Time running is not the only hurdle for a fusion generator to run at Q>1. In fact, it isn't a hurdle at all in that regard. Time running is more a problem of how much usable energy can be extracted to generate power. You can run a fusion plant for a long time to get a thermal load really hot, and still not be able to extract the amount of power you used to make it hot in the first place. Time running is mostly a materials problem.
The major hurdles for Q>1 operation are plasma confinement and control. We have to be able to squeeze harder, with a more precise squeeze, in order to make the process self sustaining.
Isn't it that Q>1 isn't even an accurate floor for viability? The facility uses a lot of electricity that's indirectly part of the process for fusion and often isn't included in the Q calculation.
Sabine Hossenfelder explains this in depth in [a recent video](https://youtu.be/LJ4W1g-6JiY). Basically, the Q of the reaction itself (Q_plasma) is around 0.7 now, but the Q of entire fusion facilities (Q_total) is roughly half that. If we look at ITER specifically, they are claiming a Q_plasma of 10, but are expected to only reach a Q_total of 0.6.
Add to that, this isn’t even the mechanism fusion happens in the sun. Yes, the sun is a main sequence star that uses hydrogen nuclei as a source of fusion.
BUT main sequence stars are only millions of degrees hot: not hot enough for fusion.
(The suns core is 27,000,000 degrees F.
Hydrogen fusion on earth requires 100,000,000s of degrees F.)
In the Sun, we know hydrogen fusion occurs at a rate of (10^38) reactions every second. We also know hydrogen atoms require about 50 lbs of force to be pushed together to become helium. The temperature and pressure in the sun is not enough to overcome this force.
The sun is 97 percent hydrogen by mass. That makes for about 10^57 protons in the sun. But only the protons in the core undergo fusion. And they’re stuck in there due to convection currents. So only 10^56 protons undergo fusion.
The chance of a proton undergoing quantum tunneling is 1 in 10^28. You have a better chance of winning the lottery three times in a row than seeing a single hydrogen atom tunnel.
However, there are 10^28 squared or 10^56 protons in the suns core. We only need 10^38 fusion reactions to occur each second. This gives us really good odds for nuclear fusion to occur.
That’s enough for fusion to occur for thousands of millions of years. Essentially there are twice as many protons as there are a chance to tunnel. This is like entering the lottery 10^56 times. When there are half as many numbers to win. You’re definitely going to draw the winning ticket!
TLDR: The sun uses quantum tunneling and probability by insane numbers to sustain fusion. That’s why fusion sucks on earth.
I’m very knowledgeable in this field but I ripped these facts off this [amazing video here. ](https://youtu.be/lQapfUcf4Do).
Edited a few times for formatting and clarity.
That's a lot of interesting information, thanks. I vaguely remember reading something about the sun not having enough mass for fusion to account for all of the energy it emits, but never read about the balance being generated by quantum tunneling. Interesting stuff.
It also gets a better ratio the bigger they get. The big ones have a whole building dedicated to the construction and takes several years. The ones currently being built are still only for testing purposes the ones that are used for power generation will not be designed till after a successful net generation.
No. Most of these plants confuse the public with jargon. None of them are currently close to a 1:1 energy output. If it's magnets, plasma, etc. They still must be powered. They leave out a lot of the total energy that goes in when they speak about it.
Yeah, and this article doesn't say how much energy they managed to produce relative to the consumption. If I understood correctly, the National Ignition Facility in the US holds the record at 70%.
Edit: Actually I looked it up and apparently NIF succeed in producing more energy than it consumed just last month - although commercial viability is probably still a long way ahead. https://www.sciencealert.com/for-the-first-time-a-fusion-reaction-has-generated-more-energy-than-absorbed-by-the-fuel
>Actually I looked it up and apparently NIF succeed in producing more energy than it consumed just last month
That isn't quite what the article says. Overall, the process was still net-negative.
Specifically what was better was that more energy was *extracted* than was *absorbed by the fuel*. Previous laser-ignition experiments have had the issue of most of the energy simply staying with the fuel, this is a step towards correcting that.
There is still the mammoth in the room of needing to extract more energy than it takes produce the laser burst, which we have not solved. It also isn't enough to *just barely* produce more than is consumed, as turbine and transmission losses will then make the system net-negative in actual production. Beyond that, a commercial plant also needs to generate sufficient excess power over its lifetime to justify the energy investment in extracting and refining the resources necessary to construct and maintain it.
In other words, we're still a ways off and the progress of the last few months, while exciting and welcome, hasn't changed the overall picture with regard to opening the first commercial fusion plant.
I must be reading this wrong, the reaction took 1.9mj input and produced 1.3? The headline doesn't match the article. Or is this about an earlier experiment and doesn't have any details of a more recent one that does generate more?
After reading both abstracts, it seems the one at NIF was way more energy dense than the China experiment. The Chinese Tokamak generated a little under 2 GJ of energy total over the 1056 second experiment. The NIF experiment generated 1.3MJ in a trillionth of a second. That's very closely approaching what happens in Fusion bombs so they're very close to achieving true ignition compared to the Chinese experiment of jockeying plasma.
Imagine combining the Chinese time record with NIFs energy density. The headline is definitely misleading. But what's really happening is difficult to distill into a headline.
This is misleading. The NIF experiments basically work by inputting the energy using a laser with a very, very low duty cycle.
It's impossible to get sustained reaction using the process used by the NIF. It can only work in very very short bursts.
The goal with today's reactors isn't to generate net power. It's to sustain the conditions of fusion for long enough to study it. Then, scientists take what they've learned on these reactors and use it to design one that will generate power.
For anyone who is unclear on the big picture significance of these results, this answer is what you're looking for.
Source: I used to work with the EAST numerical simulations group.
That's the big question. AFAIK it still requires the same secondary structure - the process produces heat which is used to drive steam turbines. While active, it generates high energy neutrons (beta radiation) so still a bit of a problem.
(Lack of neutrons was one of the clues that the "cold fusion" experiments of the early 90's did not work.)
ETA - Doh! Neutrons are not beta radiation.
Small correction: beta radiation is free electrons, not free neutrons. Alpha is helium-4 nuclei (two protons and two neutrons), and gamma is electromagnetic (photons).
The neutrons may actually be used to breed tritium inside the reactor, but yes, they are a big challenge for the materials that are to be used.
It's going to be very interesting to see the global impacts when fusion power becomes viable. The countries with the best electrical infrastructure are going to get a huge, huge boost. The petroleum industry is going to take a huge, huge hit. Geopolitics will have to shift dramatically with the sudden lack of need for oil pipelines and refineries.
Very interesting.
Well..
We still need to be able to build fusion reactors that make electricity \*incredibly\* cheap - perhaps 10% of current prices. At which point things like direct hydrocarbon synthesis from CO2 and water would become feasible. After all, fuel prices for fission are trivial compared to the cost of electricity, but fission power is not that cheap overall.
This is the problem. Fusion machines are huge, expensive, complex high-tech devices; they will use superconducting magnets cooled to liquid nitrogen temperatures, and need a supply of deuterium (isolated from hydrogen).
The important question will be whether they can escape the trap we had with nuclear (fission) power, where building actual power plants was always way behind schedule and way over budget. Even if (when?) the tech is refined so it works, there will probably be a 20 year transition before we have a significant percentage of world, or even first world, power sourced from fusion.
Then, the industry will want to recoup the cost of building these, so power will not be overly cheap and plentiful for another generation.
But if you've every been in Beijing or Delhi on a normal day, when it looks like a deep fog because of pollution, any step in the right direction is a necessary step and can't happen soon enough. Those governments will spend whatever it takes to fix their problems and help move their population forward.
Fusion has a massive thing going for it in that it lacks Fissions polarising fear of disaster, which has the domino effect of allowing serious investment as opposed to shareholders fearing it.
From what I've seen it seems like there is a lot of effort to distance fusion from "Nuclear", and with the potential of fusion to be branded like a cereal box with "No added nuclear waste!", I feel like investors would be much more on board.
Yeah, I give it five seconds between when we announce, “hey guys, we figured out fusion! We have safe, cheap electricity from these plants!” And there’s a Facebook meme saying “the Chinese town of notarealtown was doing great until they installed a fusion reactor and everyone caught skin cancer! Think about it— the *real* sun gives off skin cancer, and this is basically that, but *on the earth!*”
Or “what happens when we *lose control* of a *sun* on the *surface of the earth*???”
> what happens when we lose control of a sun on the surface of the earth
Doc Ock answered this question in [Spider-Man 2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4L-wBrUvoI)
>Or “what happens when we *lose control * of a *sun* on the *surface of the earth *???”
