OT: nuclear fusion might not be quite as far off in the futu

[Bill Sloman]

Today's issue of the Proceedings of the (US) National Academy of Sciences opens with a tolerably interesting article

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/4/1824

It's likely to be a more compact solution than ITER, and could get working earlier.

There's a guy in Sydney who wants to use a pulsed laser to fuse boron nuclei, who seems to think that he's even closer to a practical solution, but there are venture capitalists in the mix.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[Sylvia Else]

On 29/01/2020 5:14 pm, Bill Sloman wrote:

Today's issue of the Proceedings of the (US) National Academy of Sciences opens with a tolerably interesting article

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/4/1824

It's likely to be a more compact solution than ITER, and could get working earlier.

There's a guy in Sydney who wants to use a pulsed laser to fuse boron nuclei, who seems to think that he's even closer to a practical solution, but there are venture capitalists in the mix.

I can't judge its merits, but "working with a more advanced prototype at
least three times larger..." That is, "We need a bigger machine to get
energy positive". Where have we heard that before?

Sylvia.

 

Sylvia Else <sylvia@email.invalid> wrote in
news:h9cvj3Fbe6iU1@mid.individual.net:

On 29/01/2020 5:14 pm, Bill Sloman wrote:
Today's issue of the Proceedings of the (US) National Academy of
Sciences opens with a tolerably interesting article

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/4/1824

It's likely to be a more compact solution than ITER, and could
get working earlier.

There's a guy in Sydney who wants to use a pulsed laser to fuse
boron nuclei, who seems to think that he's even closer to a
practical solution, but there are venture capitalists in the mix.


I can't judge its merits, but "working with a more advanced
prototype at least three times larger..." That is, "We need a
bigger machine to get energy positive". Where have we heard that
before?

Sylvia.

They'll have it down in ten years. ;-)

 

[Bill Sloman]

On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 7:55:05 PM UTC+11, Sylvia Else wrote:

On 29/01/2020 5:14 pm, Bill Sloman wrote:
Today's issue of the Proceedings of the (US) National Academy of Sciences opens with a tolerably interesting article

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/4/1824

It's likely to be a more compact solution than ITER, and could get working earlier.

There's a guy in Sydney who wants to use a pulsed laser to fuse boron nuclei, who seems to think that he's even closer to a practical solution, but there are venture capitalists in the mix.

I can't judge its merits, but "working with a more advanced prototype at
least three times larger..." That is, "We need a bigger machine to get
energy positive". Where have we heard that before?

Pretty much everywhere, starting with steam engines.

It is worth paying attention to the size they need to get to - which is mentioned in the article.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[Whoey Louie]

On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 3:55:05 AM UTC-5, Sylvia Else wrote:

On 29/01/2020 5:14 pm, Bill Sloman wrote:
Today's issue of the Proceedings of the (US) National Academy of Sciences opens with a tolerably interesting article

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/4/1824

It's likely to be a more compact solution than ITER, and could get working earlier.

There's a guy in Sydney who wants to use a pulsed laser to fuse boron nuclei, who seems to think that he's even closer to a practical solution, but there are venture capitalists in the mix.


I can't judge its merits, but "working with a more advanced prototype at
least three times larger..." That is, "We need a bigger machine to get
energy positive". Where have we heard that before?

Sylvia.

+1

 

[Whoey Louie]

On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 6:00:55 AM UTC-5, Bill Sloman wrote:

On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 7:55:05 PM UTC+11, Sylvia Else wrote:
On 29/01/2020 5:14 pm, Bill Sloman wrote:
Today's issue of the Proceedings of the (US) National Academy of Sciences opens with a tolerably interesting article

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/4/1824

It's likely to be a more compact solution than ITER, and could get working earlier.

There's a guy in Sydney who wants to use a pulsed laser to fuse boron nuclei, who seems to think that he's even closer to a practical solution, but there are venture capitalists in the mix.

I can't judge its merits, but "working with a more advanced prototype at
least three times larger..." That is, "We need a bigger machine to get
energy positive". Where have we heard that before?

Pretty much everywhere, starting with steam engines.

