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Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#511

Post by VBprogrammer »

34679 wrote: post #495
moron4hire wrote: post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you factor in the inefficiencies of the power distribution grid and the heating element of the kettle? I'd say the journalists are just repeating what they've been told by the scientists, and the scientists factored inefficiency in on a calculation similar to your first.

There may exist inefficiencies in the transfer of heat from the element to the water, but there is no such thing as an inefficient heating element. All of the power it uses will be converted to heat. Take a light bulb for example. When used to light a space, the inefficient part would be the energy that is lost to heat. The rest is converted to light, but as soon as that light hits an object, it's converted to heat.…

The kettle is also losing a lot of heat to the air in the room.

Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#513

Post by simfree »

tomp wrote: post #503
johnzim wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also quite a helpful metric. Most British people are aware that the national grid used to spend a lot of time making sure they had the power available to draw during the commercial breaks of mass-media TV events (series finales, half time in a cup match etc) purely for the nation boiling water with electric kettles en masse. Great intersection of hard science (energy necessary to boil water + extremely efficient…

Makes you wonder if the US idea of using just 110 volts isn't better... not from an individual viewpoint (slower to boil water) but from the grid perspective.

110v does nearly halve your peak power draw... But the transformers have a bit of added complexity and in homes and businesses you need thicker wire to move the same amount of power.

Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#514

Post by winrid »

onychomys wrote: post #331
ClumsyPilot wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"with very expensive and massive fission reactors" The laws if physics don't owe us a free lunch. Light, safe and cheap powersource does not exist Fossil fuels aren't a power source, they wre a power store - that power was collected and millions of years ago. Also 100% productivity on 25 years is quite good - what did combustion engines improve in that time, 5%?

The 1997 F-150 made 220bhp and got 18mpg [0], while the 2022 F-150 makes 400bhp and 19mpg [1], so fusion is doing way better than that! (...i think i chose comparable trim levels to do that comparison, there are a stunning number of choices there!) [0] https://www.cars.com/research/ford-f_150-1997/specs/103719/ [1] https://www.edmunds.com/ford/f-150/2022/features-specs/

The newer F150 also weighs more. Also, if it didn't have to make twice the power, it would probably get 40mpg today.

ICE engines have advanced a lot in 20 years, especially in terms of cost per HP/MPG.

Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#515

Post by belter »

jjoonathan wrote: post #389
1024core wrote: post #372

It's not a massive energy output - only enough to boil about 60 kettles' worth of water. ... The British and their penchant for tea...

Did the British go with 240V because it makes tea faster? I don't know the history... but I want to believe.

They went with it because their Rock music sounds better:

"110v vs 220v amp tone" https://www.thegearpage.net/board/index.php?threads/110v-vs-...

Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#516

Post by bityard »

tomp wrote: post #503
johnzim wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also quite a helpful metric. Most British people are aware that the national grid used to spend a lot of time making sure they had the power available to draw during the commercial breaks of mass-media TV events (series finales, half time in a cup match etc) purely for the nation boiling water with electric kettles en masse. Great intersection of hard science (energy necessary to boil water + extremely efficient…

Makes you wonder if the US idea of using just 110 volts isn't better... not from an individual viewpoint (slower to boil water) but from the grid perspective.

The US grid (the last-mile bits anyway) isn't 110 volts, it's 220. It's just our houses that are wired for (mostly) 110 V.

Edit: I would love to see some sort of hybrid 110/220 V residential wiring/plug standard take hold in the US. It would require more expensive cable in the walls (since you need one additional conductor) and plugs, but it's totally doable. Most electrical products and appliances made these days are easily converted between 110/220, or run just fine on either.

Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#517

Post by whimsicalism »

34679 wrote: post #495
moron4hire wrote: post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you factor in the inefficiencies of the power distribution grid and the heating element of the kettle? I'd say the journalists are just repeating what they've been told by the scientists, and the scientists factored inefficiency in on a calculation similar to your first.

There may exist inefficiencies in the transfer of heat from the element to the water, but there is no such thing as an inefficient heating element. All of the power it uses will be converted to heat. Take a light bulb for example. When used to light a space, the inefficient part would be the energy that is lost to heat. The rest is converted to light, but as soon as that light hits an object, it's converted to heat.…

Presumably heat dispersing into the air rather than into the water would be an example of an inefficient heating element.

Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#518

Post by jfengel »

whimsicalism wrote: post #282
jfengel wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's kind of her thing. She is usually right, but also overly pessimistic in a way opposite from the popular press over-optimism. I get frustrated because it paints science in an undeserved negative light. It is at least truthful, in a way that most anti science writing is not. Mostly I find it unhelpful in that it points out problems without either explaining why they were reasonable or giving a real alternative.

Sabine is not as "right" as many of her pop-sci fans seem to want. Most of her opinions about the direction of theoretical physics are not really falsifiable or "right."

That's correct. That's sort of the point. Fundamental research is in kind of a slump right now, and it's hard to judge where (or whether) it should continue.

I don't think much of her "just do something different, don't ask me what" approach.

Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#519

Post by satronaut »

Axien wrote: post #338
ComputerGuru wrote: post #297

> It's not a massive energy output - only enough to boil about 60 kettles' worth of water. This made me laugh. How much more British can you get?

Are you referring to a morning kettle of tea or an afternoon kettle of tea?

an african or european kettle?

Re: Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

#520

Post by ajuc »

Joeri wrote: post #287
ajuc wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with solar is unpredictability and A LOT of batteries needed to bridge the mismatch between production peaking at noon and consumption peaking at late evening. Both of these are solved with fusion power. Energy market operates on the assumption that whoever unbalances the network has to pay for balancing it. Providing too much and too little energy is both bad - you have to pay someone else to use more/le…

But nuclear power is also not predictable, as plants regularly experience unexpected downtime. No power source is fully predictable, which is why you need controllable power sources to make up the difference. I would say solar’s problem is controllability. You can only turn it up to the limit of the amount of sun received, which is none at night, and sometimes very little in the day. It remains to be seen how control…

Yes, unexpected stuff happen to baseload powerplants too. Once every year on average maybe? Probably less. If that happens you may need to pay for balancing once a year.

Meanwhile solar is unexpected on the scale of minutes to hours, every day. It's not the same.

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