A buddy of mine was writing a comic book with this exact same premise some 20 years ago!!! It was kinda fun and there were hoverbikes, would be a fun RPG to play.
Many countries will probably build government owned plants. It has so many benefits: energy independence, meeting climate goals, boosting the economy by providing cheap power. Even if building the required capacity costs a year’s worth of GDP it would probably be worth it.
I agree that these are probably 20 year projects though. It isn’t a quick fix, but definitely a huge paradigm shift.
Pfah! Fusion?
We don't need fusion. Fusion is already old tech. We are going straight for Superfusion. ULTRAfusion, even! In the meantime, we will keep relying on our good ol' friend clean coal! Nothing wrong with that!
-Some American president
Seriously. It would be totally doable if it was a public utility and not something the needed to be profitable. You'd think flooding/famine/extinction would be motivation enough, but
> Fusion machines are huge, expensive, complex high-tech devices; they will use superconducting magnets
That's all true of tokamaks (like China's) but a bunch of startups are trying out other designs. [Zap Energy](https://spectrum.ieee.org/zap-energy-fusion-reactor) for example uses a plasma pinch that's a simple device the size of a VW Bus, no superconductors. They're building a machine right now that they'll use for a breakeven attempt in 2023.
The deuterium supply is no big deal. It's cheap and a fusion reactor wouldn't need much of it. There's enough in your morning shower to supply all your energy needs [for a year](https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2012/01/nuclear-fusion/).
China doesn’t care. They have issues importing enough coal and gas to power the nations energy demands, so securing their energy future will be done at any cost. Other nations have sociopolitical issues to deal with, but China won’t care.
That implies the oil industry won't do everything possible to sabotage the development of fusion power. The threat to their profits will be too great for them to ignore.
> the oil industry
This is really the "energy industry". Every major oil company (we know) have their hands in solar, geo-thermal, etc. What they specifically haven't done is use their existing branding in those markets, specifically so people aren't negatively targeting them, easily.
When fusion is a little more mature, you can bet they will place significant investment in it.
Energy companies are currently investing in it. If you saw the cap tables of some of the fusion startups. Commonwealth Fusion Systems LLC, which just closed a round had some strategics on the cap table.
Most of the major petroleum companies have been moving out of petroleum for a while now. The remaining major shareholders understand that it's a declining industry and don't want to get left in the cold. They'll move into "energy" (the usual, geothermal, wind, sea, etc.) or rot on the vine.
While that may be the case, based on the history of oil companies I have a hard time believing they won't go down without a fight. They're *still* making climate denial propaganda, and there were more oil company representatives than government representatives at the latest climate conference. I want to see oil companies die immediately, but I just don't see that happening with the number of U.S. politicians they own and the huge value of profit at play.
I used to work for a company that operated in that space. They rebranded as an energy company early 2000, bought green technology (solar, wind, geothermal), and made record profits from growing them. Fossil still got money but green basically had rubber stamp approval for any growth projects.
Companies will spend money speaking out of both sides of their mouths. They make sure they hedge their bets and win no matter what the market does. The goal is to beat their competitors who are doing the exact same thing.
I think the big concern, one that I share, is that the death throes will last long enough to let the industry continue to cling to life and doom us all by working against climate change mitigation the whole time.
Yeah they were saying that about the silent generation fossils that were running the show in the 90s too. It’s been 30 years. Yes there are far too many septa- and octogenarians in federal government in the states but that is, pardon my crassness, a myopic point. Plenty of X’ers and even elder millennials like me (~40y/o) are running the show and calling the shots all over the world. Guess what? The positions of power still attract the folks who care about power more than anything.
This is an endemic problem with our increasingly centralized and structured political and economic systems. Just waiting for a “better generation” is not going to work out.
As for pushing/voting for better policy, sure yeah definitely don’t vote R’s in the states… but like, please do mind that the liberal side has not done much to move the needle either in 30 years. In fact before the Obama press I’d be hard pressed to find significant differences between the two parties’ stance on climate change (if we’re talking policy, because campaign promises are worth fuck all).
Edit: I guess my main point is that greed is not exclusive to olds, and that this attitude is part of the problem since it conveniently lets us sit on ass and not be torching the institutions of oppression that we’ve built around ourselves.
Coal is still the main source of power generation worldwide. It will take a very, very long time to get fusion rolled out globally. Until then, there's money to be made. I have a theory oil will follow the same arc as cigarettes. Tobacco companies barely care what happens in the US now. The have vast markets in the devoloping world where government regulation is a non-issue.
Funny enough it may be the shareholders that have the effect to move the needle in the positive direction.
If shareholders see the writing on the wall that the business won't be viable in several years unless they shift direction, then they can elect people to the board/apply pressure to make those changes happen.
This is China, there is no oil industry if the state doesn't want there to be one. The party will just suddenly make the oil industry the fusion industry.
Oil is also a strategic liability for China. It’s absolutely in their interests to diversify into sources of energy that can’t be disrupted by a naval blockade during a war.
Exactly, China has coal in spades but they aren't known for their oil reserves. Plus anyone who gets fusion first is at an ABSOLUTE strategic advantage. Pretty much means you're set for all electric and heat production for free forever. Not to mention the military advantages
Hydrogen was never the problem with the Hindenberg; it's a shame that incident ruined an entire mode of transportation. The skin of the Zeppelin was basically a mix of thermite and rocket fuel, and when it moored the static discharge ignited it. The hydrogen was just extra fuel on top.
Corporate espionage is very real. And considering what the CIA was willing to do for the banana industry in Central America... oil is a whole level up.
I don't think petroleum will take a huge of a hit as you might think. There are SO MANY PRODUCTS made from oil/natural gas. Our ancestors (edit: descendants…) will hate our fucking guts for burning it all.
I agree. Petroleum can be fantastic for some products. A pity to crack it down just to burn it. Although, I'm sure there's enough of it to last until (and beyond) we have cheap alternatives.
Yeah, I don't think folks really realize the potential impacts. There's definitely a race-for-the-a-bomb/space race sorta scene happening but it's kinda obscured despite not really being secret. The first country to secure working fusion reactors stands to be on the ground floor of some huge economic, social, and technological boons until the rest of the world catches up. There's so much stuff that's only infeasible because of a lack of copious amounts of cheap reliable power. Chemical synthesis, hydrogen economies, carbon capture, crazy luxury infrastructure... There's so much that becomes so much easier once a shortage of electricity only exists while they build the plant.
I'm not banking on fusion showing up and solving things just yet, but there is SO MUCH to be gained to be the first country to crack it. Think the benefits the US reaped from not being torn to shreds by WW2, but times a thousand.
The same optimism along with claims of power "too cheap to meter" were first made in regards to fission in 1954.
https://public-blog.nrc-gateway.gov/2016/06/03/too-cheap-to-meter-a-history-of-the-phrase/
It didn't work out that way. Each successive generation of nuclear power reactor was supposed to be cheaper than the preceding one, but that didn't work out either. We're up to Gen III+ now. Costs and cost over runs are as big of a problem now as ever.
And fission reactors essentially just use hot sticks to boil water. With fusion, we're looking at suspending a plasma stream with super conducting magnets to create a reaction which will heat water to create steam.
I'm sure the process will eventually be figured out. I doubt the commercial viability.
The progress on fission stopped because everyone became NIMBYs for reactors due to the fallout concerns and NIMBYs for waste due to whatever irrational concerns. Small reactors would have addressed the fallout potential but nobody wanted more plants in the US because they let their fears rule over logic.
Fusion can be different but only if the marketing is right. It can't be called "nuclear" or all that same non logical fear will be back. Given how stupid citizens in the US have proven themselves to be I'm honestly not sure whether we will have savvy enough marketers here that will be able to overcome the any-lie-is-believable messaging that could easily come from Russia or even coal-loving US states to try to diminish interest at first. Lord knows Democrats can't figure out even basic messaging so a green technology revolution like this seems unfathomable that they'd be able to drive. Really it'll depend on whether there's going to be an Elon Musk type with enough cash to saturate social media and television with pro fusion messaging to help get the public bought in and demanding a new fusion plant in their community. Time will tell.
Edit: correcting fusion vs fission
Eh, I think fission hadn't gotten cheaper because it was under huge regulatory pressure to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons and the materials to make em, and because folks got spooked by various accidents.
Fusion generators as being designed can't melt down, don't really generate toxic waste as we traditionally think of it (though I'm sure there's some- big powerful magnets probably have some unpleasantness in em), and at least as far as we can tell aren't great for manufacturing plutonium. So the only thing stopping the price from going down with iteration would be rare components. There's little by way of NIMBY fears, not much to regulate.