It is worth paying attention to the size they need to get to - which is mentioned in the article.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

With steam engines an actual working prototype showing how one gets
usable power out of it was demonstrated at the very beginning.
With nuclear fusion, we have exactly the opposite after more than
half a century.

 

[John Robertson]

On 2020/01/29 1:19 a.m., DecadentLinuxUserNumeroUno@decadence.org wrote:

Sylvia Else <sylvia@email.invalid> wrote in
news:h9cvj3Fbe6iU1@mid.individual.net:

On 29/01/2020 5:14 pm, Bill Sloman wrote:
Today's issue of the Proceedings of the (US) National Academy of
Sciences opens with a tolerably interesting article

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/4/1824

It's likely to be a more compact solution than ITER, and could
get working earlier.

There's a guy in Sydney who wants to use a pulsed laser to fuse
boron nuclei, who seems to think that he's even closer to a
practical solution, but there are venture capitalists in the mix.


I can't judge its merits, but "working with a more advanced
prototype at least three times larger..." That is, "We need a
bigger machine to get energy positive". Where have we heard that
before?

Sylvia.


They'll have it down in ten years. ;-)

Just about the same time the world ignites from climate change... isn't
that always ten years away?

Don't get me wrong I WANT fusion to work, but one has heard this all
before many, many times. One suspects some basic assumptions are wrong.

John ;-#)#

 

[Rick C]

On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 7:09:28 PM UTC-5, John Robertson wrote:

On 2020/01/29 1:19 a.m., DecadentLinuxUserNumeroUno@decadence.org wrote:
Sylvia Else <sylvia@email.invalid> wrote in
news:h9cvj3Fbe6iU1@mid.individual.net:

On 29/01/2020 5:14 pm, Bill Sloman wrote:
Today's issue of the Proceedings of the (US) National Academy of
Sciences opens with a tolerably interesting article

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/4/1824

It's likely to be a more compact solution than ITER, and could
get working earlier.

There's a guy in Sydney who wants to use a pulsed laser to fuse
boron nuclei, who seems to think that he's even closer to a
practical solution, but there are venture capitalists in the mix.


I can't judge its merits, but "working with a more advanced
prototype at least three times larger..." That is, "We need a
bigger machine to get energy positive". Where have we heard that
before?

Sylvia.


They'll have it down in ten years. ;-)


Just about the same time the world ignites from climate change... isn't
that always ten years away?

Don't get me wrong I WANT fusion to work, but one has heard this all
before many, many times. One suspects some basic assumptions are wrong.

John ;-#)#

No one with even a minor education in the field has been saying nuclear fusion energy is just 10 years away. They have always known it was considerably hard with many complex issues to solve.

It's just people like you who make ridiculous statements like this.

Not only has this been repeated many, many times, but this is being picked up as a response to anything anyone says that is more than 30 days out.

Sometimes I get tired of reading all the nonsense in this group.

--

Rick C.

- Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging
- Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

 

[Bill Sloman]

On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 5:36:06 AM UTC+11, Whoey Louie wrote:

On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 6:00:55 AM UTC-5, Bill Sloman wrote:
On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 7:55:05 PM UTC+11, Sylvia Else wrote:
On 29/01/2020 5:14 pm, Bill Sloman wrote:
Today's issue of the Proceedings of the (US) National Academy of Sciences opens with a tolerably interesting article

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/4/1824

It's likely to be a more compact solution than ITER, and could get working earlier.

There's a guy in Sydney who wants to use a pulsed laser to fuse boron nuclei, who seems to think that he's even closer to a practical solution, but there are venture capitalists in the mix.

I can't judge its merits, but "working with a more advanced prototype at
least three times larger..." That is, "We need a bigger machine to get
energy positive". Where have we heard that before?

Pretty much everywhere, starting with steam engines.

It is worth paying attention to the size they need to get to - which is mentioned in the article.

With steam engines an actual working prototype showing how one gets
usable power out of it was demonstrated at the very beginning.
With nuclear fusion, we have exactly the opposite after more than
half a century.

Whoey Louie's grasp of reality is decidedly weak. Nuclear fusion - in the sun - has been delivering usable power for the past few billion years.

