Nuclear fusion is going to be ... 1 year away!

[bignateyk]

So what makes fusion so much better than fission?

 

[frostedflakes]

It's still very far from being commercially viable. Fusion gain is a great achievement, though, with any luck commercial fusion will be achievable by 2050.

The EU is planning to complete construction of HiPER by 2020. It's supposed to offer 20 times the fusion gain of the NIF experiments at 1/10th the cost. This is still only a pilot plant, though. It will take even more research before large scale fusion is practical.

edit: bignateyk

Off the top of my head: You can get more energy from combining atoms than breaking them, the nuclear waste is short-lived (decades, instead of thousands of years for fissile waste), no nuclear proliferation concerns, abundant fuel source, etc.

 

[MrPickins]

About the laser used for the experiment

"it would boil the contents of more than 50 Olympic-sized swimming pools in a second"

Now that's a powerful laser!

QFT

I'm impressed that they've gotten 1MJ on the target.

 

[MrPickins]

So what makes fusion so much better than fission?

Extremely high energy density in the fuel, less radioactive waste and no chance of catastrophic failure, to name a few benefits.

 

[rcpratt]

Even if they perfected it tomorrow, it wouldn't be ready commercially for at least 25-30 years.

And as others have said, fusion has a much higher energy density (about 17.6 MeV from ~5u products, 3.52 MeV/u) than fission (about 200 MeV from ~240u products, 0.83 MeV/u). There is also very little waste, and the fuels (Deuterium, Tritium, Helium-3) are much more abundant that uranium or other fission fuels.

 

[Mxylplyx]

Extremely high energy density in the fuel, less radioactive waste and no chance of catastrophic failure, to name a few benefits.

Not to mention the fuel that could be extracted from a bucket of sea water and a shovel full of soil would probably yield as much power as an entire tanker full of conventional oil based fuel.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

That's the biggest pencil I've ever seen.

 

[Albatross]

Well, its reported by the BBC....the same company that brought you a film shot entirely by chimps.......

for a moment there,i thought you talked about Hollywood.. :awe:

 

[ElFenix]

Once we get this working the only thing left is the replicator, then war can pretty much end on Earth... that is unless someone else attacks from another world.

People only really fight over resource control. If everyone has abundant power and food what is there to fight over?

chicks.

 

[destrekor]

That's the biggest pencil I've ever seen.

:biggrin:

I had to look back, as I was like "WTF, is you high?", so I clicked link again, and bam, epic pencil.

 

[eits]

they've been using one in new york for years

 

[darkxshade]

How the heck do you contain something that's in the millions of degrees? 😱

 

[destrekor]

How the heck do you contain something that's in the millions of degrees? 😱

with super science!


But seriously, I hope this works. This is what this century needs, and it needs it very very bad.

 

[rcpratt]

How the heck do you contain something that's in the millions of degrees? 😱

A magnetic field contains the plasma. Materials are definitely the #1 issue preventing fusion from working correctly right now, though.

 

[ElFenix]

How the heck do you contain something that's in the millions of degrees? 😱

same way they cram all that graham.

 

[BladeVenom]

Wow, not the standard "10 years from now" answer that we've been receiving since the 80's. an actual sustained/controlled fusion reaction may be happening THIS year!

Of course, commercial reactors are probably 10 years away 😛

I thought they had been saying 10 years since the 50's. That's when we had the first fusion bomb.

 

[AMCRambler]

nimby!

Slim you got so much stuff parked in your "back yard" it's not even funny.

 

[darkxshade]

Even if the plasma is contained by a magnetic field, wouldn't the heat that radiates from it alone hot enough to melt just about anything up to a distance?

 

[Lemon law]

I have to ask, what are we talking about here. Fusion reactions have been demonstrated for decades, the problem is and remains, the power required to create the conditions under which fusion can occur on earth has always been greater than the extra fusion based energy generated.

And now they are claiming we can get over that hill and be able to generate more fusion energy than what is input. But if its just a tiny bit over that hill, it still won't pay for the equipment required, so to be practical, they have to get way above that hill.

And then in big country like the USA, we will need a large number of fusion generators, because line losses eat up 50% of all electricity generated. Although some sort of super electrical grid could help there.

The other question lies in the inputs. If simply hydrogen is being fused, its one thing, but if the inputs are in deuterium or tritium, that stuff is rare and expensive to come up with in large quantities likely needed.

In short, this thread seems to speculate way beyond the available information.

 

[Rubycon]

Anyone else find it amusing that this:

looks like this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_gadget

Hmmm that looks familiar! 😉

 

[Red Squirrel]

what? I thought we already had nuclear fusion going on. Isin't that what nuclear power plants and nuclear subs use?

 

[Red Squirrel]

Hmmm that looks familiar! 😉

That would look awesome in my server room when I build it. :biggrin:

"what's that?"

"Power backup"

 

[Rubycon]

LOL silly squirrel, trix are for kids! 😉

Oh that was a rabbit.

Yeah look up...way up. That big fireball in the sky? That's fusion. 😉

 

[AMCRambler]

HA!

It does sound an awful lot like Spiderman 2. I think deuterium was even the material Doc Oc traded Spiderman for from Harry Oswald. You think Stan Lee knows something we don't?

 

[The Boston Dangler]

what? I thought we already had nuclear fusion going on. Isin't that what nuclear power plants and nuclear subs use?

😡