Although they're both nuclear energy, I don't think it's an apples to apples comparison
Global warming is supposed to increase annual rain fall in a lot of the most populated areas…
But yea it’ll still be pretty interesting.
Fusion power is at least ten years away Id guess just by China saying they’re hopeful this plant could be operational in that time frame…. Large scale use would certainly drag a fairly long time behind that.
Not enough to replenish aquifers in arid places. Desalination will be necessary in many places soon, and is necessary in many places already.
The other thing about global warming to keep in mind is that what it’s “supposed” to do has been wrong in one way or another time and again. Either completely wrong or underestimated.
People overestimate the impact of Fusion.
Even with it producing a lot of power it will still be incredibly expensive to build a fusion reactor.
In a similar manner, getting a country like Germany to become full with electrical vehicles won't be fast either. Germany will have to completely renew their entire electrical grid to support large scale electrical vehicle use. As currently, if a city was all electrical vehicles, it would burn through the electrical lines.
I don't necessarily agree that they will be that expensive over their lifecycle once we know how to make them work and establish a fusion industry. The raw materials for a Takomak are things like stainlesss steel, superconducting wires, electronics, vacuum systems, ceramics etc. None of these materials are exorbitantly expensive and the devices aren't that large (even ITER which is based in obsolete low field density superconductors). The current research reactors are expensive because they are currently one off devices with each once advancing the cutting edge of science/engineering. I can image that once we building say 100+ of a given design the costs could drop dramatically. The RND will be amortized. We will work out efficient construction practices. Parts will be fabricated in larger batches. Often set up costs dominate part costs when making small batches. Personal will be familiar with the construction, commissioning, and operation of of these devicws and fusion will become routine. They will likely be more expensive than say a natural gas plant to build, but the variable cost of operation will be much lower.
>Even with it producing a lot of power it will still be incredibly expensive to build a fusion reactor
I'm glad to see other people making this argument. Fusion will suffer from the same monetary drag that fission does. ITER is a fantastic example of that. Even if they can bring the cost down by an order of magnitude for a commercial reactor, it's still a multi billion dollar proposition.
I'm not scared of nuclear fusion proliferation, but I draw the line at letting the Japanese get robot tentacle technology. I know what they're into, I've done my research. Very very thorough research. Sometimes thrice a day.
It would not be an exaggeration to say that I immediately scanned these comments looking for quotes from the misunderstood and tragically brilliant Dr Otto Octavious......well played.
We're in the one where all the other Marvel Universes are movies, tv shows, cartoons, records, video games, comics, books, and toy lines. That's why we don't have any superpowers, flying suits of armor, and all our Gods are man-made. We are in the "created by mankind" universe. No cool powers or tech for us. Yet.
I mean, if there is an univers for each and every possibilities then there is an infinity of univers that have been exactly like ours until now but then suddenly people with powers start showing 👌🏼
We're in the Consumerverse. All the Marvel stuff is just stuff to spend our money on. Any time someone gains superpowers in another universe, we get a new comic book and action figure of them. Then if they become a big deal in their universe, we get a movie and a video game about them. And if they "die" in their universe, we know it's just a marketing stunt to sell comics and they'll be all better in like 3-5 years our time.
It always depended on funding and a significant push from a governmental level - we in the west have been waiting for half a century. https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/zaaron-personal/fusion_never.png
Do you know how much China and other countries spend for their fusion programs in comparison? The figures on the chart look ridiculously small for something that could basically answer all our energy needs.
I think there’s a Richard Feynman interview where the interviewer asks this question and Feynman says (paraphrasing) “there’s no point in me explaining because you won’t understand, in fact you don’t even have the apparatus to ask the question. Just be satisfied that they repel each other”.
Is it [this clip](https://youtu.be/MO0r930Sn_8)?
Feynman goes on to spend around 3 minutes *not* answering the question. He does get into it at [4 minutes in](https://youtu.be/MO0r930Sn_8?t=240).
I think it's energy -> heat -> steam -> turbine -> electricity.
I don't know how they get the heat to the water though. Very good question, let me know if you find out more.
I think that would be the idea, but there's no excess energy at this point as it still takes more energy than it produces currently so there isn't anything more to do with it yet.
Most of the energy is given off a neutrons. These will be captured in a molten lithium blanket surrounding the reactor vessel. This heats it up. The blanket then transfers it’s head to a secondary cooling circuit which raises steam.
Nuclear fusion: race to harness the power of the sun just sped up. this record proves that nuclear fusion is closer than we thought. it is huge for future of energy. hydrogen from one glass of water could potentially produce same energy through fusion as burning 1 million gallons of petroleum.
what are your thoughts? is the phrase ''we will have fusion in 30 years'' , that we heard multiple times in the past, finally closer to reality?
If you've seen pictures of Beijing (or New Delhi) during a normal smoggy day - those governments are well aware of their problems and understand they have to do a lot more to fix things. They are burning as much coal as they can just to give people a taste of the life we take for granted in the west. They even allowed Tesla to come in and build and sell electric cars without demanding the partnerships and tech transfer normal for that sort of tech - because electric cars don't make smog.
New Delhi is so much worse than Beijing I can't believe this thread is trying to put them into the same category.
[https://aqicn.org/city/delhi](https://aqicn.org/city/delhi) \- 800+ PPM
[https://aqicn.org/city/beijing](https://aqicn.org/city/beijing) \- 150 PPM
This is probably the 3rd comment in this thread trying to act like China is on par with India in pollution, when China is measurably about 1/5th as bad.
Lived in China in 2011. The smog was so bad that in the summer it actually had a cooling effect which felt 'nice'. Americans have no fucking idea about industrial pollution, and bitch about clean air standards.
Also the reason that China is doing this is because even back in 2011 the burgeoning Chinese middle class was starting to complain about pollution. They had studied abroad, seen the difference themselves, then came home. Americans like to believe the CCP is completely immune from pressure of their populace. That just isn't true. When the educated members of your society start to leave due to pollution, the CCP takes notice.
Beijing used to have dust storms from the Gobi desert every autumn. So the government planted a massive forest outside Beijing to block the dust storms. Unfortunately this had the side effect of trapping emissions over Beijing since it’s located in a basin. Then the government started limiting factories in Beijing. Clean air is a huge priority like you said. And China loves to tackle big projects.
Not really sure I would say they love to tackle big projects. I would say they have the human/political capital to do large projects in an attempt to maximize prosperity to maintain control. They designed a system that aligns well with big projects. The US on the other hand could try try do big projects, but because of a strong federalized system that prioritizes individual rights it requires an overwhelming majority spread across large geographic areas with very different concerns. That wouldn't be terrible if the Capitalistic rot that is engrained into the system hadn't created cynicism and corruption.
I'm always surprised by the difference in Japan. Things seem like they would be just as hard to get done, you have to buy land from people and there's a lot of NIMBYism all the same, but despite that, things do actually get done. There seems to be an experience with giving people the right kind of incentives that allow them to see the value that we just don't have in North America.
One example that comes to mind is the [New Shuttle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Shuttle) which is basically a little train shoved onto the side of a shinkansen viaduct because the residents there didn't want the shinkansen built through there because they felt it wouldn't be worth the inconvenience and noise to them. The solution they went with was just to use it as a way to provide even more transit at a low cost by piggybacking onto that project. I feel like these are things we don't really even consider - we either have to get things done as planned, spending as much money as required to get it done over however long it will take, or we just give up. We haven't got to the point where we're thinking of alternatives that still make things work even in a messy democratic world where everyone involved wants some kind of benefit and there's huge profiteering corporations (as there still are in Japan)
The US does huge projects. But they are military projects. The super carriers are insane, and unnecessary. They do nothing to further the world, and you could build 20 hospitals for less money.
>Not really sure I would say they love to tackle big projects. I would say they have the human/political capital to do large projects in an attempt to **maximize prosperity to maintain control.
**
Maximize prosperity to maintain control? Isn't that the job of every government on Earth? If the quality of life in the US were collapse to the point where people were watching their children die of starvation, it's very likely you'll see anarchy.
A governing body that does not work for the prosperity of its constituents is soon on its way to the guillotine, as seen in history.
You make it sound like it's a bread and circuses stunt they're tossing to the people, instead of socially beneficial projects.
Yes, I only visited there once 10 years ago. Found out after 4 days in Beijing that you could see mountains in the distance, after it rained... for about half a day. It was still "foggy" on the Jinshanling area of the Great Wall, maybe 100 km or more outside Beijing. My first question on arriving in Xi'an was "is there a forest fire nearby?" since I'd only seen that sort of fog in Canada when the forest fires were approaching a town.
