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Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#361

Post by steve_adams_86 »

soperj wrote: post #313
ClumsyPilot wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whats with public schooling? I havent found anything that looks relevant

They're responsible for common core, which basically makes teachers teach to the test to keep their jobs.

Worth mentioning though is that they didn't invent Common Core Standards; they support it. Common Core was also preceded by No Child Left Behind, which shifted emphasis in education in a similar war.

All that is to say that the issue didn't originate with the Gates Foundation. It goes much deeper and is arguably a broad societal issue. No one agrees on how teaching should be done, there's insufficient coordination, people doing the work lack resources and incentive, and kids suffer a lot as a result.

Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#363

Post by malka »

time_to_smile wrote: post #155
prohobo wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sadge. But I think this is the best bet for sustainable and clean energy, so why not put all the enthusiasm we can into it? A breakthrough is a breakthrough, and that's good news.

> bet for sustainable and clean energy The best bet for sustainable and clean energy is to stop using fossil fuels and figure out how to deal with the economic consequences. I feel this optimism around this far off solutions for decades has been just a detrimental to climate action as out right climate denialism. Growing up in the 90s I was always told "everything will be fine, since we'll figure it all out with tech…

> the economic consequences.

you mean the death of billions of people ?

Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#364

Post by dfdz »

willis936 wrote: post #232
dfdz wrote: post #80

> This is more than double what was achieved in similar tests back in 1997. The experiment produced > 11 megawatts of power and at Jet > two 500 megawatt flywheels are used to run the experiments log_2(2*500/11)*(2022-1997) + 2022 = 2185 At this rate we will have fusion by 2185 I guess?

This is a disingenuous argument. JET was not designed as a power plant. Those flywheels are used exclusively to transiently power the copper confinement coils. Since superconduction was discovered, no reactor study has had non-superconducting confinement coils because they are (very obviously) impractical.

The only purpose of my comment was to provide context for the numbers in the article via a thought experiment involving doubling.

Since the calculation involves taking log_2, even if the estimate for the "used power" is off by a factor of 4 the result will only change by 50 years.

Can you make your qualitative comment quantitative and update the numbers in my doubling thought experiment?

I would be curious about what you think is more realistic.

Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#365

Post by NoGravitas »

khafra wrote: post #182
ambrozk wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a very dumb meme that people use to avoid learning anything about the actual hurdles that are currently being faced by fusion researchers. At some point, fusion will be much less than 30 years away, and at that point, I guarantee you that lazy people will still be repeating this joke, because it is literaly the only thing they know about the subject.

"Fusion is always 30 years away" is a heuristic that almost always works. https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/heuristics-that-almost...

"Assuming anything Scott Alexander Siskin says is wrong" is also a heuristic that almost always works.

Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#366

Post by tclancy »

jimworm wrote: post #103
vcdimension wrote: post #35

They're still a very long way from getting a net gain in energy: https://youtu.be/LJ4W1g-6JiY

For those wondering, the Q for this particular result was 0.33. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H99hvPlC4is&t=48m

We can make it up in volume.

Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#368

Post by openknot »

Gadiguibou wrote: post #283

I really appreciate the note of the environmental analyst which helps readers who don't have deep knowledge of the field understand the meaning of this breakthrough in context. I wish more news agencies adopted the same practice.

The Financial Times, though pricey as a financial newspaper, is a good source for this. It regularly publishes in-depth articles with a wide range of interviews with experts for readers to learn the context of current issues (via their "News in-depth" series, and also their series called "The Big Read").

Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#369

Post by humanistbot »

tra3 wrote: post #355

Can someone ELI5 for people that don't follow fusion tech closely? In particular does this mean we're going to have fusion soon?

We have controlled fusion in labs, but it takes more energy to start up than what you get out of it. The longer you can sustain the fusion reaction, the more you can get out of it. They did it for 5 seconds, which is longer than anyone else, but still a net negative.

Predictions about the future of fusion are notoriously difficult to make.

Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#370

Post by gtsop »

kimbernator wrote: post #119
formvoltron wrote: post #105

OK so with fusion everybody loves it because the fuel would be clean and nearly endless. Isn't that what solar power offers? Nobody wants to deploy solar due to high upfront cost. However, wouldn't the startup on a fusion reactor be much greater?

Solar comes with a lot of challenges for large-scale usage as a replacement for coal, nuclear, etc. Really, the only thing better about solar at the moment is that it is available. First off, the daylight cycle is an obvious concern and there still isn't a great way to store solar energy during the day for use by cities (or generally large consumers) at night. Not to say it's not possible, but people are largely stil…

> First off, the daylight cycle is an obvious concern and there still isn't a great way to store solar energy during the day for use by cities (or generally large consumers) at night. Not to say it's not possible, but people are largely still trying to figure out what the right solution for that is.

Not a concern at all. Google renewable energy storage. It is there but there is profit merit, so it is not welcome

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