Breaking News: Fusion Energy

[kfrankie]

https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/12/politics/nuclear-fusion-energy-us-scientists-climate/index.html

 

The US Department of Energy is expected to announce Tuesday that scientists have for the first time successfully produced a nuclear fusion reaction resulting in a net energy gain, according to the Financial Times and The Washington Post.

The result of the experiment would be a massive step in a decadeslong quest to unleash an infinite source of clean energy that could help end dependence on fossil fuels. Researchers have for decades attempted to recreate nuclear fusion – replicating the fusion that powers the sun.

Scientists at the National Ignition Facility at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California made the discovery, according to The Post.

*************************

Reported by multiple major news outlets, including Washington Post, CNN, FoxNews, the Guardian, blah blah blah.   Scientist/physicist nerds-- talk amongst yourselves, try not to mess you pants, and let everyone else listen.

 

Edited December 12, 2022 by kfrankie

[bearrock]

Wow.  Isn't fusion the holy grail of clean energy?  

[abdcskins]

Whoa, sounds pretty groundbreaking and potentially amazing news for the planet 🌎

[CousinsCowgirl84]

1 hour ago, bearrock said:

Wow.  Isn't fusion the holy grail of clean energy?  

Yes, looks like they didn’t produce enough energy for it to be commercial viable yet, but it’s comming.

 

if this works Solar panels will be what CFL bulbs were to LED bulbs.

[Renegade7]

Paging @Corcaighto help guncheck this.

 

I disagree with you on how close fusion is, but didn't see this close.  What I was reading yesterday is folks were Hella nervous to make an announcement as part of making doubly sure first, but basically couldn't help but start talking about it.

 

This being official would be massive step in ending the "always 30 years away narrative", imo.

[Spaceman Spiff]

 

[gbear]

Except we may actually be 30 years away this time.  There are still all the issues bring this new energy production up to scale, securing the needed materials and then producing ways of transmitting/transferring the energy.  However, these are the seemingly more mundane issues with the sci-fi of creating a net positive energy seemingly in reach.

[LD0506]

You do realize this means a fusion reactor produces heat to boil water to make steam to turn turbines yadda yadda yadda........it's a better fire, but hardly some holy grail. You still have massive infrastructure and delivery networks and a host of other issues that we have already, along with the centralized control and monetization of the network as opposed to diffuse solar + better batteries that might allow you to go offgrid altogether.

 

Not to throw cold water on this, it's a great step but still just a step. 

[TradeTheBeal!]

10 minutes ago, Spaceman Spiff said:

 

I don’t understand this joke/gif, but spiff posted it…so I’m sure it’s very clever and erudite!

[Xameil]

6 minutes ago, TradeTheBeal! said:

I don’t understand this joke/gif, but spiff posted it…so I’m sure it’s very clever and erudite!

Thats what he wants you to think.

I'm onto his game he just posts random **** to make you think its deep and clever.

[CousinsCowgirl84]

1 hour ago, Renegade7 said:

Paging @Corcaighto help guncheck this.

 

I disagree with you on how close fusion is, but didn't see this close.  What I was reading yesterday is folks were Hella nervous to make an announcement as part of making doubly sure first, but basically couldn't help but start talking about it.

 

This being official would be massive step in ending the "always 30 years away narrative", imo.

Well it’s still 30 years away from being commercial viable most likely. At least now there is a proven way to achieve viability.

[Wildbunny]

22 minutes ago, LD0506 said:

You do realize this means a fusion reactor produces heat to boil water to make steam to turn turbines yadda yadda yadda........it's a better fire, but hardly some holy grail.

I have to disagree here.

Producing 120% of energy is just huge.

 

That ratio up to now has been really low, so it would be a major step. Sure, it's quite huge, takes lots of place, but this process will get upgraded as time goes by, will get smaller for probably better production out of it.

 

Just like computers...

 

It's a major step and everyone will want to have this kind of energy, because, basically, you're just creating energy that didn't exist prior to it.

[Destino]

This is an incremental step in the long struggle to develop fusion energy.  It doesn’t show any viable means of sustained energy production. It’s kind of surprising that it’s receiving so much hype because there have been other recent similar breakthroughs that went by largely without notice. 
 

Things like this is what I mean.  This from September 2021

Quote

It was a moment three years in the making, based on intensive research and design work: On Sept. 5, for the first time, a large high-temperature superconducting electromagnet was ramped up to a field strength of 20 tesla, the most powerful magnetic field of its kind ever created on Earth. That successful demonstration helps resolve the greatest uncertainty in the quest to build the world’s first fusion power plant that can produce more power than it consumes, according to the project’s leaders at MIT and startup company Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS).

https://news.mit.edu/2021/MIT-CFS-major-advance-toward-fusion-energy-0908

Maybe the influx of private funding in recent years or the nearing completion of France’s International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) is finally generating some buzz.  
 

whatever the reason it’s good to see people cheering on science.  Between this and the Artemis missions, we might be nearing another leap forward in human scientific achievement.

