Fusion Discussion Thread

[Gargamel]

Moderator note -Dec 12, 2022- :  This thread is a mashup of a few threads on updates and advances in Fusion research.  Future press releases and updates should be merged into this one. 

 

Oxford's JET lab smashes nuclear fusion energy output record https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-60312633
 

(I’ll merge this into an existing topic if needed  once I get home.) 

Edited December 14, 2022 by Gargamel
Added mod note

[Codraroll]

It looks a bit promising, but it also contains one of the most disheartening sentences I've ever seen in a purportedly optimistic report on fusion technology:

Quote

This is more than double what was achieved in similar tests back in 1997.

 

[Scotius]

Well, at least there is steady progress. Hopefully it will accelerate when ITER comes online, and starts throwing its considerable weight around

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

1 hour ago, Codraroll said:

It looks a bit promising, but it also contains one of the most disheartening sentences I've ever seen in a purportedly optimistic report on fusion technology:

This is more than double what was achieved in similar tests back in 1997

Look, if every 25 years we double the output of our previous best fusion effort... Isn't that kind of a Moore's Law thing? 

 

Someone do the math?  How long until we have commercial fusion for the masses? 

[kerbiloid]

3 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

Someone do the math?  How long until we have commercial fusion for the masses? 

In 1952..54 it was lasting just for ~1 mks.

70 years later, in 2022, it lasts 5 s, 50 000 000  times greater. 

So, in 2092 it will be ~50 000 000 * 5 s = 2 900 days ~= 8 years, at it means that something useful will be achieved somewhere in 2022..2092 range.

[Nuke]

i knew this was coming. 
 

nvm. q-plasma was only 0.33 for this shot. not really record breaking. 

Edited February 9, 2022 by Nuke

[RCgothic]

From reading the report, JET first operated in 1997 and one of the results was an issue with the lining.

ITER was designed and built off the back of those results. That process took 25+ years. (ノಥ,_｣ಥ)ノ彡┻━┻

But meanwhile JET was still available, so they tore down the lining and tested the new design. It worked. ITER would have been in peril if it hadn't.

So not a breakthrough exactly, but a verification of an intended upgrade.

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

The time is the thing.

 

[Nuke]

read the nature article. looks like this shot was aiming for higher energy output. it was running d-t. the shot only lasted 5 seconds, which is the limit for what jet's coils can handle. this machine formerly set the q record for a tokamak, but that's not what they were going for with this shot.

[Johnmo89]

I wonder how this will affect the energy industry in general... I mean the French reactor. After all, if all the predictions come true, then in 2025 we will get a new unlimited source of energy. Have they thought about how this will affect the global economy?

[Gargamel]

12 minutes ago, Johnmo89 said:

I wonder how this will affect the energy industry in general... I mean the French reactor. After all, if all the predictions come true, then in 2025 we will get a new unlimited source of energy. Have they thought about how this will affect the global economy?

Until there is a functioning plant and it’s economical to build more, it will have no affect at all. 

[mikegarrison]

This is clearly not the highest power output from fusion in human history. Just the highest power output that didn't almost immediately expand into a glowing ball of heat and then form a mushroom cloud.

[kerbiloid]

It's like a 200+ mm APDS, it can hit a Landkreuzer.

If attach it to an anti-tank railgun.

59 MJ per shot, 1 round per 5 seconds, 12 rpm.

It could protect the reactor plant from a tank assault.

[Shpaget]

3 hours ago, Johnmo89 said:

After all, if all the predictions come true, then in 2025 we will get a new unlimited source of energy.

None of the relevant predictions state that ITER will give us unlimited source of energy, let alone one that is cheap enough to affect the economy.

[Johnmo89]

38 minutes ago, Shpaget said:

None of the relevant predictions state that ITER will give us unlimited source of energy, let alone one that is cheap enough to affect the economy.

Here is the article where I've got an information about it's cheapness and limitless

https://theprint.in/environment/clean-cheap-and-limitless-how-fusion-power-can-meet-10-of-the-worlds-energy-needs/583259/

[Gargamel]

36 minutes ago, Johnmo89 said:

Here is the article where I've got an information about it's cheapness and limitless

https://theprint.in/environment/clean-cheap-and-limitless-how-fusion-power-can-meet-10-of-the-worlds-energy-needs/583259/

This article reads identical to a sales brochure for flying cars in the 1950’s.   Yeah we’re trying to get there, but we’re still a ways off.  

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

So... Ten years? 

[Jacke]

26 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

So... Ten years? 

It's been ten years for the last 50 years.

[kerbiloid]

Two energetical crysises later.

Seriously.

So, by 2050.

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

8 minutes ago, Jacke said:

It's been ten years for the last 50 years.

Well - that's better than the guy quoted in my (link) post above: he said 'decades'... the singular must be better than the plural, n'est cie pas? 

Rejoice!

Huzzah!

All our problems are solved!

 

 

[Johnmo89]

15 hours ago, Gargamel said:

This article reads identical to a sales brochure for flying cars in the 1950’s.   Yeah we’re trying to get there, but we’re still a ways off.  

Yeah I know it. I just replied to Shpaget that we are trying to get there. Nobody knows about terms. I was talking about our goal. Of course I see and know that this article is not a reliable source.

[mikegarrison]

Just now, Johnmo89 said:

Yeah I know it. I just replied to Shpaget that we are trying to get there. Nobody knows about terms. I was talking about our goal. Of course I see and know that this article is not a reliable source.

Well, there have been flying cars since 1949. It just turns out that they tend to be not very good cars and not very good planes.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aerocar

Meanwhile there isn't much that people ever envisioned from "flying cars" that haven't been done for decades with helicopters.

[Gargamel]

5 hours ago, mikegarrison said:

5 hours ago, Johnmo89 said:

 

Well, there have been flying cars since 1949. It just turns out that they tend to be not very good cars and not very good planes.

Oddly enough, almost exactly the same can be said about Fusion.   

[Nuke]

On 2/9/2022 at 10:07 PM, Johnmo89 said:

I wonder how this will affect the energy industry in general... I mean the French reactor. After all, if all the predictions come true, then in 2025 we will get a new unlimited source of energy. Have they thought about how this will affect the global economy?

it will displace anyone who based their entire economy on oil. 

[Codraroll]

19 hours ago, Jacke said:

It's been ten years for the last 50 years.

The value of "it" has changed a bit, though. At first it was "achieving nuclear fusion", then it was "sustaining nuclear fusion", then it was "produce more energy than was used to start the reaction", and then "achieve a net energy production over time", and so on. The milestones seem to be always ten years away, but they also seem to arrive roughly every ten years as well.

Granted, the number of steps between the next milestone and commercial utilization always seems to stay the same, though. And again, each step takes ten years.