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Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt

marathonfusion.com

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Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt

#11

Post by 0cf8612b2e1e »

Aeolun wrote: post #10
modeless wrote: post #6

Unfortunately gold generated in this way would be radioactive. They calculate they would have to store the gold for over 13 years to not require labeling as radioactive waste, or over 17 years to reach the level of radioactivity of a banana. I bet it would still be less valuable than regular gold even after that. It could still be identified, and people would discriminate against it. People are funny about nuclear wa…

17 years to banana is basically free money.

Most gold does not even leave the vaults. Just paper trades on who owns it.

Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt

#12

Post by Ekaros »

modeless wrote: post #6

Unfortunately gold generated in this way would be radioactive. They calculate they would have to store the gold for over 13 years to not require labeling as radioactive waste, or over 17 years to reach the level of radioactivity of a banana. I bet it would still be less valuable than regular gold even after that. It could still be identified, and people would discriminate against it. People are funny about nuclear wa…

Well for gold that will be placed in some vault dig deep into the ground that doesn't seem too bad trade off..

Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt

#13

Post by oh_my_goodness »

Even if this were true, at 0.15 USD/kWh it would cost more than just buying the gold. Even excluding cost of cleaning up the radioactivity, the equipment, labor, everything except the power.

A GW-year is 8760 GWh. That's 8760/5000 = 1.75 GWh per kg of gold. At 0.15 USD/kWh, a GWh costs $150k US. So 1.75GWh costs about $263k. A kg of gold costs about 100k US.

Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt

#14

Post by HPsquared »

wizzwizz4 wrote: post #7

> previously a […] PhD candidate in Plasma Physics at Princeton University The advice is generally not to advertise yourself as having been a PhD candidate: you're basically advertising that you couldn't complete a PhD. (Insert obligatory caveats about academia having problems, and failure to complete a PhD not implying that somebody is incapable.)

"Didn't" is not the same as "couldn't". Priorities change, and completing a PhD is a massive time commitment.

Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt

#16

Post by crinkly »

wizzwizz4 wrote: post #7

> previously a […] PhD candidate in Plasma Physics at Princeton University The advice is generally not to advertise yourself as having been a PhD candidate: you're basically advertising that you couldn't complete a PhD. (Insert obligatory caveats about academia having problems, and failure to complete a PhD not implying that somebody is incapable.)

As a former PhD candidate, yes that.

Honestly in my case I discovered I like being paid actual money and despise academic politics. Got a job offer so I phoned in sick on a catch up with my adviser and never went back. No one even checked on me for 6 weeks (!)

Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt

#17

Post by mtzaldo »

modeless wrote: post #6

Unfortunately gold generated in this way would be radioactive. They calculate they would have to store the gold for over 13 years to not require labeling as radioactive waste, or over 17 years to reach the level of radioactivity of a banana. I bet it would still be less valuable than regular gold even after that. It could still be identified, and people would discriminate against it. People are funny about nuclear wa…

It reminded me of avocado trees. They take a couple of years to produce avocados and still people plant those.

Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt

#18

Post by floxy »

modeless wrote: post #6

Unfortunately gold generated in this way would be radioactive. They calculate they would have to store the gold for over 13 years to not require labeling as radioactive waste, or over 17 years to reach the level of radioactivity of a banana. I bet it would still be less valuable than regular gold even after that. It could still be identified, and people would discriminate against it. People are funny about nuclear wa…

>In practice, given that much of all gold is used to store value and is not actively in use, we do not expect the need to store it for 7–17 years to be a major impediment; at worst, it means that the product will initially have somewhat less value than pure 197Au, and so some discount should be applied to the value of freshly produced gold.

Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt

#19

Post by K0balt »

Aeolun wrote: post #10
modeless wrote: post #6

Unfortunately gold generated in this way would be radioactive. They calculate they would have to store the gold for over 13 years to not require labeling as radioactive waste, or over 17 years to reach the level of radioactivity of a banana. I bet it would still be less valuable than regular gold even after that. It could still be identified, and people would discriminate against it. People are funny about nuclear wa…

17 years to banana is basically free money.

Theres always money in the banana stand!

Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt

#20

Post by ip26 »

wizzwizz4 wrote: post #7

> previously a […] PhD candidate in Plasma Physics at Princeton University The advice is generally not to advertise yourself as having been a PhD candidate: you're basically advertising that you couldn't complete a PhD. (Insert obligatory caveats about academia having problems, and failure to complete a PhD not implying that somebody is incapable.)

Given he left Princeton early and is now supposedly synthesizing gold merely two years later, the narrative seems in his favor.
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