Nuclear fusion is a good investment for the world. Truthfully, fusion power is the final answer to our future energy needs. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8n7j5k-_G8
Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
191–200 of 201 posts
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#192Earlier quoted context omitted.
Prof Mackay's talk pretty much says that in order to use renewable energy the whole UK would have to be covered in electricity generating equipment. However, 15% of UK energy is generated from renewables (excluding nuclear), which would mean that currently one seventh of the landmass of the UK was covered in wind turbines etc. Which it isn't. You'd be able to tell. So, one of us has made a mistake with our calculatio…
According to [1] in 2012 for the UK renewables provided 11.3% of electricity demand and 3.94% of total energy demand. It's an important distinction, because petrol natural gas and jet fuel aren't renewable. MacKay is the author of a book - "Sustainable Energy without the hot air" - which lays out all his calculations and the rationales behind the inputs. And it's available online [2]. So if you want to audit his calc…
I've looked at the book, there's when I checked his figures and they seemed to disagree with reality.
So, electricity is about 1/3 of total energy. The 15% figure is the latest one for the last quarter of 2013[1] (PDF, see page 13). That means that (according to Prof Mackay) 5% of the UK is covered in renewable electricity generation.
No, it's still not.
[1]https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachm...
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#193Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not yet, right now we are focused on pushing the technical milestones as fast as possible. This is a great question, what do people here think about a crowdfunding campaign for something like fusion, is it worth it?
I helped out with the recent Focus Fusion crowdfunding. Our goal was $200K, we raised $180K, but it also brought in some new investors who took us well over the goal, and who gave the crowdfund the credit for their interest. We had a very low budget so our marketing was bare-bones. We had a lot of excitement, but also a lot of skepticism and pushback. Our hired marketing team insisted on an extremely optimistic prese…
That's very interesting. So what do you think solar roadways did better? Or is their concept just more reportable by media because it's more understandable.
What role did you play? Do you think a marketing team is necessary for a successful campaign?
By the way, email me if you want to chat sometime. I've been kicking around an idea for a better kickstarter.
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#194Earlier quoted context omitted.
Prof Mackay's talk pretty much says that in order to use renewable energy the whole UK would have to be covered in electricity generating equipment. However, 15% of UK energy is generated from renewables (excluding nuclear), which would mean that currently one seventh of the landmass of the UK was covered in wind turbines etc. Which it isn't. You'd be able to tell. So, one of us has made a mistake with our calculatio…
To start with, you're talking about electricity generation, where he is talking about total energy requirements. So your 15% figure doesn't include the energy consumption of cars, aeroplanes, many types of heating etc. I believe he also includes the embodied energy of imports (this was in his book), where if goods are manufactured overseas and imported, it may make sense to count the energy used to manufacture them,…
Ok, if we're talking total energy, then 5% rather than 15%. The point still stands.
I've no idea why he would include imports. Does he exclude exports? It seems a bit mad. There's a huge difference between me buying some aluminium and having to generate the electricity at my home to smelt it myself as a kind of cottage industry! (A case of he who smelted, dealt it?)
The point about area use not increasing linearly is a good one. However, Prof Mackay doesn't do this. He consistently states that - even giving renewables every advantage and pretending they'll always work at peak efficiency - you'd still have to blanket the country with them to make them effective.
I've read his book and it's where I first started to think there was something a bit off in what he was saying. Yes, he's very full of the idea that he's the hard-nosed realist and anyone who disagree must have their heads in the sand. I've heard that tactic before.
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#195Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's insanely cool that YC is now part of this. Also love that pg credits Sam for making it happen. On a somewhat related note. Despite the setbacks and the bad rep nuclear gets, fusion really could be a better future. The energy density is in a class of its own, compared to that of renewables. Prof David MacKay demonstrates this quite effectively here[1]. This of course is not to take anything away from renewables o…
> On a somewhat related note. Despite the setbacks and the bad rep nuclear gets, fusion really could be a better future. It sure could be a better future but the "bad rep" problem is bigger than I ever thought. The coalition of green parties in the European council (or Commission? Parliament? EU bureaucracy is confusing-) have the following in their program (paraphrased): "Cancel the funding of all nuclear power proj…
Pandora's Promise is a very interesting documentary about plain nuclear fission power, created by an environmentalist who decided to think for himself and investigate the power source that his movement hates.
The film highlights much of the misinformation campaign about fission, with particular emphasis on Chernobyl. I highly recommend watching, no matter the what you believe about nuclear power.
> "Cancel the funding of all nuclear power projects, like the ITER project"
This is so very sad indeed. Fusion and fission are entirely different technologies, and both show immense promise to meet the energy needs of the future.
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#196Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nope, Scotland over produces and sells to England, but that's still UK, at least for another month ;-) Offshore wind was included in the impossible. There's something off in his figures. Perhaps wind turbines have become more efficient since he first made his calculations?
It may also be diminishing returns, not all land is equal for wind turbine placement. If all the "good" spots can't generate enough for the UK's needs you might need to start using less suitable locations.
