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Fusion energy breakthrough by Livermore Lab

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Re: Fusion energy breakthrough by Livermore Lab

#581

Post by jnwatson »

jkelleyrtp wrote: post #537
floxy wrote: post #523

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Their most recent article has a ton of great data and next steps: That device in the photo is great. Looks to be about 16AWG magnet wire. Guessing a 10mm ID of the coil, and about 25mm in length. To get to 26 Tesla, looks like you'd need to push about 33,000 A through that coil. Coil inductance might be about 1uH, and if the test lasts ~1us, then you'd need 33kV to push that 33kA through the coil. 30kV/inch insulati…

Before ignition, very little science had been explored in the "burning plasma" regime. Now that ignition had been figured out, an entire new field of experimentation has been opened up. https://www.llnl.gov/news/three-peer-reviewed-papers-highlig... In particular, the original article talks about magnetic compression hypothesis being a byproduct of white dwarf simulation. With this new regime, they were able to apply…

"magnetic compression hypothesis being a byproduct of white dwarf simulation"

That is the coolest thing I'll read all month.

Re: Fusion energy breakthrough by Livermore Lab

#582

Post by [deleted] »

belorn wrote: post #510
Retric wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You see a lot of handwaving such as that very close to 0 statement with nuclear but someone’s got to be on the hook. The rate and cost of failures directly relate to insurance costs. A 1 in 100,000 chance per year to cause a 500 billion dollar accident represents a ~5 million per year insurance cost to offset that risk before considering the risk premium associated with insurance. And that’s on top of the normal risk…

> You see a lot of handwaving such as that very close to 0 statement with nuclear but someone’s got to be on the hook. Yes, and that one is society. It what we do with any risk that is so great that if any company would have to carry it then the company would fold and society would still have to carry it. Hydro power is one prime example. If a dam would break the damage downstream would be too high for any power comp…

[deleted]

Re: Fusion energy breakthrough by Livermore Lab

#583

Post by [deleted] »

Retric wrote: post #326
Galaxeblaffer wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is simply not true. according to IEA https://www.iea.org/reports/projected-costs-of-generating-el... LCOE of nuclear is cheaper than almost all other possibilities we have. sure nuclear is very expensive up front, but a nuclear powerplant can run for 100 years while wind and solar had to be completely replaced every 25 years. your correct that nuclear has had some very expensive accidents, but the chance of a mo…

You see a lot of handwaving such as that very close to 0 statement with nuclear but someone’s got to be on the hook. The rate and cost of failures directly relate to insurance costs. A 1 in 100,000 chance per year to cause a 500 billion dollar accident represents a ~5 million per year insurance cost to offset that risk before considering the risk premium associated with insurance. And that’s on top of the normal risk…

[deleted]

Re: Fusion energy breakthrough by Livermore Lab

#584

Post by pontifier »

I see I'm a little late to the discussion, but this is very similar to the patented Fusion device I've been proposing for several years here. http://www.DDproFusion.com

The main idea behind my reactor is to contain NIF like explosions in magnetic fields. I've been trying to get a test reactor built for a long time, and my plans have been hampered by a theft earlier this year.

A huge difference between the current NIF device and my proposed device is the speed of implosions and the strength of the field. While the NIF device must be re-built before every implosion, my device creates an environment where the implosions form as part of a harmonic oscillation. The ions are allowed to travel their entire individual cyclotron trajectories before they return to the implosion site... my target frequency was 2.4GHz, which is a useful frequency for direct conversion and COTS components.

Re: Fusion energy breakthrough by Livermore Lab

#586

Post by zaphar »

peterashford wrote: post #539
Galaxeblaffer wrote: post #531

Earlier quoted context omitted.

solar is fine in some places for some usecases and yes it's very cheap to add, but we've currently got no viable solution for storing the energy efficiently.

Batteries, pumped hyrdo, compressed air energy storage, hydrogen, the (large and growing) EV fleet, thermal energy storage

Batteries have had a lot of problems meeting capacity as a storage solution. Pumped Hydro is pretty good but highly location dependent, Gravity and compressed air I believe show a lot of promise. I don't know enough about Hydrogen or thermal storage to comment. But we are no where near actually solving the energy storage needs to use solar and wind exclusively. Unless we demonstrate real breakthroughs in production ready storage we'll always need a backup. Nuclear whether fission or fusion would have been a better route to clean energy but we basically stopped innovating there decades ago and now we are too far behind.