At present it takes more power to get a hydrogen plasma at the earth's surface hot and dense enough to fuse than the fusing nuclei deliver, but that isn't "exactly the opposite" of delivering usable power, it's just a step along a road to getting there.

The point of the article was that while ITER currently looks like the likeliest route to commercial nuclear power generation, there are others, and most of them look as if they could work on a smaller scale.

Whooe Louie doesn't really understand how technical development works. It's an exploration of possibilities, rather than an expedition down the only possible route.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[Bill Sloman]

On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 12:47:11 PM UTC+11, Sylvia Else wrote:

On 30/01/2020 11:08 am, Bill Sloman wrote:
On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 5:36:06 AM UTC+11, Whoey Louie
wrote:
On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 6:00:55 AM UTC-5, Bill Sloman
wrote:
On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 7:55:05 PM UTC+11, Sylvia Else
wrote:
On 29/01/2020 5:14 pm, Bill Sloman wrote:
Today's issue of the Proceedings of the (US) National Academy
of Sciences opens with a tolerably interesting article

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/4/1824

It's likely to be a more compact solution than ITER, and
could get working earlier.

There's a guy in Sydney who wants to use a pulsed laser to
fuse boron nuclei, who seems to think that he's even closer
to a practical solution, but there are venture capitalists in
the mix.

I can't judge its merits, but "working with a more advanced
prototype at least three times larger..." That is, "We need a
bigger machine to get energy positive". Where have we heard
that before?

Pretty much everywhere, starting with steam engines.

It is worth paying attention to the size they need to get to -
which is mentioned in the article.

With steam engines an actual working prototype showing how one
gets usable power out of it was demonstrated at the very
beginning. With nuclear fusion, we have exactly the opposite after
more than half a century.

Whoey Louie's grasp of reality is decidedly weak. Nuclear fusion - in
the sun - has been delivering usable power for the past few billion
years.

At present it takes more power to get a hydrogen plasma at the
earth's surface hot and dense enough to fuse than the fusing nuclei
deliver, but that isn't "exactly the opposite" of delivering usable
power, it's just a step along a road to getting there.

The point of the article was that while ITER currently looks like the
likeliest route to commercial nuclear power generation, there are
others, and most of them look as if they could work on a smaller
scale.

Whooe Louie doesn't really understand how technical development
works. It's an exploration of possibilities, rather than an
expedition down the only possible route.


Nevertheless, there has been a specific goal for a long time - obtain
usable power from hydrogen fusion on Earth. There has never appeared to
be a theoretical obstacle (unlike free energy machines, for example),
yet achieving the goal has taken, and is still taking, longer than I
believe anyone imagined it would when research on it started.

If one were inclined to be sceptical, one would have history on one's side.

Have you any idea how long people imagined that it would take when the research got under way?

It's the nature of development that nothing works until you've solved all the problems that stopped it from working. Since it's a process of exploration, rather than trip down a well-charted path, the only people who make confident predictions about how long it's going to take to get to the destination are those who don't know what they are talking about.

And that includes the crowd that are happy to assure us that we'll never get there.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[Sylvia Else]

On 30/01/2020 11:08 am, Bill Sloman wrote:

On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 5:36:06 AM UTC+11, Whoey Louie
wrote:
On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 6:00:55 AM UTC-5, Bill Sloman
wrote:
On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 7:55:05 PM UTC+11, Sylvia Else
wrote:
On 29/01/2020 5:14 pm, Bill Sloman wrote:
Today's issue of the Proceedings of the (US) National Academy
of Sciences opens with a tolerably interesting article

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/4/1824

It's likely to be a more compact solution than ITER, and
could get working earlier.

There's a guy in Sydney who wants to use a pulsed laser to
fuse boron nuclei, who seems to think that he's even closer
to a practical solution, but there are venture capitalists in
the mix.

I can't judge its merits, but "working with a more advanced
prototype at least three times larger..." That is, "We need a
bigger machine to get energy positive". Where have we heard
that before?

Pretty much everywhere, starting with steam engines.

It is worth paying attention to the size they need to get to -
which is mentioned in the article.

With steam engines an actual working prototype showing how one
gets usable power out of it was demonstrated at the very
beginning. With nuclear fusion, we have exactly the opposite after
more than half a century.