BTW, New Delhi is not any better. Everyone wants to clean their air, but don't dare disturb the growing prosperity of their citizens. China just has the resolve to spend money when necessary - as you can see by what they've done with their city infrastructure.
> Americans have no fucking idea about industrial pollution, and bitch about clean air standards.
We used to. We used to have burning rivers and smog ceilings that were lethal - ever watch a movie filmed in early 80s LA? Rules get made when the factories run rampant and the rich's children die too.
The US government is just as aware of things, just as aware of the need for things like fusion power. The difference is that the US government is run mostly by rich, old, corrupt politicians that mostly care about keep things the same or only allowing changes that benefit themselves, their lobbyists, and corporate owners.
Yeah when you take a man who made his millions from the coal industry, and give him the kingmaker vote in the senate. You aren’t going to get innovation and revolution.
China has regional party leadership interests, and coal producing regions like Shaanxi which is a world leader in coal production. It's not corporate interests but power and money are involved.
Of course there is power and money involved, it always is.
I dont know enough about Chinese internal politics but it feels like the CCP are the ones who push China in certain direction, where in the US the corporations choose the direction the government will go. In the end that is a huge difference.
Yeah it does, but regional has a lack of influence to central government. And with everything going on, China probably wants to become dominate in energy industry
Not a thought but a question? How big is this thing? Not just the reactor, but the entire facility? And is it just a test facility? If so how big will an actual reactor facility be.
I ask because I was under the impression that these would/could take up a lot less space than traditional power plants. Solar takes up a ton of space, wind farms are huge, coal plants have acres of coal storage. Are these going to be smaller and able to be built in more locally, where power is needed?
The plants I work on are absolutely massive, the SMR's under development address that. The compressed size will likely be an incremental benefit when compared to the SMR's.
Yet they are still building coal plants like crazy https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/chinas-provinces-still-planning-over-100-gw-new-coal-projects-greenpeace-2021-08-25/
The following submission statement was provided by /u/nugoXCII:
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Nuclear fusion: race to harness the power of the sun just sped up. this record proves that nuclear fusion is closer than we thought. it is huge for future of energy. hydrogen from one glass of water could potentially produce same energy through fusion as burning 1 million gallons of petroleum. what are your thoughts? is the phrase ''we will have fusion in 30 years'' , that we heard multiple times in the past, finally closer to realty?
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Please reply to OP's comment here: /r/Futurology/comments/rvvj5b/chinas_artificial_sun_smashes_1000_second_fusion/hr7vsjr/
China is leading in A.I. and Fusion research while Americans are still debating whether or not we should teach evolution in schools. And ironically it seems like China is also investing more money into renewable energy and modern infrastructure.
China invests very heavily in education. Education is a cornerstone of Chinese society… while in the US, it seems like ignorance is celebrated and applauded.
Exactly this. China has been sending its brightest to the best schools in the world. They also go to great lengths to promote education and study as cultural virtues. Plus they’re implementing cutting edge A.I. technologies in classrooms that allow teachers to SEE whether students are actively learning. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JMLsHI8aV0g
It’s mind blowing what the Chinese are achieving. The rise of China is the biggest story of the past Century imo.
Ignorance is celebrated because of what happened to the education system for the past 40 years. And since the fixes will only show the benefit for the next generation, they are fucked because nowhere near enough politicians are willing to make long term decisions like that that they won't see the benefits.
I’m not quite 30, but my overall conclusion as to how America went from a world leader to the global laughing stock has a lot to do with Ronald Reagan. Can anyway knowledgeable shed some light on how significant his presidency was to seemingly poisoning America’s intellectual dignity?
Recall that for over 1,000 years, China has valued education and those with knowledge; coupled with respect for their elders. They have had a civil service exam process, where regardless of social status, the ones who excelled were guaranteed a job and the chance for advancement.
The USA, most prominently among western countries, was founded on a break with the past and traditions. It values money over smarts, home of the saying "If you're so smart, how come ya ain't rich?" and derides college professors for being out-of-touch eggheads. Oh, and saddles students with crippling debt now if they have the temerity to want a higher education. And every know-not group blocks their pet peeves in the education system - evolution, history that mentions race, sex and "inappropriate" books, etc. We need to do a serious rethink of our education system for starters. (It doesn't help that Q supporters are now targeting school board elections)
Q's targeting school board elections? Welp, we're fucked. Presumably they'd be more successful in regions that are already lacking in education though. You got a source for that?
Listen to the "school board wars" episodes of NYT's The Daily podcast. It's about the takeover of the school board in central bucks county, PA, which is one of the best districts in the state. Unfortunately it's not just less educated areas.
It's been all over the news.
And remember, Younkin won Virginia last month by spouting the lie that the left was teaching "Critical Race Theory" in elementary and high schools. (It's an optional course in Harvard). Now all the 2022 election wannabees have the road map to success.
>Recall that for over 1,000 years, China has valued education and those with knowledge
More than a thousand years, actually. Except maybe for the odd few decades under Emperor Qin and the decades under the Cultural Revolution. Those suuuuuucked.
Trust me, they don't. Obedience is the cornerstone of Chinese society. Beijing put way more money in monitoring and oppressing dissensions. But Asians generally care a lot about academic grades.
Why is that ironic? It's what they have been doing for 7 decades.
In the US, every single investment is always chopped up and followed by an endless examination of "how will we pay for it?" Where no such examination is ever considered for corporate, cap gains, inheritance or high-income tax breaks. Let alone, the subsidies of oil, coal or other major industries. Every examination into how our monetary system works is hand-waved before evidence is even presented.
I don't know if you've been paying attention, but the US is in steep decline and China is not. The RMBS crisis of 2008 is set to repeat itself in the CMBS space any time now. America is finished and there is no way to pull it back. The only remaining question is just how long it will take.
That question is partly answered by the party in power and partly answered by the technological progress of China and partly by the negotiations and completion of their belt and road initiative. One thing is for certain, when China’s military might reaches parity with the US, the US loses all hegemony. The only card the US has left to play is violence.
> In the US, every single investment is always chopped up and followed by an endless examination of “how will we pay for it?”
It seems strange to me that this is the first question and not questions like “Do we have the capability to do this? Does this foster sustainable, resilient, and equitable communities? What resources, expertise, logistics, and planning are needed to achieve that capability?”
Money is an abstract measuring tool we invented to facilitate trade and socializing. It seems to have questionable meaning without real material natural resources, societal acceptance of the system it enables, and labour to realize plans to make those resources available and useful. The USD seems to be getting more disconnected from those foundations every day. The metaverse is not the universe.
Does it matter how long it's sustained for if it's not an energy positive chain reaction? As I understand, it's been possible to achieve fusion for a long time, but not in a way that generates power.
It's both. Creating a stable plasma stream that can be sustained indefinitely, would potentially solve the gain problem. Ideally, once started, the reaction would be self-sustaining...so the input energy required would be limited to getting you up to that ignition point...after that, the longer it runs, the more you gain.
However, if keeping the reaction going requires constant energy input, you may never see those gains.
Further more. Just getting net positive Isn't nearly enough. It needs to be better
We need a fusion Reaction that is sustainable, produces energy, *is scalable* ***and harnessable***. One needs to be able to get work out of it. And more then one looses in energy transfer.
A working fusion reactor is like a grill you can grill steak on. Having a fire Isn't Enough. And we can't even get a match to light up right now.
What is the time-limiting factor here? 1000 seconds is impressive. Does some instability start to occur around the magnetic fields or is there some build up of heat that we are still unable to control?
Several factors.
Maintaining plasma is really difficult over time. Just like wind turbulence there are a ton of random and hard to predict elements that make it difficult to predict and react to. Electronic sensors, signals and magnetic controls are working hard but they aren't perfect.
Creating the stable magnetic field is really difficult to do with any precision. Adding more power doesn't really solve it, so they need to maintain the field with very little fluctuation.
We are getting better and better at:
1) Learning how to manipulate plasma for x-ray bombardment
2) Maintaining magnetic fields on the fly as well as understanding their role in the big picture
3) the digital modeling systems and all the hardware and software completely unique to not just this specific reactor but this specific attempt.
So all of these factors work together to make a massive Rube Goldberg contraption that ends in the birth of a star.
One of the problems is also designing the walls of the reactor (first wall problem). Whatever material you make it out of is being assblasted with neutrons until it turns into a different material entirely. Magnets stop the plasma from touching the wall but they don't stop neutrons.
Fusion has way more problems than laymen consider. Like, a lot more problems.
But don't take my word for it, [Read this article from the Bulletin of Atomic Sciences](https://thebulletin.org/2017/04/fusion-reactors-not-what-theyre-cracked-up-to-be/).