Re: Fusion energy breakthrough by Livermore Lab

#587

Post by Retric »

Galaxeblaffer wrote: post #504
Retric wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You see a lot of handwaving such as that very close to 0 statement with nuclear but someone’s got to be on the hook. The rate and cost of failures directly relate to insurance costs. A 1 in 100,000 chance per year to cause a 500 billion dollar accident represents a ~5 million per year insurance cost to offset that risk before considering the risk premium associated with insurance. And that’s on top of the normal risk…

that's simply still not true. the last three plants built in Europe (England, France and Finland) has been very expensive because they've all been first of its kind and there hasn't really been built anything else. but if you take a look at what's happening elsewhere in the world KHNP for example has their standardized APR1400 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/APR-1400 reactor that seems to be very affordable Poland ju…

It’s not just the United Kingdom that has had issues with APR-1400.

United Arab Emirates has had massive issues. Unit 1 began construction in 2012 and was “completed” in 2018, but didn’t enter commercial operation until 2021 due to literally hundreds of issues. “In December 2018, it was reported that voids were found in the concrete containment buildings for units 2 & 3. Grease was found to have leaked through the unit 3 containment, which may have been due to a crack in the concrete.” https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barakah_nuclear_power_plant

South Korea also ran into multiple delays, “Shin Kori-3 was initially scheduled to commence operation by the end of 2013, but the schedules for both Units 3 & 4 were delayed by approximately one year to replace safety-related control cabling, which had failed some tests.”

Poland isn’t a failure at this point, but they don’t have a power plant yet and their cost projections before delays aren’t very rosy.

Objectivity it’s reasonable to blame bad management for issues within a single project or even country, but when several different projects in different countries run into issues that suggest more fundamental problems.

Re: Fusion energy breakthrough by Livermore Lab

#588

Post by godelski »

signatoremo wrote: post #206
dylan604 wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because it's A) true, B) relevant to keep all of the hype in check. The year of Linux on the desktop is always right around the corner too. Yes, they are tropes, but they were not born out of nothing. Someone has to keep the bloviated PR campaigns checked with reality. Otherwise, some crazy fools might actually start believing that fusion is real and gets duped out of their money. If you can't stand a bit of real cri…

If you want to keep the hype in check, do it with facts like /acidburnNSA did above. Let people debate. You don’t even know what will be announced. Repeating the same joke in every single fusion article is tiresome and has long past its funny expiration date.

It's also weird to watch people debate passionately but without the passion to actually gain expertise in the thing they are debating. I find it weird that we do this. I'm not immune, we all do it. We should at least be cognizant and try to reduce how heated we get over things we know so little about. It is just weird.

Re: Fusion energy breakthrough by Livermore Lab

#589

Post by zaphar »

Schroedingersat wrote: post #529
Galaxeblaffer wrote: post #524

Earlier quoted context omitted.

please stop calling them nukes, it makes you sound like Greenpeace crazy person that actually think that a nuclear power plant has anything to do with nuclear weapons that nuke is normally referring to. could you please provide some evidence that the capacity factor and supply safety is remotely comparable between APR1400 and offshore wind? What do you think service costs are for offshore/onshore wind and hinkley poi…

Nuke is a word that applies to a reactor, a bomb, and someone who works on a reactor equally. Stop with the pearl clutching. https://pris.iaea.org/PRIS/WorldStatistics/ThreeYrsEnergyAva... Cheap reactors are unreliable reactors. > What do you think service costs are for offshore/onshore wind and hinkley point? having maintenance and an industry is actually a good thing for the economy. Stop with the broken window fal…

Colloquially speaking, which your conversation here is, nuke has always meant bombs not reactors. He's not pearl clutching, he's reacting to what sounds like unnecessarily negative terminology.

Re: Fusion energy breakthrough by Livermore Lab

#590

Post by godelski »

Veen wrote: post #151
dylan604 wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because it's A) true, B) relevant to keep all of the hype in check. The year of Linux on the desktop is always right around the corner too. Yes, they are tropes, but they were not born out of nothing. Someone has to keep the bloviated PR campaigns checked with reality. Otherwise, some crazy fools might actually start believing that fusion is real and gets duped out of their money. If you can't stand a bit of real cri…

It's not a trope; it's a cliché. There's nothing wrong with poking holes in overinflated hype, but do they have to be so boring and repetitive about it.

It's also just a parrot trick. There's no reason behind why it is 30 years away or even why 30 instead of 15 instead of 20. It is just a line. These numbers are meaningless but touted as a way to add validity to the argument without providing actual evidence for why fusion is such a tough nut to crack. We should dispose of hype, but let's do it from a place of understanding. I hope we're a bit smarter than parrots.
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