Whoey Louie's grasp of reality is decidedly weak. Nuclear fusion - in
the sun - has been delivering usable power for the past few billion
years.

At present it takes more power to get a hydrogen plasma at the
earth's surface hot and dense enough to fuse than the fusing nuclei
deliver, but that isn't "exactly the opposite" of delivering usable
power, it's just a step along a road to getting there.

The point of the article was that while ITER currently looks like the
likeliest route to commercial nuclear power generation, there are
others, and most of them look as if they could work on a smaller
scale.

Whooe Louie doesn't really understand how technical development
works. It's an exploration of possibilities, rather than an
expedition down the only possible route.

Nevertheless, there has been a specific goal for a long time - obtain
usable power from hydrogen fusion on Earth. There has never appeared to
be a theoretical obstacle (unlike free energy machines, for example),
yet achieving the goal has taken, and is still taking, longer than I
believe anyone imagined it would when research on it started.

If one were inclined to be sceptical, one would have history on one's side.

Sylvia.

 

[Rick C]

On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 8:47:11 PM UTC-5, Sylvia Else wrote:

On 30/01/2020 11:08 am, Bill Sloman wrote:
On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 5:36:06 AM UTC+11, Whoey Louie
wrote:
On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 6:00:55 AM UTC-5, Bill Sloman
wrote:
On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 7:55:05 PM UTC+11, Sylvia Else
wrote:
On 29/01/2020 5:14 pm, Bill Sloman wrote:
Today's issue of the Proceedings of the (US) National Academy
of Sciences opens with a tolerably interesting article

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/4/1824

It's likely to be a more compact solution than ITER, and
could get working earlier.

There's a guy in Sydney who wants to use a pulsed laser to
fuse boron nuclei, who seems to think that he's even closer
to a practical solution, but there are venture capitalists in
the mix.

I can't judge its merits, but "working with a more advanced
prototype at least three times larger..." That is, "We need a
bigger machine to get energy positive". Where have we heard
that before?

Pretty much everywhere, starting with steam engines.

It is worth paying attention to the size they need to get to -
which is mentioned in the article.

With steam engines an actual working prototype showing how one
gets usable power out of it was demonstrated at the very
beginning. With nuclear fusion, we have exactly the opposite after
more than half a century.

Whoey Louie's grasp of reality is decidedly weak. Nuclear fusion - in
the sun - has been delivering usable power for the past few billion
years.

At present it takes more power to get a hydrogen plasma at the
earth's surface hot and dense enough to fuse than the fusing nuclei
deliver, but that isn't "exactly the opposite" of delivering usable
power, it's just a step along a road to getting there.

The point of the article was that while ITER currently looks like the
likeliest route to commercial nuclear power generation, there are
others, and most of them look as if they could work on a smaller
scale.

Whooe Louie doesn't really understand how technical development
works. It's an exploration of possibilities, rather than an
expedition down the only possible route.


Nevertheless, there has been a specific goal for a long time - obtain
usable power from hydrogen fusion on Earth. There has never appeared to
be a theoretical obstacle (unlike free energy machines, for example),
yet achieving the goal has taken, and is still taking, longer than I
believe anyone imagined it would when research on it started.

If one were inclined to be sceptical, one would have history on one's side.

Yes, that would be true right up to the day the first reactor was turned on to make electricity for a few cities. It was also true for many, many things that took a long time to finally happen, like the Panama Canal.

Do you really think fusion power will never happen?

--

Rick C.

+ Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging
+ Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

 

[Bill Sloman]

On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 11:09:28 AM UTC+11, John Robertson wrote:

On 2020/01/29 1:19 a.m., DecadentLinuxUserNumeroUno@decadence.org wrote:
Sylvia Else <sylvia@email.invalid> wrote in
news:h9cvj3Fbe6iU1@mid.individual.net:

On 29/01/2020 5:14 pm, Bill Sloman wrote:
Today's issue of the Proceedings of the (US) National Academy of
Sciences opens with a tolerably interesting article

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/4/1824

It's likely to be a more compact solution than ITER, and could
get working earlier.