By far the most efficient wind turbine placements are offshore. We have plenty of coast, and so far very little of it has offshore wind farms.
We also have a good few estuaries that could create electricity relatively easily - using known and proven technology, which fusion certainly isn't.
Bottom line is these figures are either incompetent or disingenuous.
I'm old enough to remember fusion being touted as the Next Big Thing for literally all of my life. Commercial containment fusion seems no closer now than it did fifty years ago.
There are alternatives, but they're highly speculative. Dropping YC cash on them makes sense as a long shot, but the science doesn't suggest it's wise to expect them to make good.
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#197Earlier quoted context omitted.
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…
No doubt they could come up with something dangerous, but I wouldn't worry about that particular mode. Plasma doesn't travel far. A nice portable high intensity directed neutron radiation source might be pretty nasty, though.
There are already commercial oilfield tools that use neutron generators with relatively low power input requirements. I'm not seeing how to make a useful weapon out of something like that, though. What can it do that isn't already done better by normal guns and bombs?
I guess you could use it to attack people inside a building without directly destroying the building, but I would figure that if you got a high enough neutron flux to reliably kill everyone inside the building, you'd also get enough activation radiation to render the building uninhabitable for at least weeks. You might well need fancy decontamination, and possibly to demolish the building and haul away parts of it. Seems easier to just use a bomb.
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#198Earlier quoted context omitted.
I won't deny it's complicated, but there's more to thinking about how we conduct war than just the proximal individual act of killing. Two cultures that, for instance, respect military vs. civilian distinctions may war with each other with much less total damage than two cultures that practice Total War, even if the political outcome is the same in the end. Just because war is bad does not mean we are forced to throw…
War, itself, is a pretty damned sophomoric thing.
"Sophomoric" is not merely an empty insult, to be flung at whatever you don't like. It is a specific thing. It can not apply in this case... only a particular justification for a war could be sophomoric, not the whole act.
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#199Earlier quoted context omitted.
To start with, you're talking about electricity generation, where he is talking about total energy requirements. So your 15% figure doesn't include the energy consumption of cars, aeroplanes, many types of heating etc. I believe he also includes the embodied energy of imports (this was in his book), where if goods are manufactured overseas and imported, it may make sense to count the energy used to manufacture them,…
Ok, if we're talking total energy, then 5% rather than 15%. The point still stands. I've no idea why he would include imports. Does he exclude exports? It seems a bit mad. There's a huge difference between me buying some aluminium and having to generate the electricity at my home to smelt it myself as a kind of cottage industry! (A case of he who smelted, dealt it?) The point about area use not increasing linearly is…
If your goal is sustainability, there is no difference. Pushing your energy consumption out to another country is just shifting the problem. Though yes, you would want to exclude exports in this model.
Picture a hypothetical country that solely consists of stay at home programmers making large sums of money, powered entirely by solar, but importing vast amounts of physical goods manufactured in environmentally unfriendly ways. The country would by traditional measures be a perfect model of sustainability, but it is simply paying others to do unsustainable actions on its behalf.
The book isn't really "saying" much, for the most part. The vast bulk of it is simple, back of the envelope calculations for energy consumption which shows working. I realize you might not want to take a half hour to find specific faults in it, but it is not helpful say there is "something a bit off" with a work like that, when the source code is published for all to see.
For instance, that he counts embodied energy of imports, and you do not wish to, makes a big difference to the bottom line. Just skimming the chapter headings is enough to point out a concrete disagreement.
Fair point about the hard nosed realist tactic often being used to discredit dissenting views. That wasn't my intention, I was more trying to say that the conclusions presented should not be used to infer some political position of the author.
There are a ton of studies paid for by the oil industry that paint all kinds of pictures, I just meant it's not a book like that. If I realized you'd already read it, I wouldn't have included that part.
Re: Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup
#200Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ok, if we're talking total energy, then 5% rather than 15%. The point still stands. I've no idea why he would include imports. Does he exclude exports? It seems a bit mad. There's a huge difference between me buying some aluminium and having to generate the electricity at my home to smelt it myself as a kind of cottage industry! (A case of he who smelted, dealt it?) The point about area use not increasing linearly is…
If your goal is sustainability, there is no difference. Pushing your energy consumption out to another country is just shifting the problem. Though yes, you would want to exclude exports in this model. Picture a hypothetical country that solely consists of stay at home programmers making large sums of money, powered entirely by solar, but importing vast amounts of physical goods manufactured in environmentally unfrie…
Having read the book the specific fault with it is that the results it comes up with from its simple back of the envelope calculations, bear no resemblance to actual reality and are therefore wrong.
Including imports is wrong. In your hypothetical country, fixing those unsustainable actions is up to the country they're importing goods from. Show that they can't use wind/solar on their landmass if you want. The idea that every area of a country (or indeed the world) are equally good at generating power is obviously incorrect. Claiming that this makes wind and solar power unusable is equally incorrect.
The book reads like it was paid for by the nuclear industry (I don't think it was; it just reads that way).