YC used to get a lot of criticism for only funding "trivial web companies". You don't hear that so much these days.
I'm not up to date on everything YC funds - what other non-web companies have they funded?
Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
51–60 of 201 posts
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#52Excellent news, I can't wait to drive a Tesla powered by fusion power.
I don't think mobile fusion reactors are what they're going for. And if you're looking to reduce global carbon emissions try walking, biking or using public transportation. It's true electric cars don't emit carbon the way a fuel based car does, but the production and maintenance of an electric vehicle certainly does.
My reading of "a Tesla powered by fusion power" was that the electricity charging the batteries would come from a fusion generator source. And indeed, a clean electrical source makes electric transportation much more environmentally attractive.
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#53Nature had a fun article a few weeks back on the current trickle of VC into fusion startups. http://www.nature.com/news/plasma-physics-the-fusion-upstart... It's certainly interesting, and I wish these companies all the best. The consternation I see occasionally over a company like this getting a (relatively) small amount of funding confuses me. There are so many software startups that receive equivalent or greater f…
There was another good one in science.
http://news.sciencemag.org/physics/2014/07/fusions-restless-...
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#54 Safe: With no possibility of melt-down, or hazardous nuclear
waste, fusion dose not suffer the drawbacks that make
fission an unattractive alternative.
I wonder what the service interval on an installed reactor will be? Or are they doing isotope separation on the produced helium on-site?
(Fun fact: you can get deuterium from water[1] but helium comes from natural gas fields![2] It's literally a fossil gas, which is why we're running out of it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helium#Occurrence_and_productio... )
1: Commercially, heavy water is a byproduct of electrolysis plants: since deuterium doesn't electrolyze quite as easily as light water, it tends to accumulate in electrolysis stacks
2: The same rock formations that trap natural gas also trap helium.
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#55Excellent news, I can't wait to drive a Tesla powered by fusion power.
I don't think mobile fusion reactors are what they're going for. And if you're looking to reduce global carbon emissions try walking, biking or using public transportation. It's true electric cars don't emit carbon the way a fuel based car does, but the production and maintenance of an electric vehicle certainly does.
fusion plant -> mains electricity -> your tesla
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#56They're using deuterium, but the figure mentions that they're fusing it with helium. But helium-3 is very expensive, and I'd been under the impression that deuterium / helium-4 fusion required impractically high temperatures to work?
helium 4 is stable (it's the alpha particle) so fusion with helium 4 either doesn't produce energy or it produces very little.
It's possible that the reactor does two reactions: 1) D + D -> 3He + n, 3He + D -> 4He + p.
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#57What's the plasma configuration of the machine? I think there's a research group at U of Washington working on merging spheromaks which create a field reversed configuration. Is this a spinoff of that group? edit: looks like it is - this is the group: https://www.aa.washington.edu/research/plasmaDynamics/phdx.h...
Yes! Prof. John Slough is the Chief Scientist at Helion and the inventor of the Fusion Engine. UW has been leading the field of 'alternates' fusion for decades.
Our 'About Us' page has a short blurb:
http://www.helionenergy.com/
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#58When talking about breaking even, does that include the energy needed to make the deuterium? Or rather to collect it, considering it has to be extracted from water or something. IIRC deuterium costs quite a lot of energy to produce and as a result for a while it was only produced by countries having large amount of hydroelectricity available.
Not exactly related, but this made me wonder : inside a tank full of liquid hydrogen, do the DH and DD molecules lie on the bottom? Is it possible to just siphon them from there?
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#59It's interesting that you can justify this investment in at least four separate ways, independently: 1) Even if there is a low chance of success, it would be wildly profitable if successful, and investing early gets you a good share if it's successful. 2) Fusion power would make the world a better place; investing in this way, when you already have huge returns and it's someone else's money, is actually rational even…
The risk of #3 is that they don't create fusion but they do develop a machine that can emit streams of hot plasma which is then turned into the Navy's weapon of choice for close weapons support on carrier battle groups. That said, I am looking forward to at least one of the fusion efforts bearing fruit. I'm something of an optimist here but I expect a durable solution to the 'energy problem' to emerge from our develo…
The risk of #3 is that they don't create fusion but they do develop a machine that can emit streams of hot plasma which is then turned into the Navy's weapon of choice for close weapons support on carrier battle groups.
Why is that a risk? I'd like to live in a country with that technology, because otherwise other countries will have it and we won't.
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#60Can someone explain why this team is confident that they can build a commercially viable reactor in 3 years? Conventional wisdom is that nuclear fusion is "decades away". What does this team know that others don't?