There's a guy in Sydney who wants to use a pulsed laser to fuse
boron nuclei, who seems to think that he's even closer to a
practical solution, but there are venture capitalists in the mix.


I can't judge its merits, but "working with a more advanced
prototype at least three times larger..." That is, "We need a
bigger machine to get energy positive". Where have we heard that
before?

They'll have it down in ten years. ;-)


Just about the same time the world ignites from climate change... isn't
that always ten years away?

Well, the predictions about a much worse Australian bushfire season in 2020 as a consequence of climate change were made about 2009.

Nobody is predicting world "ignition", just progressively worse inconveniences.

John Robertson seems to be a sucker for denialist propaganda, which goes to quite a lot of trouble to depict realistic predictions as alarmist.

Don't get me wrong I WANT fusion to work, but one has heard this all
before many, many times. One suspects some basic assumptions are wrong.

The energy radiated by the sun is generated by some other process?

The basic assumptions look to be sound enough. The practical difficulties of getting a much less dense plasma that the one at the core of the sun hot enough for hydrogen fusion are considerable.

We've clearly got the plasma hot enough for fusion to take place, but getting enough of it that warm to generate more energy than it takes to get it hot and keep it confined is work in progress.

The point about the article is that ITER isn't the only approach that might work.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[Sylvia Else]

On 30/01/2020 12:58 pm, Rick C wrote:

On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 8:47:11 PM UTC-5, Sylvia Else
wrote:
On 30/01/2020 11:08 am, Bill Sloman wrote:
On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 5:36:06 AM UTC+11, Whoey Louie
wrote:
On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 6:00:55 AM UTC-5, Bill
Sloman wrote:
On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 7:55:05 PM UTC+11, Sylvia
Else wrote:
On 29/01/2020 5:14 pm, Bill Sloman wrote:
Today's issue of the Proceedings of the (US) National
Academy of Sciences opens with a tolerably interesting
article

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/4/1824

It's likely to be a more compact solution than ITER, and
could get working earlier.

There's a guy in Sydney who wants to use a pulsed laser
to fuse boron nuclei, who seems to think that he's even
closer to a practical solution, but there are venture
capitalists in the mix.

I can't judge its merits, but "working with a more
advanced prototype at least three times larger..." That is,
"We need a bigger machine to get energy positive". Where
have we heard that before?

Pretty much everywhere, starting with steam engines.

It is worth paying attention to the size they need to get to
- which is mentioned in the article.

With steam engines an actual working prototype showing how one
gets usable power out of it was demonstrated at the very
beginning. With nuclear fusion, we have exactly the opposite
after more than half a century.

Whoey Louie's grasp of reality is decidedly weak. Nuclear fusion
- in the sun - has been delivering usable power for the past few
billion years.

At present it takes more power to get a hydrogen plasma at the
earth's surface hot and dense enough to fuse than the fusing
nuclei deliver, but that isn't "exactly the opposite" of
delivering usable power, it's just a step along a road to getting
there.

The point of the article was that while ITER currently looks like
the likeliest route to commercial nuclear power generation, there
are others, and most of them look as if they could work on a
smaller scale.

Whooe Louie doesn't really understand how technical development
works. It's an exploration of possibilities, rather than an
expedition down the only possible route.


Nevertheless, there has been a specific goal for a long time -
obtain usable power from hydrogen fusion on Earth. There has never
appeared to be a theoretical obstacle (unlike free energy machines,
for example), yet achieving the goal has taken, and is still
taking, longer than I believe anyone imagined it would when
research on it started.

If one were inclined to be sceptical, one would have history on
one's side.

Yes, that would be true right up to the day the first reactor was
turned on to make electricity for a few cities. It was also true for
many, many things that took a long time to finally happen, like the
Panama Canal.

Do you really think fusion power will never happen?

I don't doubt that an energy positive reactor will eventually be built.
Whether it will ever be economic is another question.

Sylvia.

