Fusion

[FootballFan]

Is it finally becoming real?

Read a couple of places about advances being made solving the problem that has been 30 years away for 40 years.

Do you think it will be significant?

I have heard it compared to the impact of the internal combustion engine at a time when everyone rode a horse or rode in a buggy pulled by a horse.

 

[Stee6043]

I've read quite a bit about the facility in EU that is one of the biggest (I think) facilities being built to test. Surely sounds like a potential game changer but I gather that utility scale production is decades away still. Might be a big deal for my kids but I'm not sure I'll see it impact our lives.

https://www.iter.org

 

[Bill Curtis]

It certainly has been in the works and going on a while.

I worked on building the cell spools (the magnetic components) and welded some of the thermocouples to the copper water cooled plates (then vacuum leak checked everything with a helium mass spectrometer) for the Tocomac reactor being built at Lawrence Livermore Labs. That was back in late 70's / early 80's.

Fun times

 

[Skybolt]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2022/12/11/fusion-nuclear-energy-breakthrough/

 

[El Capitan]

Yes, it is real, not necessarily brand new. We've conducted nuclear fission for a while. Nuclear fusion is not decades away and will be the cleanest, cheapest, safest form of electricity in 18-24 months. The manufacturing ecosystem is in full swing with a number of companies ramping. It's energy yield / cost and yield compared to resource requirements are off the charts. Basically, water to cool the plasma, and same amount of lithium thats in your cell phone. It will leapfrog current day tech, and next to advances in quantum computing probably the most transformational tech on the planet.

 

[Stee6043]

Yes, it is real, not necessarily brand new. We've conducted nuclear fission for a while. Nuclear fusion is not decades away and will be the cleanest, cheapest, safest form of electricity in 18-24 months. The manufacturing ecosystem is in full swing with a number of companies ramping. It's energy yield / cost and yield compared to resource requirements are off the charts. Basically, water to cool the plasma, and same amount of lithium thats in your cell phone. It will leapfrog current day tech, and next to advances in quantum computing probably the most transformational tech on the planet.

You believe we are 24 months away from utility scale fusion? No fricken way. The permits alone will take 10 years...

 

[FootballFan]

Does realization of Fusion reduce the viability for solar panels and wind turbines even more?

My understanding is it would allow placement of power generation close to the consumer, eliminating the costly distribution systems. Is that an accurate understanding?

 

[El Capitan]

You believe we are 24 months away from utility scale fusion? No fricken way. The permits alone will take 10 years...

I never said that but your comment points to your limited understanding of the fusion market and is in the context of a government run fusion program, which is not what I am talking about. Yes, if the US government moves forward beyond grants to develop fusion energy we are decades away.

Fusion is largely funded today by venture capital. There are already developed fusion reactors in the private sector so we are not decades away.

Commercializing nuclear fusion tech is already underway. Less than $10B in last 3 decades has been invested by the government in nuclear fusion. This last year is a record year in private industry investment in fusion. At the government level there will a major shift in investments by government but they will do as government does, lag behind the private sector.

The barrier is broken, now, already, not decades away. You will see massive levels of funding poured into fusion. The private sector will explode due to the demand for net energy, clean, safe, cheap energy, with no contaminated waste to dispose of. It has already been produced twice by at least two different labs, one in Utah, one in the UK.

The reactor facilities are not cheap to build. There are already a handful of companies that have their own approach to produce nuclear fusion energy in the 12-18 months, and it will be demonstrated by several private companies in different countries.

Russia, Brazil, UK, several countries have already accomplished fusion. Successful fusion reactions have already happened also in south Korea, there's a company in Vancouver Canada.

The cap ex is building the plant but it virtually pays for itself making electricity ridiculously cheap, main cost is labor to keep reactors running, but there is zero energy cost i.e. coal, natural gas, etc. Its as close to "free" energy as possible after recouping cap ex in a few years.

We're talking about AI driven unlimited energy, AI driven labor in robotics (see Tesla assembly by Optimus humanoids that augment labor shortages and AI driven vehicles). All powered by almost zero cost energy production.

Consider yourself more informed now.

 

[Woody]

Does realization of Fusion reduce the viability for solar panels and wind turbines even more?

My understanding is it would allow placement of power generation close to the consumer, eliminating the costly distribution systems. Is that an accurate understanding?

Well I don't know but you'd still need water for cooling and turbines wouldn't you.

 

[FootballFan]

Well I don't know but you'd still need water for cooling and turbines wouldn't you.

I actually do not know enough about fusion to answer the question. Just what I read about the future of the technology, smaller, more compact. Heavily distributed. But I don't know if it uses Turbines or requires cooling like fission does.

 

[Stee6043]

I never said that but your comment points to your limited understanding of the fusion market and is in the context of a government run fusion program, which is not what I am talking about. Yes, if the US government moves forward beyond grants to develop fusion energy we are decades away.

Isn't that sort of, exactly, what I was suggesting? I used the term "utility scale production". I feel like you're agreeing with me....but in a really weird way...

 

[El Capitan]

Does realization of Fusion reduce the viability for solar panels and wind turbines even more?

My understanding is it would allow placement of power generation close to the consumer, eliminating the costly distribution systems. Is that an accurate understanding?

Renders all major sources of conventional energy production obsolete. Yes.

