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Will we ever get fusion power?

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Re: Will we ever get fusion power?

#91

Post by DesiLurker »

shrimp_emoji wrote: post #4

It's just 50 years away.

AI was also 30years away forever then it was not. its a function of dollar spent researching not fairy dust powered by hopes and dreams. problem is the problem seems so unsurmountable that private sector (until now) was never interested in exploring this and govt funding is really mostly about making things blow up. so there you are. all that said the fusion triple product neutron-fluxtimeenergy has been steadily getting better over decades & hence a flurry of recent funding. That is until AI started sucking up all oxygen.

Re: Will we ever get fusion power?

#92

Post by mayama »

jmpman wrote: post #33
bsder wrote: post #28

The big problem is that we have funded fusion at "Fusion Never" levels. Had we shoved as much money at fusion as we have at, say, horizontal drilling for liquified dinosaurs, we'd have fusion right now .

Is that true of the Chinese?

Fission is pathway to nukes, so every nation with intention of building nukes invests in fission regardless of commercial viability. Fusion on the other hand is pure r&d project and may give bragging rights if a country gets it first. So even in China it is not priority.

Re: Will we ever get fusion power?

#93

Post by travisb »

kobalsky wrote: post #68
ffgjgf1 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Just by buying an electric vehicle I already have more than enough batteries to solve these problems for my household. Not if you live in Northern Europe. Solar is basically worthless there during winter. I’m not even talking about polar nights, just places like Denmark where the difference in production between January and June is 20x. No batteries (that we know of) would solve that.

doesn't long-distance power transmission solve that problem? just put the solar panels somewhere else?

The 'somewhere else' is a big issue though. In order to deal with Northern Europe winter power demands you probably want those solar panels to be on the Tropic of Capricorn in the southern hemisphere.

That's along ways away. It'll take a lot of costly electrical infrastructure to move that power.

Even worse, if you want to work during the night, you also want the solar panels about 45 degrees west. So like in South America. Tough luck for those places where that sweet spot is in the middle of a large ocean.

Re: Will we ever get fusion power?

#94

Post by [deleted] »

jmpman wrote: post #32
choilive wrote: post #11

We already have a zero maintenance fusion power plant that will last billions of years and that outputs millions of times more energy per second than humanity uses in a year. We already have technology that can take the electromagnetic waves this fusion power plant produces and directly convert it into electricity without needing pesky intermediaries like boiling water to turn a turbine. This technology is relatively…

Will orbiting solar panels ever work? Now that starship is viable, payload cost to orbit will dramatically drop. Is it cheaper to have orbiting solar plants than solar/battery(or whatever long term energy storage)? It’s that baseload problem which makes the manmade fusion/fission attractive.

[deleted]

Re: Will we ever get fusion power?

#95

Post by rmbyrro »

In 100,000 years from now, after we're past the next ice age, archeologists will unearth tokamaks all around the world. Regular people will speculate aliens and a worldwide connection between the peoples of the world to explain the multiple occurrences.

They'll have unlimited energy based on some quantum shit.

Re: Will we ever get fusion power?

#97

Post by Detrytus »

mayama wrote: post #92
jmpman wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is that true of the Chinese?

Fission is pathway to nukes, so every nation with intention of building nukes invests in fission regardless of commercial viability. Fusion on the other hand is pure r&d project and may give bragging rights if a country gets it first. So even in China it is not priority.

Wait, isn't fusion also possibly applicable as a weapon? I mean, thermonuclear weapons exist today with fission bomb being the fuze, once we achieve fusion ignition can't we build thermonuclear bomb from it that would not need uranium/plutionium?

Re: Will we ever get fusion power?

#98

Post by rcxdude »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #69
TaylorAlexander wrote: post #31

Would love to see comments that actually respond to the article! Everyone here seems to be sharing their general opinions on fusion or a reaction to the article title. The article is actually very detailed!

Agreed, I think it is a great article. Personally, I'm most inclined to agree with the "bear case" summarized at the bottom of the article: 1. I think it's highly likely that, at some point (and probably in the not-too distant future with ITER and DEMO), humans will produce fusion reactors that are self-sustaining with net positive output (ignition). 2. Given the inherent complexity and difficulty with fusion, I thin…

"Base load" doesn't really enter into it: you just need storage to make renewables make sense by supplying when generation doesn't meet demand and recharging when demand is less than supply. (or, if you have a cheap "base load" you use storage to even out the peaks and troughs in the same way). Base load is just a somewhat arbitrary line drawn across the lowest point of demand, it's not an actual requirement of the grid like supply and demand always matching.

Re: Will we ever get fusion power?

#99

Post by peutetre »

markus_zhang wrote: post #96

20 years from now. And the same answer after 20 years.

No, there are multiple projects and companies that are making good progress toward commercially practical fusion reactors.

Helion Energy has a contract to deliver Microsoft a fusion reactor by 2028. It's only four years away so we don't need to speculate about it. Helion will either deliver or they won't:

https://www.reuters.com/technology/microsoft-buy-power-nucle...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bDXXWQxK38

https://www.helionenergy.com/

MIT's Commonwealth Fusion Systems has started construction of their small scale SPARC reactor. Once that has proven itself they will build a larger scale ARC reactor. They should get to first plasma in 2025:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3Giq6NuPYs

https://energy.mit.edu/news/mit-designed-project-achieves-ma...

https://www.technologyreview.com/2024/04/23/1090425/mits-sup...

https://cfs.energy/

Re: Will we ever get fusion power?

#100

Post by cryptonector »

rmbyrro wrote: post #95

In 100,000 years from now, after we're past the next ice age, archeologists will unearth tokamaks all around the world. Regular people will speculate aliens and a worldwide connection between the peoples of the world to explain the multiple occurrences. They'll have unlimited energy based on some quantum shit.

They'll either wonder at our stupidity, or they'll wonder what they missed since it will appear to them that maybe we got it working.
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