 

[Bill Sloman]

On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 1:13:18 PM UTC+11, Sylvia Else wrote:

On 30/01/2020 12:58 pm, Rick C wrote:
On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 8:47:11 PM UTC-5, Sylvia Else
wrote:
On 30/01/2020 11:08 am, Bill Sloman wrote:
On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 5:36:06 AM UTC+11, Whoey Louie
wrote:
On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 6:00:55 AM UTC-5, Bill
Sloman wrote:
On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 7:55:05 PM UTC+11, Sylvia
Else wrote:
On 29/01/2020 5:14 pm, Bill Sloman wrote:
Today's issue of the Proceedings of the (US) National
Academy of Sciences opens with a tolerably interesting
article

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/4/1824

It's likely to be a more compact solution than ITER, and
could get working earlier.

There's a guy in Sydney who wants to use a pulsed laser
to fuse boron nuclei, who seems to think that he's even
closer to a practical solution, but there are venture
capitalists in the mix.

I can't judge its merits, but "working with a more
advanced prototype at least three times larger..." That is,
"We need a bigger machine to get energy positive". Where
have we heard that before?

Pretty much everywhere, starting with steam engines.

It is worth paying attention to the size they need to get to
- which is mentioned in the article.

With steam engines an actual working prototype showing how one
gets usable power out of it was demonstrated at the very
beginning. With nuclear fusion, we have exactly the opposite
after more than half a century.

Whoey Louie's grasp of reality is decidedly weak. Nuclear fusion
- in the sun - has been delivering usable power for the past few
billion years.

At present it takes more power to get a hydrogen plasma at the
earth's surface hot and dense enough to fuse than the fusing
nuclei deliver, but that isn't "exactly the opposite" of
delivering usable power, it's just a step along a road to getting
there.

The point of the article was that while ITER currently looks like
the likeliest route to commercial nuclear power generation, there
are others, and most of them look as if they could work on a
smaller scale.

Whooe Louie doesn't really understand how technical development
works. It's an exploration of possibilities, rather than an
expedition down the only possible route.


Nevertheless, there has been a specific goal for a long time -
obtain usable power from hydrogen fusion on Earth. There has never
appeared to be a theoretical obstacle (unlike free energy machines,
for example), yet achieving the goal has taken, and is still
taking, longer than I believe anyone imagined it would when
research on it started.

If one were inclined to be sceptical, one would have history on
one's side.

Yes, that would be true right up to the day the first reactor was
turned on to make electricity for a few cities. It was also true for
many, many things that took a long time to finally happen, like the
Panama Canal.

Do you really think fusion power will never happen?

I don't doubt that an energy positive reactor will eventually be built.
Whether it will ever be economic is another question.

The first one built - probably ITER - is unlikely to be economic. ITER was not designed to make money, but rather to be close enough to something that might make money to provide useful design information.

The interesting question is whether it's going to look much like the version that does make money (if one ever shows up).

Useful information - in this context - includes "this approach isn't practical".

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[Rick C]

On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 9:35:12 PM UTC-5, Bill Sloman wrote:

On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 1:13:18 PM UTC+11, Sylvia Else wrote:
On 30/01/2020 12:58 pm, Rick C wrote:

Do you really think fusion power will never happen?

I don't doubt that an energy positive reactor will eventually be built.
Whether it will ever be economic is another question.

The first one built - probably ITER - is unlikely to be economic. ITER was not designed to make money, but rather to be close enough to something that might make money to provide useful design information.

The interesting question is whether it's going to look much like the version that does make money (if one ever shows up).

Useful information - in this context - includes "this approach isn't practical".

Seems like $20 billion is a lot of money to spend if they weren't pretty durn sure it would result in a viable solution.

I know that climate change isn't caused by the heat released when burning carbon based fuels. But I wonder how much energy we individually need to release before that does become a problem? I suppose that unlike CO2 pollution, problems caused by releasing too much heat can always be addressed by simply reducing energy consumption. The problem with CO2 pollution is that even if we cut back on our CO2 production, it won't be enough. We need to reduce our carbon emissions to near zero.

--

Rick C.

-- Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging
-- Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

 

[Bill Sloman]

On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 3:22:19 PM UTC+11, Rick C wrote:

On Wednesday, January 29, 2020 at 9:35:12 PM UTC-5, Bill Sloman wrote:
On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 1:13:18 PM UTC+11, Sylvia Else wrote:
On 30/01/2020 12:58 pm, Rick C wrote:

Do you really think fusion power will never happen?