 

[Jabbyrwock]

I've always thought that fusion was a beautiful example of the cultural differences between Europeans and Americans, and the bleed over of those differences into engineering designs and approaches.  The Europeans have favored the Tokamak fusion reactor design, which confines the plasma with magnetic fields within an elegant torus and gently (at least as gently as you can at these temperatures) coaxes the plasma to fusion with external currents.  The American ICF approach, however, is basically "HIT IT WITH BIG FRIGGIN LASERS!!!!!!".

 

I love being American.

[PokerPacker]

22 minutes ago, Jabbyrwock said:

I've always thought that fusion was a beautiful example of the cultural differences between Europeans and Americans, and the bleed over of those differences into engineering designs and approaches.  The Europeans have favored the Tokamak fusion reactor design, which confines the plasma with magnetic fields within an elegant torus and gently (at least as gently as you can at these temperatures) coaxes the plasma to fusion with external currents.  The American ICF approach, however, is basically "HIT IT WITH BIG FRIGGIN LASERS!!!!!!".

 

I love being American.

Reminds me of an episode of Junkyard Wars that pitted a team of Americans against a team of Brits in a competition to build a car crusher out of whatever they could find in the junkyard.  The Brits built a fancy hydrolic press to squish the cars.  The Americans just built a giant hammer.  And used a British mini as the winch to raise the hammer just to stick a finger in the eyes of the Brits.

[tshile]

Yay for the generation after me 

 

*goes back to work*

[Renegade7]

36 minutes ago, CousinsCowgirl84 said:

Well it’s still 30 years away from being commercial viable most likely. At least now there is a proven way to achieve viability.

 

One more "30 years away" and that's it I can live with...

[Xameil]

I call BS on that 30 years. I found a picture of a home fusion energy generator. It even powers cars.

[kfrankie]

For what its worth, I don't believe this report refers to "cold fusion," from the debunked 1989 report of Martin Fleischmann and Stanley Pons, but instead to a fusion process that occurs at high temperatures.  Like what happens with the Sun.

[Jumbo]

3 hours ago, Xameil said:

Thats what he wants you to think.

I'm onto his game he just posts random **** to make you think its deep and clever.

  

 

Around the mod room we just say if you add Spiff to PB you have a whole wit.

[PokerPacker]

11 minutes ago, Jumbo said:

 Around the mod room we just say if you add Spiff to PB you have a whole wit.

Wait 'til you see what you get when they have kids.  The whole wit bred.

[Destino]

3 hours ago, Jabbyrwock said:

I've always thought that fusion was a beautiful example of the cultural differences between Europeans and Americans, and the bleed over of those differences into engineering designs and approaches.  The Europeans have favored the Tokamak fusion reactor design, which confines the plasma with magnetic fields within an elegant torus and gently (at least as gently as you can at these temperatures) coaxes the plasma to fusion with external currents.  The American ICF approach, however, is basically "HIT IT WITH BIG FRIGGIN LASERS!!!!!!".

 

I love being American.

MITs SPARC reactor is a Tokamak as well.  
 

I’m not an expert on any of this stuff but it seems that scientists feel like they are getting within striking distance of some meaningful measure of sustained operation.  In other words a machine that generates fusion (plasma heated to 150 million Celsius) and is able to contain that plasma long enough for power output to even matter.  I’m fairly certain the current record is a few seconds.  China has contained plasma for 17 minutes but well below the extreme temperature needed for fusion.  Does anyone know if a goal exists for sustained operation in order to actually operate as a power plant and produce electricity?  If there is, I haven’t seen it.
 

the sudden interest and investment is why I think they're close.  You don’t see this sort of buzz and cash flow unless people start to think a break through is close.  But even if this is achieved, how much further is an actual working power plant?  This is all still a very long way off.

 

[Renegade7]

@Destino I remember feeling same way a couple months ago that there's a reason private sector is all the sudden getting more involved then it usually does.

 

We are still the same species that got from Kitty Hawk to a man on the Moon in one lifetime, our priorities clearly have a major impact on the rate of our advancement in certain technologies.

Edited December 12, 2022 by Renegade7

[dfitzo53]

5 hours ago, LD0506 said:

You do realize this means a fusion reactor produces heat to boil water to make steam to turn turbines yadda yadda yadda........it's a better fire, but hardly some holy grail. You still have massive infrastructure and delivery networks and a host of other issues that we have already, along with the centralized control and monetization of the network as opposed to diffuse solar + better batteries that might allow you to go offgrid altogether.

 

Not to throw cold water on this, it's a great step but still just a step. 

[The Sisko]

Meh.🥱🥱🥱 Call me when they build a Dyson sphere. That, I can get excited for.