Fuck, yes, this is the future I want. Great job guys, keep at it!
Also—I appreciate the alchemical aspects. A nice aesthetic for a future vision.
Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt
21–30 of 104 posts
Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt
#22Unfortunately 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…
Imagine a whiskey manufacturer saying "this is impossible because we'll have to age it for 13 years" lel
Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt
#23Even 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.
The gold is a byproduct of generating the electricity. You still get to sell the electricity too.
Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt
#24Even 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.
15 cents per kWh is much more expensive than what you buy electricity for around the world. Also, they can time their usage for when the electricity is free or very cheap
Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt
#25> 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.)
Well, he did pass his qualifiers so I guess that means something.
Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt
#26Even 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.
The gold is a byproduct of generating the electricity. You still get to sell the electricity too.
Wait, really?
Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt
#27Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt
#28> 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.
>allegedly synthesizing gold in large volumes
Are they alleging they are currently synthesizing gold? Seems like they are saying, if you do X, Y, and Z with a fusion reactor at some time in the future, you will also get gold as a byproduct.
Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
The gold is a byproduct of generating the electricity. You still get to sell the electricity too.
Wait, really?
Third paragraph from the post, in bold:
> Using our approach, power plants can generate five thousand kilograms of gold per year, per gigawatt of electricity generation (~2.5 GWth), without any compromise to fuel self-sufficiency or power output.
Re: Marathon fusion claims to invent alchemy, making 5000 kgs gold per gigawatt
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
The gold is a byproduct of generating the electricity. You still get to sell the electricity too.
Wait, really?
> Using our approach, power plants can generate five thousand kilograms of gold per year, per gigawatt of electricity generation (~2.5 GWth), without any compromise to fuel self-sufficiency or power output.