I don't doubt that an energy positive reactor will eventually be built.
Whether it will ever be economic is another question.

The first one built - probably ITER - is unlikely to be economic. ITER was not designed to make money, but rather to be close enough to something that might make money to provide useful design information.

The interesting question is whether it's going to look much like the version that does make money (if one ever shows up).

Useful information - in this context - includes "this approach isn't practical".

Seems like $20 billion is a lot of money to spend if they weren't pretty durn sure it would result in a viable solution.

Sure. It should result in a viable solution, and we do need to find one.

There's no guarantee that it will be most viable solution by the time it's more or less working.

> I know that climate change isn't caused by the heat released when burning carbon based fuels. But I wonder how much energy we individually need to release before that does become a problem?

Quite a lot

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth%27s_energy_budget

The planet gets about 173,000 terawatts of incoming solar radiation.

Human energy production is about 18 terawatts. Geothermal heat flux from the earth's interior is 47 terawatts.

> I suppose that unlike CO2 pollution, problems caused by releasing too much heat can always be addressed by simply reducing energy consumption. The problem with CO2 pollution is that even if we cut back on our CO2 production, it won't be enough. We need to reduce our carbon emissions to near zero..

Or work out a way of pulling some CO2 out of the atmosphere. There was some Dutch professor who thought that digging up and crushing a few million tons of dolomite rock and spreading it on beaches would be the cheapest way of doing that. That would just speed up the normal weathering mechanism which soaks up excess CO2 from the atmosphere.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paleocene%E2%80%93Eocene_Thermal_Maximum

seems to have been a greenhouse gas eruption - methane rather than CO2, though since methane converts to CO2 within about a century this is an academic distinction.

Recovery seems to have taken 83,000 years - fairly rapidly in the first 33,000 years and more slowly over the next 50,000 years. Speeding that up might be a good idea.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[Rick C]

On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 12:58:42 AM UTC-5, Bill Sloman wrote:

On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 3:22:19 PM UTC+11, Rick C wrote:

Seems like $20 billion is a lot of money to spend if they weren't pretty durn sure it would result in a viable solution.

Sure. It should result in a viable solution, and we do need to find one.

There's no guarantee that it will be most viable solution by the time it's more or less working.

I expect the $20 billion is planned to be spent over at least a decade if not more. So perhaps we will know more about which approaches to continue in less than that.

I would hope the lion's share of the ITER budget is planned for expenses that would not be required for a power plant. Otherwise it is unlikely it could be economical.

I know that climate change isn't caused by the heat released when burning carbon based fuels. But I wonder how much energy we individually need to release before that does become a problem?

Quite a lot

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth%27s_energy_budget

The planet gets about 173,000 terawatts of incoming solar radiation.

Human energy production is about 18 terawatts. Geothermal heat flux from the earth's interior is 47 terawatts.

If the temperature is a linear result of the total heat absorbed, then we would need to produce around 600 terawatts or more than 30 times our current level of heat to raise the temperature of the surface of the earth by 1°C.

That is a large multiple of what we produce now, but if energy were to become truly too cheap to meter, what might we use that energy on? Or should I say, waste it on compared to how we use it now?

I suppose that unlike CO2 pollution, problems caused by releasing too much heat can always be addressed by simply reducing energy consumption. The problem with CO2 pollution is that even if we cut back on our CO2 production, it won't be enough. We need to reduce our carbon emissions to near zero.

Or work out a way of pulling some CO2 out of the atmosphere. There was some Dutch professor who thought that digging up and crushing a few million tons of dolomite rock and spreading it on beaches would be the cheapest way of doing that. That would just speed up the normal weathering mechanism which soaks up excess CO2 from the atmosphere.

Sounds to me like a potential example of a law of unintended consequences. While dolomite can be beneficial as a pH buffer, if the pH value is could be impacted too much by such large quantities.

--

Rick C.

-+ Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging
-+ Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

 

[Bill Sloman]

On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 7:14:37 PM UTC+11, Rick C wrote:

On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 12:58:42 AM UTC-5, Bill Sloman wrote:
On Thursday, January 30, 2020 at 3:22:19 PM UTC+11, Rick C wrote:

Seems like $20 billion is a lot of money to spend if they weren't pretty durn sure it would result in a viable solution.