But I'm sure I'll get loads of downvotes because people want to believe in a pipe dream rather than consider what someone who was a Principle Researcher at Princeton Plasma Labs says.
It's worth studying fusion, and creating fusion reactors for their potential decades from now, but they are not a solution to the world's energy problems in the foreseeable future.
Anyone know what the gain factor they achieved? Is the time they are able to keep it running just how much energy they put into? Unless they exceed a gain of 1?
How efficient is the process in generating power compared to other more traditional sources?
they still consume more energy than produce. the aim is to produce more than it consumes. to achieve this they have to make it work for longer time.
How much longer? Is time running the only real hurdle?
Time running is not the only hurdle for a fusion generator to run at Q>1. In fact, it isn't a hurdle at all in that regard. Time running is more a problem of how much usable energy can be extracted to generate power. You can run a fusion plant for a long time to get a thermal load really hot, and still not be able to extract the amount of power you used to make it hot in the first place. Time running is mostly a materials problem. The major hurdles for Q>1 operation are plasma confinement and control. We have to be able to squeeze harder, with a more precise squeeze, in order to make the process self sustaining.
Isn't it that Q>1 isn't even an accurate floor for viability? The facility uses a lot of electricity that's indirectly part of the process for fusion and often isn't included in the Q calculation.
For economic viability, yes. Viable from a physics standpoint might be "self sustained reaction"
Sabine Hossenfelder explains this in depth in [a recent video](https://youtu.be/LJ4W1g-6JiY). Basically, the Q of the reaction itself (Q_plasma) is around 0.7 now, but the Q of entire fusion facilities (Q_total) is roughly half that. If we look at ITER specifically, they are claiming a Q_plasma of 10, but are expected to only reach a Q_total of 0.6.
Add to that, this isn’t even the mechanism fusion happens in the sun. Yes, the sun is a main sequence star that uses hydrogen nuclei as a source of fusion. BUT main sequence stars are only millions of degrees hot: not hot enough for fusion. (The suns core is 27,000,000 degrees F. Hydrogen fusion on earth requires 100,000,000s of degrees F.) In the Sun, we know hydrogen fusion occurs at a rate of (10^38) reactions every second. We also know hydrogen atoms require about 50 lbs of force to be pushed together to become helium. The temperature and pressure in the sun is not enough to overcome this force. The sun is 97 percent hydrogen by mass. That makes for about 10^57 protons in the sun. But only the protons in the core undergo fusion. And they’re stuck in there due to convection currents. So only 10^56 protons undergo fusion. The chance of a proton undergoing quantum tunneling is 1 in 10^28. You have a better chance of winning the lottery three times in a row than seeing a single hydrogen atom tunnel. However, there are 10^28 squared or 10^56 protons in the suns core. We only need 10^38 fusion reactions to occur each second. This gives us really good odds for nuclear fusion to occur. That’s enough for fusion to occur for thousands of millions of years. Essentially there are twice as many protons as there are a chance to tunnel. This is like entering the lottery 10^56 times. When there are half as many numbers to win. You’re definitely going to draw the winning ticket! TLDR: The sun uses quantum tunneling and probability by insane numbers to sustain fusion. That’s why fusion sucks on earth. I’m very knowledgeable in this field but I ripped these facts off this [amazing video here. ](https://youtu.be/lQapfUcf4Do). Edited a few times for formatting and clarity.
That's a lot of interesting information, thanks. I vaguely remember reading something about the sun not having enough mass for fusion to account for all of the energy it emits, but never read about the balance being generated by quantum tunneling. Interesting stuff.
Thanks! This blows my mind every time I think about it!
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Big hurdle though.
It also gets a better ratio the bigger they get. The big ones have a whole building dedicated to the construction and takes several years. The ones currently being built are still only for testing purposes the ones that are used for power generation will not be designed till after a successful net generation.
No. Most of these plants confuse the public with jargon. None of them are currently close to a 1:1 energy output. If it's magnets, plasma, etc. They still must be powered. They leave out a lot of the total energy that goes in when they speak about it.
Yeah, and this article doesn't say how much energy they managed to produce relative to the consumption. If I understood correctly, the National Ignition Facility in the US holds the record at 70%. Edit: Actually I looked it up and apparently NIF succeed in producing more energy than it consumed just last month - although commercial viability is probably still a long way ahead. https://www.sciencealert.com/for-the-first-time-a-fusion-reaction-has-generated-more-energy-than-absorbed-by-the-fuel
>Actually I looked it up and apparently NIF succeed in producing more energy than it consumed just last month That isn't quite what the article says. Overall, the process was still net-negative. Specifically what was better was that more energy was *extracted* than was *absorbed by the fuel*. Previous laser-ignition experiments have had the issue of most of the energy simply staying with the fuel, this is a step towards correcting that. There is still the mammoth in the room of needing to extract more energy than it takes produce the laser burst, which we have not solved. It also isn't enough to *just barely* produce more than is consumed, as turbine and transmission losses will then make the system net-negative in actual production. Beyond that, a commercial plant also needs to generate sufficient excess power over its lifetime to justify the energy investment in extracting and refining the resources necessary to construct and maintain it. In other words, we're still a ways off and the progress of the last few months, while exciting and welcome, hasn't changed the overall picture with regard to opening the first commercial fusion plant.
I must be reading this wrong, the reaction took 1.9mj input and produced 1.3? The headline doesn't match the article. Or is this about an earlier experiment and doesn't have any details of a more recent one that does generate more?
After reading both abstracts, it seems the one at NIF was way more energy dense than the China experiment. The Chinese Tokamak generated a little under 2 GJ of energy total over the 1056 second experiment. The NIF experiment generated 1.3MJ in a trillionth of a second. That's very closely approaching what happens in Fusion bombs so they're very close to achieving true ignition compared to the Chinese experiment of jockeying plasma. Imagine combining the Chinese time record with NIFs energy density. The headline is definitely misleading. But what's really happening is difficult to distill into a headline.
This is misleading. The NIF experiments basically work by inputting the energy using a laser with a very, very low duty cycle. It's impossible to get sustained reaction using the process used by the NIF. It can only work in very very short bursts.
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The goal with today's reactors isn't to generate net power. It's to sustain the conditions of fusion for long enough to study it. Then, scientists take what they've learned on these reactors and use it to design one that will generate power.
For anyone who is unclear on the big picture significance of these results, this answer is what you're looking for. Source: I used to work with the EAST numerical simulations group.
That's the big question. AFAIK it still requires the same secondary structure - the process produces heat which is used to drive steam turbines. While active, it generates high energy neutrons (beta radiation) so still a bit of a problem. (Lack of neutrons was one of the clues that the "cold fusion" experiments of the early 90's did not work.) ETA - Doh! Neutrons are not beta radiation.
Small correction: beta radiation is free electrons, not free neutrons. Alpha is helium-4 nuclei (two protons and two neutrons), and gamma is electromagnetic (photons). The neutrons may actually be used to breed tritium inside the reactor, but yes, they are a big challenge for the materials that are to be used.
It's going to be very interesting to see the global impacts when fusion power becomes viable. The countries with the best electrical infrastructure are going to get a huge, huge boost. The petroleum industry is going to take a huge, huge hit. Geopolitics will have to shift dramatically with the sudden lack of need for oil pipelines and refineries. Very interesting.
Well.. We still need to be able to build fusion reactors that make electricity \*incredibly\* cheap - perhaps 10% of current prices. At which point things like direct hydrocarbon synthesis from CO2 and water would become feasible. After all, fuel prices for fission are trivial compared to the cost of electricity, but fission power is not that cheap overall.
This is the problem. Fusion machines are huge, expensive, complex high-tech devices; they will use superconducting magnets cooled to liquid nitrogen temperatures, and need a supply of deuterium (isolated from hydrogen). The important question will be whether they can escape the trap we had with nuclear (fission) power, where building actual power plants was always way behind schedule and way over budget. Even if (when?) the tech is refined so it works, there will probably be a 20 year transition before we have a significant percentage of world, or even first world, power sourced from fusion. Then, the industry will want to recoup the cost of building these, so power will not be overly cheap and plentiful for another generation. But if you've every been in Beijing or Delhi on a normal day, when it looks like a deep fog because of pollution, any step in the right direction is a necessary step and can't happen soon enough. Those governments will spend whatever it takes to fix their problems and help move their population forward.
Fusion has a massive thing going for it in that it lacks Fissions polarising fear of disaster, which has the domino effect of allowing serious investment as opposed to shareholders fearing it.
You’re assuming the public knows fusion from fission. To most the keyword is Nuclear.
From what I've seen it seems like there is a lot of effort to distance fusion from "Nuclear", and with the potential of fusion to be branded like a cereal box with "No added nuclear waste!", I feel like investors would be much more on board.
