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Wendelstein 7-X: Gigajoule energy turnover generated for eight minutes

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Re: Wendelstein 7-X: Gigajoule energy turnover generated for eight minutes

#251
post #170
post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

true. but on the other hand, the 'theoretical' is being turned into practice as evidenced by this 8 minute containment. the best a tokamak can do is half a second.

Tokamak record time for plasma confinement is 403 seconds as of April 2023, see https://english.cas.cn/newsroom/mutimedia_news/202304/t20230... 403s is about 7 minutes, so less than Wendelstein 7-X.

They could go longer. 7-8 mins is an arbitrary cut off out of fear that something might break (quench), knowing that enough data has been gathered for the time being.

Re: Wendelstein 7-X: Gigajoule energy turnover generated for eight minutes

#252

Ahh, Wendelstein is that stellerator reactor. The stellerator is really cool, and an alternative to a tokamak reactor. Tokamak is the doughnut shaped reactor, and it has a problem where the plasma near the outer circumference has less magnetic confinement. The stellerator is similar, but confines the plasma to a ribbon and folds it over on itself in a mobius-like arrangement. I used to be really interested in this, b…

> The stellerator is really cool, and an alternative to a tokamak reactor.

They should've gone with a catchier name like "forbidden cruller".

Re: Wendelstein 7-X: Gigajoule energy turnover generated for eight minutes

#253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't either, since I spelled it Warf! I never watched Star Trek (probably get my HN privileges revoked for that), but I did know that much. And then the Reading Rainbow guy's "whatever happened will happen again". I know the character's name is Geordie or whatever, but he didn't have the right accent for him to be a Geordie, so he will forever be Reading Rainbow guy instead.

He could have been the Jeopardy guy too.

Ken J was a much better choice

Re: Wendelstein 7-X: Gigajoule energy turnover generated for eight minutes

#254
post #160
post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please don't "move fast and break things" with nuclear fusion :-)

What is the worst that can happen? Seriously, I think I might know (a fire) but I do not. Is there any possibility these can go ban! and spread nasty stuff around the neighbourhood? I doubt they can go thermonuclear bang! but I am not a physicist. What is the worst than can happen?

Well, neutron bombardment from fusion means you get some radioactive isotopes. It's not as bad as spent fuel but still something to avoid.

But that doesn't really matter. This is expensive technology you don't want to blow up. Yes, more expensive than rockets.

Re: Wendelstein 7-X: Gigajoule energy turnover generated for eight minutes

#255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Zap Energy. They're at least thinking about co-opting existing infrastructure. https://www.neimagazine.com/news/newszap-energy-considers-re... Also their concept is just so weird, I love it. Worst case it works in space as a nuclear fusion drive :) My guess is that they're all going to tank without government money, unless by some miracle they have truly found some special low-cost of operation on the first try that…

Sorry, but this is bullshit. A steam turbine and a generator will be a _minor_ detail in the overall list of expenses building a fusion generator. It's like saying: "We should build an airport here in the desert, because we'll be able to save on cutting the grass!"

I feel like it's more like saying, we should build an airport here, because it's near a city and in a good location, and the land is cheap because no one else wants it for a number of reasons and this is the only thing that practically makes sense to go there.

It's not going to save a meaningful amount of money. But that doesn't mean it's a bad idea.

Re: Wendelstein 7-X: Gigajoule energy turnover generated for eight minutes

#256
post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Right now there is no reasonable way to have a 100% renewable and reliable grid in Northern Europe, excepting classic hydro. I specifically studied the German grid, and it needs about a MONTH of storage to compensate for a once-in-a-century Dunkelflaute (a period with little wind, no sun, and cold temperatures).

> Right now there is no reasonable way to have a 100% renewable and reliable grid [...] and it needs about a MONTH of storage to compensate for a once-in-a-century Dunkelflaute If you accept slightly less than 100% renewables, you could use diesel or gas backup for these once-in-a-century events.

That drives up costs because you have to maintain many gigawatts of backup capacity sitting idle most of the year. It's better to have more flexible solutions that provide value the whole year. That's either baseload (fission, fusion) or grid-scale, seasonal storage (unsolved problem).