Sure. It should result in a viable solution, and we do need to find one..

There's no guarantee that it will be most viable solution by the time it's more or less working.

I expect the $20 billion is planned to be spent over at least a decade if not more. So perhaps we will know more about which approaches to continue in less than that.

I would hope the lion's share of the ITER budget is planned for expenses that would not be required for a power plant. Otherwise it is unlikely it could be economical.


I know that climate change isn't caused by the heat released when burning carbon based fuels. But I wonder how much energy we individually need to release before that does become a problem?

Quite a lot

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth%27s_energy_budget

The planet gets about 173,000 terawatts of incoming solar radiation.

Human energy production is about 18 terawatts. Geothermal heat flux from the earth's interior is 47 terawatts.

If the temperature is a linear result of the total heat absorbed, then we would need to produce around 600 terawatts or more than 30 times our current level of heat to raise the temperature of the surface of the earth by 1°C.

It isn't. Radiated heat loss increases as the fourth power of the absolute temperature of the radiator.

All the heat received from the sun is re-radiated. The temperature at the effective radiating altitude is about -18C - about 255K - so if yo want a 1°C rise - to 256K - you need about 1.6% more power,or about 2714 more terawatts.

That is a large multiple of what we produce now, but if energy were to become truly too cheap to meter, what might we use that energy on? Or should I say, waste it on compared to how we use it now?

I suppose that unlike CO2 pollution, problems caused by releasing too much heat can always be addressed by simply reducing energy consumption. The problem with CO2 pollution is that even if we cut back on our CO2 production, it won't be enough. We need to reduce our carbon emissions to near zero.

Or work out a way of pulling some CO2 out of the atmosphere. There was some Dutch professor who thought that digging up and crushing a few million tons of dolomite rock and spreading it on beaches would be the cheapest way of doing that. That would just speed up the normal weathering mechanism which soaks up excess CO2 from the atmosphere.

Sounds to me like a potential example of a law of unintended consequences.. While dolomite can be beneficial as a pH buffer, if the pH value is could be impacted too much by such large quantities.

Dolomite - and the carbonates that CO2 produces by acting on it - are insoluble in water.

Spreading it on beaches just lets the waves shift it around to expose fresh surfaces to CO2.

More CO2 in the oceans is going to make them marginally more acid, and dolomite would would help that, but only by locking up some CO2 as insoluble compounds.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

John Robertson <spam@flippers.com> wrote in
news:ReqdnbdHrfEyg6_DnZ2dnUU7-QudnZ2d@giganews.com:

On 2020/01/29 1:19 a.m., DecadentLinuxUserNumeroUno@decadence.org
wrote:
Sylvia Else <sylvia@email.invalid> wrote in
news:h9cvj3Fbe6iU1@mid.individual.net:

On 29/01/2020 5:14 pm, Bill Sloman wrote:
Today's issue of the Proceedings of the (US) National Academy
of Sciences opens with a tolerably interesting article

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/4/1824

It's likely to be a more compact solution than ITER, and could
get working earlier.

There's a guy in Sydney who wants to use a pulsed laser to fuse
boron nuclei, who seems to think that he's even closer to a
practical solution, but there are venture capitalists in the
mix.


I can't judge its merits, but "working with a more advanced
prototype at least three times larger..." That is, "We need a
bigger machine to get energy positive". Where have we heard that
before?

Sylvia.


They'll have it down in ten years. ;-)


Just about the same time the world ignites from climate change...
isn't that always ten years away?

Don't get me wrong I WANT fusion to work, but one has heard this
all before many, many times. One suspects some basic assumptions
are wrong.

Like what happens when you take even a very small amount of
something critical? Yeah... prolly a lot of heat 'produced'.

I guess the perfect insulator would be some zero latent heat media
that could be used as a boundary layer. Like ... i dunno... dark
matter... unobtainium.

We should be able to make a tenth of a megawatt with a diode sized
device that lasts years without breakdown. A perfect little
crucible.

Yeah.. sure... let's ask the aliens what they use.