusion is close enough to start dreaming
#23Nuclear Fusion has been 20 years away for 70 years.
I was hopeful for a bit, then I saw some stuff like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JurplDfPi3U and realized nothing has changed. It's the same old shit: reporters being willfully ignorant, business people misleading the public, and on and on. Wake me up when you have plans for a full-scale, fully-functional fusion plant that can actually be built in an economically feasible way. Until then, I don't care.
Re: Nuclear fusion is close enough to start dreaming
#24It's cool that cheap money means that there's investment in stuff like fusion. I just hope when they inevitably go bankrupt when the money dries up the knowledge does not just get lost.
By cheap money you mean the rich have become so obscenely wealthy they can afford to spunk their money on moonshot ideas like interfering in elections or building rockets.
Re: Nuclear fusion is close enough to start dreaming
#25[deleted]
Re: Nuclear fusion is close enough to start dreaming
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
>Think of all the fusion powered direct air CO2 capture we could have Oh, trees? ;-)
This popped up on HN reasonably recently https://caseyhandmer.wordpress.com/2021/05/04/so-you-want-to... - basically "it's not necessarily as simple as that, where are you getting the water from?".
Is this still an issue when fusion power is available?
Re: Nuclear fusion is close enough to start dreaming
#27I’m an interested layperson at best, but I gather that we know how to build safe fission reactors now, and that the safe storage of spent (or “slightly used” as I’ve heard it called) fuel pellets is a much harder political problem than technical problem. Gorbachev once speculated that it was actually Chernobyl that brought down the USSR. I personally wonder if it’s also why we’re going to have a climate catastrophe.
Lftr, no stupid spent rods. Online reprocessing, thorium fuel, 99% fuel use. No meltdown risk. No huge containment domes. Scale in size.
Lftr can use old waste for fuel or breed yo usable fuel.
Transport of spent fuel rods is a legitimate problem.
Re: Nuclear fusion is close enough to start dreaming
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
This popped up on HN reasonably recently https://caseyhandmer.wordpress.com/2021/05/04/so-you-want-to... - basically "it's not necessarily as simple as that, where are you getting the water from?".
Is this still an issue when fusion power is available?
No, but the parent to my comment implied trees as being the source of that fusion power. Nobody's going to be able to use trees to power the desalination plants that allow us to irrigate the land so that we can grow those trees.
Re: Nuclear fusion is close enough to start dreaming
#29I’m an interested layperson at best, but I gather that we know how to build safe fission reactors now, and that the safe storage of spent (or “slightly used” as I’ve heard it called) fuel pellets is a much harder political problem than technical problem. Gorbachev once speculated that it was actually Chernobyl that brought down the USSR. I personally wonder if it’s also why we’re going to have a climate catastrophe.
I gather that we know how to build safe fission reactors now. One can hope. "Gen III" fission reactor construction is coming along, mostly in China. Sanmen Nuclear Power Station has two Gen III reactors, designed by what's left of Westinghouse. Future versions are being entirely designed in China. Most of the "small cheap reactor" concepts are arguments for why they don't need a containment vessel. That's probably no…
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Re: Nuclear fusion is close enough to start dreaming
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
What to do with spent fuel rods is more of a political problem than a technical one. Read up on Yucca Mountain. Current thinking is that the best approach to long term disposal is to find a cold hard-rock mountain where nothing has changed much in millions of years. Dig tunnels that are far above any possible flooding. Drill vertical holes in the tunnels. Package the nuclear waste in stainless steel thimbles, with th…
First question I have about it: wouldn't it be an attractive target for bombing/terrorist attacks or would it be rock solid enough to withstand those?
If you have weapons able to blow up tens/hundreds of meter thick rock, then you have much more attractive targets with more "spectacular" results.