Re: Wendelstein 7-X: Gigajoule energy turnover generated for eight minutes

#257
post #56

Interesting fact: Nuclear fusion, even if we'll make it work, won't stop global warming, because the heat it creates heats up the earth enough to bring us outside the Paris agreement: https://twitter.com/rahmstorf/status/1605967891928596481

I don't understand the conclusion.

According to the article, we currently emit 2.1w/sqm in greenhouse gasses.

If we had 10x energy and it was all fusion - it would be 0.4w/sqm.

This sounds like a massive improvement.

Additionally, I'm highly skeptical we'll be using 10x the energy in 100 years - when there's likely to be significantly less people, and everything is getting more efficient.

Sounds like the same argument that China is going to continue growing 10% per year for the next hundred years, because it did for the last 30 years. No. China's workforce is going to decline massively. It will be so much harder for them to grow at the same rate, it would take a real miracle to keep growing at that rate.

Re: Wendelstein 7-X: Gigajoule energy turnover generated for eight minutes

#258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not with a properly design energy system. The conclusion of 100% RE research is that such a system will have costs similar to fossil fuels.

No. Right now there is no reasonable way to have a 100% renewable and reliable grid in Northern Europe, excepting classic hydro. I specifically studied the German grid, and it needs about a MONTH of storage to compensate for a once-in-a-century Dunkelflaute (a period with little wind, no sun, and cold temperatures).

You're wrong about that. Back up with green hydrogen is quite plausible. Europe has enormous salt formations in which cavities can be solution mined for gas storage (this is one of the chief ways natural gas is stored). Storing hydrogen, the cost of these caverns per unit of storage capacity in these would be about $1/kWh. The total potential capacity there is in the petawatt hours, far more than would be needed.

A combined cycle power plant costs about $1/W of capacity (and for rare events, simple cycle would be even cheaper), so one could back up the entire grid with these at a small capital cost compared to powering the grid with nuclear. For Europe, these would also be useful for seasonal leveling, allowing solar to provide a larger fraction of Europe's energy demand.

Hydrogen is an example of "Power to X" (PtX), where excess power, when available, is used to make some very storable commodity. This review article talks about how important these are to reaching 100% RE.

https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9837910

"With every iteration in the research and with every technological breakthrough in these areas, 100% RE systems become increasingly viable. Even former critics must admit that adding e-fuels through PtX makes 100% RE possible at costs similar to fossil fuels."

Re: Wendelstein 7-X: Gigajoule energy turnover generated for eight minutes

#259
post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Right now there is no reasonable way to have a 100% renewable and reliable grid [...] and it needs about a MONTH of storage to compensate for a once-in-a-century Dunkelflaute If you accept slightly less than 100% renewables, you could use diesel or gas backup for these once-in-a-century events.

That drives up costs because you have to maintain many gigawatts of backup capacity sitting idle most of the year. It's better to have more flexible solutions that provide value the whole year. That's either baseload (fission, fusion) or grid-scale, seasonal storage (unsolved problem).

The backup capacity is cheap (in capital cost) compared to nuclear providing the same output. Like, an order of magnitude cheaper. Combustion turbines are remarkably compact and inexpensive for their power output (this is why they power our aircraft). It's wonderful what happens to machinery when you can reduce the need to transfer heat across fluid-solid boundaries. Rocket engines are an even more extreme example of this.

Re: Wendelstein 7-X: Gigajoule energy turnover generated for eight minutes

#260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

'Theoretically' is the right word for sure. iirc, the predecessor of the Wendelstein led to the bankruptcy of the engineering firms building the parts, because tolerances were so tight and they failed multiple times to land within the constraints.

The first Alternativlos Podcast of two conducted with the leader of the Wendelstein X project relates how certain magnetic coils were purpose made by a kind of emeritus engineer in Swiss. Which seems corollary to the common wisdom about EMI, it's magic, so the manufacturer must be a wizard. On the other hand it is reminiscent of a Georgian I met who used to be occupied with winding regular tire sized coils by hand, f…

> It likely doesn't mean that the cheques bounced on liabilities.

But that's exactly what it means:

https://dejure.org/gesetze/InsO/17.html

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