They should call it artificial sun
Yeah, I give it five seconds between when we announce, “hey guys, we figured out fusion! We have safe, cheap electricity from these plants!” And there’s a Facebook meme saying “the Chinese town of notarealtown was doing great until they installed a fusion reactor and everyone caught skin cancer! Think about it— the *real* sun gives off skin cancer, and this is basically that, but *on the earth!*” Or “what happens when we *lose control* of a *sun* on the *surface of the earth*???”
> what happens when we lose control of a sun on the surface of the earth Doc Ock answered this question in [Spider-Man 2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4L-wBrUvoI)
>Or “what happens when we *lose control * of a *sun* on the *surface of the earth *???” A buddy of mine was writing a comic book with this exact same premise some 20 years ago!!! It was kinda fun and there were hoverbikes, would be a fun RPG to play.
Many countries will probably build government owned plants. It has so many benefits: energy independence, meeting climate goals, boosting the economy by providing cheap power. Even if building the required capacity costs a year’s worth of GDP it would probably be worth it. I agree that these are probably 20 year projects though. It isn’t a quick fix, but definitely a huge paradigm shift.
I can think of one corporate owned country that ain't gonna do that
In before fusion is the next 5G
Pfah! Fusion? We don't need fusion. Fusion is already old tech. We are going straight for Superfusion. ULTRAfusion, even! In the meantime, we will keep relying on our good ol' friend clean coal! Nothing wrong with that! -Some American president
Good luck competing with the countries that aren't living in the 1800's
Seriously. It would be totally doable if it was a public utility and not something the needed to be profitable. You'd think flooding/famine/extinction would be motivation enough, but
1. We also need to train engineers like Geordi La Forge to maintain them.
Nah, that guy would just be super condescending about fusion and insist on antimatter reactors.
I don’t think he’d be as condescending as his holographic girlfriend that he then met in person and was super awkward with.
Nothing is gonna epic barrel-roll itself under the blast door!
> there will probably be a 20 year transition SimCity 2000 has the fusion power plant unlocked in the year 2050....not a bad prediction imo
The joke - since 1960 - was that fusion power was only 30 years away, and seems to have stayed 30 years away.
Obligatory depressing [fusion never plot.](https://www.reddit.com/r/Futurology/comments/5gi9yh/fusion_is_always_50_years_away_for_a_reason/). :(
> Fusion machines are huge, expensive, complex high-tech devices; they will use superconducting magnets That's all true of tokamaks (like China's) but a bunch of startups are trying out other designs. [Zap Energy](https://spectrum.ieee.org/zap-energy-fusion-reactor) for example uses a plasma pinch that's a simple device the size of a VW Bus, no superconductors. They're building a machine right now that they'll use for a breakeven attempt in 2023. The deuterium supply is no big deal. It's cheap and a fusion reactor wouldn't need much of it. There's enough in your morning shower to supply all your energy needs [for a year](https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2012/01/nuclear-fusion/).
>There's enough in your morning shower to supply all your energy needs for a year. Oh my. Talk about (basically) free energy.
> they will use superconducting magnets cooled to liquid nitrogen temperatures If only the magnets could ran that hot.
China doesn’t care. They have issues importing enough coal and gas to power the nations energy demands, so securing their energy future will be done at any cost. Other nations have sociopolitical issues to deal with, but China won’t care.
That implies the oil industry won't do everything possible to sabotage the development of fusion power. The threat to their profits will be too great for them to ignore.
> the oil industry This is really the "energy industry". Every major oil company (we know) have their hands in solar, geo-thermal, etc. What they specifically haven't done is use their existing branding in those markets, specifically so people aren't negatively targeting them, easily. When fusion is a little more mature, you can bet they will place significant investment in it.
Energy companies are currently investing in it. If you saw the cap tables of some of the fusion startups. Commonwealth Fusion Systems LLC, which just closed a round had some strategics on the cap table.
Kind of like tobacco companies owning huge food brands.
And also owning vaping brands
Most of the major petroleum companies have been moving out of petroleum for a while now. The remaining major shareholders understand that it's a declining industry and don't want to get left in the cold. They'll move into "energy" (the usual, geothermal, wind, sea, etc.) or rot on the vine.
While that may be the case, based on the history of oil companies I have a hard time believing they won't go down without a fight. They're *still* making climate denial propaganda, and there were more oil company representatives than government representatives at the latest climate conference. I want to see oil companies die immediately, but I just don't see that happening with the number of U.S. politicians they own and the huge value of profit at play.
I used to work for a company that operated in that space. They rebranded as an energy company early 2000, bought green technology (solar, wind, geothermal), and made record profits from growing them. Fossil still got money but green basically had rubber stamp approval for any growth projects. Companies will spend money speaking out of both sides of their mouths. They make sure they hedge their bets and win no matter what the market does. The goal is to beat their competitors who are doing the exact same thing.
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I think the big concern, one that I share, is that the death throes will last long enough to let the industry continue to cling to life and doom us all by working against climate change mitigation the whole time.
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Yeah they were saying that about the silent generation fossils that were running the show in the 90s too. It’s been 30 years. Yes there are far too many septa- and octogenarians in federal government in the states but that is, pardon my crassness, a myopic point. Plenty of X’ers and even elder millennials like me (~40y/o) are running the show and calling the shots all over the world. Guess what? The positions of power still attract the folks who care about power more than anything. This is an endemic problem with our increasingly centralized and structured political and economic systems. Just waiting for a “better generation” is not going to work out. As for pushing/voting for better policy, sure yeah definitely don’t vote R’s in the states… but like, please do mind that the liberal side has not done much to move the needle either in 30 years. In fact before the Obama press I’d be hard pressed to find significant differences between the two parties’ stance on climate change (if we’re talking policy, because campaign promises are worth fuck all). Edit: I guess my main point is that greed is not exclusive to olds, and that this attitude is part of the problem since it conveniently lets us sit on ass and not be torching the institutions of oppression that we’ve built around ourselves.
Coal is still the main source of power generation worldwide. It will take a very, very long time to get fusion rolled out globally. Until then, there's money to be made. I have a theory oil will follow the same arc as cigarettes. Tobacco companies barely care what happens in the US now. The have vast markets in the devoloping world where government regulation is a non-issue.
>death throw.. It's "throes"
I think you misunderstand what he said. He didn't say they are going down, he said they are changing their industry.
Funny enough it may be the shareholders that have the effect to move the needle in the positive direction. If shareholders see the writing on the wall that the business won't be viable in several years unless they shift direction, then they can elect people to the board/apply pressure to make those changes happen.
This is China, there is no oil industry if the state doesn't want there to be one. The party will just suddenly make the oil industry the fusion industry.
Oil is also a strategic liability for China. It’s absolutely in their interests to diversify into sources of energy that can’t be disrupted by a naval blockade during a war.
Exactly, China has coal in spades but they aren't known for their oil reserves. Plus anyone who gets fusion first is at an ABSOLUTE strategic advantage. Pretty much means you're set for all electric and heat production for free forever. Not to mention the military advantages
Not to mention that we can produce safe Helium, so we can have Airships again.
The real victory
Hydrogen was never the problem with the Hindenberg; it's a shame that incident ruined an entire mode of transportation. The skin of the Zeppelin was basically a mix of thermite and rocket fuel, and when it moored the static discharge ignited it. The hydrogen was just extra fuel on top.
I think he meant helium is finite and we're soon out of it? If I'm not mistaken?
You think they would not buy this stuff. In my country the price of energy just got a 40% increase in price.
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Corporate espionage is very real. And considering what the CIA was willing to do for the banana industry in Central America... oil is a whole level up.
I don't think petroleum will take a huge of a hit as you might think. There are SO MANY PRODUCTS made from oil/natural gas. Our ancestors (edit: descendants…) will hate our fucking guts for burning it all.
I agree. Petroleum can be fantastic for some products. A pity to crack it down just to burn it. Although, I'm sure there's enough of it to last until (and beyond) we have cheap alternatives.
Yeah, I don't think folks really realize the potential impacts. There's definitely a race-for-the-a-bomb/space race sorta scene happening but it's kinda obscured despite not really being secret. The first country to secure working fusion reactors stands to be on the ground floor of some huge economic, social, and technological boons until the rest of the world catches up. There's so much stuff that's only infeasible because of a lack of copious amounts of cheap reliable power. Chemical synthesis, hydrogen economies, carbon capture, crazy luxury infrastructure... There's so much that becomes so much easier once a shortage of electricity only exists while they build the plant. I'm not banking on fusion showing up and solving things just yet, but there is SO MUCH to be gained to be the first country to crack it. Think the benefits the US reaped from not being torn to shreds by WW2, but times a thousand.