 

[El Capitan]

Isn't that sort of, exactly, what I was suggesting? I used the term "utility scale production". I feel like you're agreeing with me....but in a really weird way...

Depends…commercially no, gubberment run, yes.

It doesn’t take decades to build nuclear plants. Especially if funded by private sector.

 

[El Capitan]

Imagine a the amount of lithium in your cellphone today and one tablespoon of water producing energy for 1000 people for 10 years.

That’s nuclear fusion ( not fission).

It will transform humanity as we know it.

Yes, it will power cars, planes, trains, appliances, cities, countries, planetary/galaxial travel.

It never runs out.

 

[Bill Curtis]

Sounds wonder full, BUT where greedy people and gubmt gets involved, time is wasted, money is stolen and the whole system / dream gets hijacked to serve the 1%. "The cap ex will be recovered in a few years", but the rates you pay for electricity will NEVER go down to reflect the true cost power generation. In other words, the greedy 1% will be getting greedier.

Roll the Hunger Games.

How many "green" startups, that we funded, are still viable?

 

[Creekwood]

Sounds wonder full, BUT where greedy people and gubmt gets involved, time is wasted, money is stolen and the whole system / dream gets hijacked to serve the 1%. "The cap ex will be recovered in a few years", but the rates you pay for electricity will NEVER go down to reflect the true cost power generation. In other words, the greedy 1% will be getting greedier.

Roll the Hunger Games.

How many "green" startups, that we funded, are still viable?

Invest in utilities or generation companies and become insanely rich then. Many of them are publicly traded. Capitalism is based on properly monitored and moderated greed. Its like Mike Douglas said in Wallstreet - "Greed is good".

Getting controlled fusion on any scale to happen for more than a nanosecond is many years away, let alone commercialization at utility scale. We are going to have "conventional" generation for many decades IMO.

 

[ttmott]

Politics aside we are 30 plus years from viability in fusion based commercial electrical energy.
The current thinking is heat from the reaction to a typical steam turbine / generator based power plant.
The big technical challenge is scale. These tests are on the particle size.
The second technical challenge is the process to manufacture deuterium and tritium which are the isotopes to fuse and make helium. We just don't have the capability to make these materials in any quantity at all.
Fusion is a highly radioactive reaction; the neutron flux is tremendous so there are hazards.

As a history nugget - the first nuclear electrical power made was in Arco Idaho 1955. The lights in the tiny town of Arco were lit by nuclear energy. This was part of the work Adm. Rickover was doing to create a nuclear powered Navy. There is actually an active nuclear submarine buried in the desert in Idaho where the Navy trains.

 

[highslice]

Yes, it is real, not necessarily brand new. We've conducted nuclear fission for a while. Nuclear fusion is not decades away and will be the cleanest, cheapest, safest form of electricity in 18-24 months. The manufacturing ecosystem is in full swing with a number of companies ramping. It's energy yield / cost and yield compared to resource requirements are off the charts. Basically, water to cool the plasma, and same amount of lithium thats in your cell phone. It will leapfrog current day tech, and next to advances in quantum computing probably the most transformational tech on the planet.

Politics aside we are 30 plus years from viability in fusion based commercial electrical energy.
The current thinking is heat from the reaction to a typical steam turbine / generator based power plant.
The big technical challenge is scale. These tests are on the particle size.
The second technical challenge is the process to manufacture deuterium and tritium which are the isotopes to fuse and make helium. We just don't have the capability to make these materials in any quantity at all.
Fusion is a highly radioactive reaction; the neutron flux is tremendous so there are hazards.

As a history nugget - the first nuclear electrical power made was in Arco Idaho 1955. The lights in the tiny town of Arco were lit by nuclear energy. This was part of the work Adm. Rickover was doing to create a nuclear powered Navy. There is actually an active nuclear submarine buried in the desert in Idaho where the Navy trains.

Well these are two VERY opposing views....

 

[bajturner]

Well these are two VERY opposing views....

And one of them is based in reality!

We're a long way off, unfortunately.

 

[km1125]

There are several ways to make fusion, and it's great they finally crossed the 'break even' point with this laser-induced method. As tmott says, this is still at only a particle size, and only sustained for a very small fraction of a second. It's going to be a LONG time before they get this kind of technology to a realistic scale that can actually be used for any type of power source, whether that be powering just ONE home or a utility-scale project that could power many. Very likely - due to the neutron contamination problem, that this kind of process could ONLY be used at the utility scale because of the problems containing that kind of radiation.

Making fusion work isn't the hard part. There have been kids as young as 14 who have actually made fusion generators in their garage or basement. It's getting past the "break even" point that's always been the issue, and why this is big news.

The interesting thing about any energy production is that it ALL depends on getting a "chain reaction" started, and maintaining it. Even the diesel or gas engine in your vehicle depends on a chain reaction of the chemicals in the cylinder. You can always get ONE molecule of gas or diesel to combine with some Oxygen to create heat, but getting that to happen millions or billions or trillions of times consistently is actually pretty amazing in itself!

I honestly don't think we'll EVER see the ITER develop into an actual commercially-viable plant. It is just a "demonstration" plant and might actually produce power someday, but then will come decades and decades of more development to try and make it commercially feasible. We're already spending billions and billions on that debacle, and it will probably ending up being a TRILLION dollar boondoggle before all is said and done, when other entities will have come up with a REAL method for using fusion on a realistically-commercial product.