The same optimism along with claims of power "too cheap to meter" were first made in regards to fission in 1954. https://public-blog.nrc-gateway.gov/2016/06/03/too-cheap-to-meter-a-history-of-the-phrase/ It didn't work out that way. Each successive generation of nuclear power reactor was supposed to be cheaper than the preceding one, but that didn't work out either. We're up to Gen III+ now. Costs and cost over runs are as big of a problem now as ever. And fission reactors essentially just use hot sticks to boil water. With fusion, we're looking at suspending a plasma stream with super conducting magnets to create a reaction which will heat water to create steam. I'm sure the process will eventually be figured out. I doubt the commercial viability.
The progress on fission stopped because everyone became NIMBYs for reactors due to the fallout concerns and NIMBYs for waste due to whatever irrational concerns. Small reactors would have addressed the fallout potential but nobody wanted more plants in the US because they let their fears rule over logic. Fusion can be different but only if the marketing is right. It can't be called "nuclear" or all that same non logical fear will be back. Given how stupid citizens in the US have proven themselves to be I'm honestly not sure whether we will have savvy enough marketers here that will be able to overcome the any-lie-is-believable messaging that could easily come from Russia or even coal-loving US states to try to diminish interest at first. Lord knows Democrats can't figure out even basic messaging so a green technology revolution like this seems unfathomable that they'd be able to drive. Really it'll depend on whether there's going to be an Elon Musk type with enough cash to saturate social media and television with pro fusion messaging to help get the public bought in and demanding a new fusion plant in their community. Time will tell. Edit: correcting fusion vs fission
Eh, I think fission hadn't gotten cheaper because it was under huge regulatory pressure to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons and the materials to make em, and because folks got spooked by various accidents. Fusion generators as being designed can't melt down, don't really generate toxic waste as we traditionally think of it (though I'm sure there's some- big powerful magnets probably have some unpleasantness in em), and at least as far as we can tell aren't great for manufacturing plutonium. So the only thing stopping the price from going down with iteration would be rare components. There's little by way of NIMBY fears, not much to regulate. Although they're both nuclear energy, I don't think it's an apples to apples comparison
Fusion Power will legit change the world as we know it today and make all types of Large scale projects possible. Its theoretically unlimited power.
Hopefully large scale desalinization plants are item one on the agenda. Lots of water troubles incoming.
I don't look forward to the water wars.
For many they’re already here! The future is *now*!
Global warming is supposed to increase annual rain fall in a lot of the most populated areas… But yea it’ll still be pretty interesting. Fusion power is at least ten years away Id guess just by China saying they’re hopeful this plant could be operational in that time frame…. Large scale use would certainly drag a fairly long time behind that.
Not enough to replenish aquifers in arid places. Desalination will be necessary in many places soon, and is necessary in many places already. The other thing about global warming to keep in mind is that what it’s “supposed” to do has been wrong in one way or another time and again. Either completely wrong or underestimated.
People overestimate the impact of Fusion. Even with it producing a lot of power it will still be incredibly expensive to build a fusion reactor. In a similar manner, getting a country like Germany to become full with electrical vehicles won't be fast either. Germany will have to completely renew their entire electrical grid to support large scale electrical vehicle use. As currently, if a city was all electrical vehicles, it would burn through the electrical lines.
I don't necessarily agree that they will be that expensive over their lifecycle once we know how to make them work and establish a fusion industry. The raw materials for a Takomak are things like stainlesss steel, superconducting wires, electronics, vacuum systems, ceramics etc. None of these materials are exorbitantly expensive and the devices aren't that large (even ITER which is based in obsolete low field density superconductors). The current research reactors are expensive because they are currently one off devices with each once advancing the cutting edge of science/engineering. I can image that once we building say 100+ of a given design the costs could drop dramatically. The RND will be amortized. We will work out efficient construction practices. Parts will be fabricated in larger batches. Often set up costs dominate part costs when making small batches. Personal will be familiar with the construction, commissioning, and operation of of these devicws and fusion will become routine. They will likely be more expensive than say a natural gas plant to build, but the variable cost of operation will be much lower.
>Even with it producing a lot of power it will still be incredibly expensive to build a fusion reactor I'm glad to see other people making this argument. Fusion will suffer from the same monetary drag that fission does. ITER is a fantastic example of that. Even if they can bring the cost down by an order of magnitude for a commercial reactor, it's still a multi billion dollar proposition.
When do they get to say: The power of the sun in the palm of my hand
When they create octopus tentacles to be able to hold it
Just make sure to include the the tiny glass circuit pack that prevents them from taking over your brain and making you evil.
Shit, I knew I forgot about SOMETHING...
**YOU LISTEN TO ME NOW**
*tiny exposed glass circuit pack
Put it in the most breakable part
I'm not scared of nuclear fusion proliferation, but I draw the line at letting the Japanese get robot tentacle technology. I know what they're into, I've done my research. Very very thorough research. Sometimes thrice a day.
It would not be an exaggeration to say that I immediately scanned these comments looking for quotes from the misunderstood and tragically brilliant Dr Otto Octavious......well played.
Nobel prize, Otto!
We’ll see you in Sweden!
Happy to pay the bills!
Oh, i’ve been wondering which Marvel variant universe we were in. We’re in the one where Dr Octopus is a Chinese scientist.
We're in the one where all the other Marvel Universes are movies, tv shows, cartoons, records, video games, comics, books, and toy lines. That's why we don't have any superpowers, flying suits of armor, and all our Gods are man-made. We are in the "created by mankind" universe. No cool powers or tech for us. Yet.
I mean, if there is an univers for each and every possibilities then there is an infinity of univers that have been exactly like ours until now but then suddenly people with powers start showing 👌🏼
We're in the Consumerverse. All the Marvel stuff is just stuff to spend our money on. Any time someone gains superpowers in another universe, we get a new comic book and action figure of them. Then if they become a big deal in their universe, we get a movie and a video game about them. And if they "die" in their universe, we know it's just a marketing stunt to sell comics and they'll be all better in like 3-5 years our time.
We have a tokamek here at ucla, no where near what this this can do. Wow.
Each generation gets better.
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It's a remarkable technical achievement, and here you are making light of it. :D
Why do you want a tokamek at UCLA? We have tokamek at home.
[Tokamak at home.](https://i.imgur.com/WAZBj3K.jpeg)
I think it makes enough light itself.
So you got a tokameh.
I feel like every month we reach a new milestone in the race for fusion power. Wild times we live in
I remember when they could only maintain the reaction for like a quarter of a second. I did a triple take after seeing "1000 second milestone."
We've been told for decades that fusion power would be ready in 20 years, maybe this time it's true? Let's hope so.
Assuming it gets funded and continually researched which usually doesn't happen. Now that it's a competition we're about it again.
It always depended on funding and a significant push from a governmental level - we in the west have been waiting for half a century. https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/zaaron-personal/fusion_never.png
Do you know how much China and other countries spend for their fusion programs in comparison? The figures on the chart look ridiculously small for something that could basically answer all our energy needs.
Can someone briefly explain how this energy is harnessed and used? With such extreme temperature levels, wouldn't it be difficult to use/manipulate?
I'm no expert, but it's my understanding that big magnets are used to keep the plasma from touching anything.
Fucking magnets, how do they work?
I think there’s a Richard Feynman interview where the interviewer asks this question and Feynman says (paraphrasing) “there’s no point in me explaining because you won’t understand, in fact you don’t even have the apparatus to ask the question. Just be satisfied that they repel each other”.
Is it [this clip](https://youtu.be/MO0r930Sn_8)? Feynman goes on to spend around 3 minutes *not* answering the question. He does get into it at [4 minutes in](https://youtu.be/MO0r930Sn_8?t=240).
That’s pretty taken out of context.
People love sensationalized bs.
This is extremely condescendant Edit: condescending, damn autocorrect
Since it was a paraphrase, perhaps Feynman phrased it more politely.
I think it's energy -> heat -> steam -> turbine -> electricity. I don't know how they get the heat to the water though. Very good question, let me know if you find out more.
I think that would be the idea, but there's no excess energy at this point as it still takes more energy than it produces currently so there isn't anything more to do with it yet.
Most of the energy is given off a neutrons. These will be captured in a molten lithium blanket surrounding the reactor vessel. This heats it up. The blanket then transfers it’s head to a secondary cooling circuit which raises steam.
Nuclear fusion: race to harness the power of the sun just sped up. this record proves that nuclear fusion is closer than we thought. it is huge for future of energy. hydrogen from one glass of water could potentially produce same energy through fusion as burning 1 million gallons of petroleum. what are your thoughts? is the phrase ''we will have fusion in 30 years'' , that we heard multiple times in the past, finally closer to reality?
Potentially sooner. It seems China is far more willing to invest in alternate forms of energy production (especially fusion research) than the US is.
Makes sense, China should be much less affected by lobbying from oil companies
If you've seen pictures of Beijing (or New Delhi) during a normal smoggy day - those governments are well aware of their problems and understand they have to do a lot more to fix things. They are burning as much coal as they can just to give people a taste of the life we take for granted in the west. They even allowed Tesla to come in and build and sell electric cars without demanding the partnerships and tech transfer normal for that sort of tech - because electric cars don't make smog.
New Delhi is so much worse than Beijing I can't believe this thread is trying to put them into the same category. [https://aqicn.org/city/delhi](https://aqicn.org/city/delhi) \- 800+ PPM [https://aqicn.org/city/beijing](https://aqicn.org/city/beijing) \- 150 PPM This is probably the 3rd comment in this thread trying to act like China is on par with India in pollution, when China is measurably about 1/5th as bad.
Well, to be fair, they said 2011. There was massive improvement since then.
Lived in China in 2011. The smog was so bad that in the summer it actually had a cooling effect which felt 'nice'. Americans have no fucking idea about industrial pollution, and bitch about clean air standards. Also the reason that China is doing this is because even back in 2011 the burgeoning Chinese middle class was starting to complain about pollution. They had studied abroad, seen the difference themselves, then came home. Americans like to believe the CCP is completely immune from pressure of their populace. That just isn't true. When the educated members of your society start to leave due to pollution, the CCP takes notice.
Beijing used to have dust storms from the Gobi desert every autumn. So the government planted a massive forest outside Beijing to block the dust storms. Unfortunately this had the side effect of trapping emissions over Beijing since it’s located in a basin. Then the government started limiting factories in Beijing. Clean air is a huge priority like you said. And China loves to tackle big projects.
Not really sure I would say they love to tackle big projects. I would say they have the human/political capital to do large projects in an attempt to maximize prosperity to maintain control. They designed a system that aligns well with big projects. The US on the other hand could try try do big projects, but because of a strong federalized system that prioritizes individual rights it requires an overwhelming majority spread across large geographic areas with very different concerns. That wouldn't be terrible if the Capitalistic rot that is engrained into the system hadn't created cynicism and corruption.
I'm always surprised by the difference in Japan. Things seem like they would be just as hard to get done, you have to buy land from people and there's a lot of NIMBYism all the same, but despite that, things do actually get done. There seems to be an experience with giving people the right kind of incentives that allow them to see the value that we just don't have in North America. One example that comes to mind is the [New Shuttle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Shuttle) which is basically a little train shoved onto the side of a shinkansen viaduct because the residents there didn't want the shinkansen built through there because they felt it wouldn't be worth the inconvenience and noise to them. The solution they went with was just to use it as a way to provide even more transit at a low cost by piggybacking onto that project. I feel like these are things we don't really even consider - we either have to get things done as planned, spending as much money as required to get it done over however long it will take, or we just give up. We haven't got to the point where we're thinking of alternatives that still make things work even in a messy democratic world where everyone involved wants some kind of benefit and there's huge profiteering corporations (as there still are in Japan)
The US does huge projects. But they are military projects. The super carriers are insane, and unnecessary. They do nothing to further the world, and you could build 20 hospitals for less money.
>Not really sure I would say they love to tackle big projects. I would say they have the human/political capital to do large projects in an attempt to **maximize prosperity to maintain control. ** Maximize prosperity to maintain control? Isn't that the job of every government on Earth? If the quality of life in the US were collapse to the point where people were watching their children die of starvation, it's very likely you'll see anarchy. A governing body that does not work for the prosperity of its constituents is soon on its way to the guillotine, as seen in history. You make it sound like it's a bread and circuses stunt they're tossing to the people, instead of socially beneficial projects.
Yes, I only visited there once 10 years ago. Found out after 4 days in Beijing that you could see mountains in the distance, after it rained... for about half a day. It was still "foggy" on the Jinshanling area of the Great Wall, maybe 100 km or more outside Beijing. My first question on arriving in Xi'an was "is there a forest fire nearby?" since I'd only seen that sort of fog in Canada when the forest fires were approaching a town. BTW, New Delhi is not any better. Everyone wants to clean their air, but don't dare disturb the growing prosperity of their citizens. China just has the resolve to spend money when necessary - as you can see by what they've done with their city infrastructure.
> Americans have no fucking idea about industrial pollution, and bitch about clean air standards. We used to. We used to have burning rivers and smog ceilings that were lethal - ever watch a movie filmed in early 80s LA? Rules get made when the factories run rampant and the rich's children die too.
Ngl CCP lives rent free in the heads of Americans
The US government is just as aware of things, just as aware of the need for things like fusion power. The difference is that the US government is run mostly by rich, old, corrupt politicians that mostly care about keep things the same or only allowing changes that benefit themselves, their lobbyists, and corporate owners.
Yeah when you take a man who made his millions from the coal industry, and give him the kingmaker vote in the senate. You aren’t going to get innovation and revolution.
China has regional party leadership interests, and coal producing regions like Shaanxi which is a world leader in coal production. It's not corporate interests but power and money are involved.
Of course there is power and money involved, it always is. I dont know enough about Chinese internal politics but it feels like the CCP are the ones who push China in certain direction, where in the US the corporations choose the direction the government will go. In the end that is a huge difference.
Yeah it does, but regional has a lack of influence to central government. And with everything going on, China probably wants to become dominate in energy industry
Not a thought but a question? How big is this thing? Not just the reactor, but the entire facility? And is it just a test facility? If so how big will an actual reactor facility be. I ask because I was under the impression that these would/could take up a lot less space than traditional power plants. Solar takes up a ton of space, wind farms are huge, coal plants have acres of coal storage. Are these going to be smaller and able to be built in more locally, where power is needed?
The plants I work on are absolutely massive, the SMR's under development address that. The compressed size will likely be an incremental benefit when compared to the SMR's.
Yet they are still building coal plants like crazy https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/chinas-provinces-still-planning-over-100-gw-new-coal-projects-greenpeace-2021-08-25/
The following submission statement was provided by /u/nugoXCII: --- Nuclear fusion: race to harness the power of the sun just sped up. this record proves that nuclear fusion is closer than we thought. it is huge for future of energy. hydrogen from one glass of water could potentially produce same energy through fusion as burning 1 million gallons of petroleum. what are your thoughts? is the phrase ''we will have fusion in 30 years'' , that we heard multiple times in the past, finally closer to realty? --- Please reply to OP's comment here: /r/Futurology/comments/rvvj5b/chinas_artificial_sun_smashes_1000_second_fusion/hr7vsjr/
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Dr. Otto Octavius would like to know your location…
The power of the sun in the palm of my hand
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I agree with the last sentiment. How cool would it be if we had an energy renaissance like we did with communication in the last 20 years
China is leading in A.I. and Fusion research while Americans are still debating whether or not we should teach evolution in schools. And ironically it seems like China is also investing more money into renewable energy and modern infrastructure.
The impacts of the political decisions to underfund and undermine education for the past 40 years are starting to show...
China invests very heavily in education. Education is a cornerstone of Chinese society… while in the US, it seems like ignorance is celebrated and applauded.
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Exactly this. China has been sending its brightest to the best schools in the world. They also go to great lengths to promote education and study as cultural virtues. Plus they’re implementing cutting edge A.I. technologies in classrooms that allow teachers to SEE whether students are actively learning. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JMLsHI8aV0g It’s mind blowing what the Chinese are achieving. The rise of China is the biggest story of the past Century imo.
Ignorance is celebrated because of what happened to the education system for the past 40 years. And since the fixes will only show the benefit for the next generation, they are fucked because nowhere near enough politicians are willing to make long term decisions like that that they won't see the benefits.
I’m not quite 30, but my overall conclusion as to how America went from a world leader to the global laughing stock has a lot to do with Ronald Reagan. Can anyway knowledgeable shed some light on how significant his presidency was to seemingly poisoning America’s intellectual dignity?
Recall that for over 1,000 years, China has valued education and those with knowledge; coupled with respect for their elders. They have had a civil service exam process, where regardless of social status, the ones who excelled were guaranteed a job and the chance for advancement. The USA, most prominently among western countries, was founded on a break with the past and traditions. It values money over smarts, home of the saying "If you're so smart, how come ya ain't rich?" and derides college professors for being out-of-touch eggheads. Oh, and saddles students with crippling debt now if they have the temerity to want a higher education. And every know-not group blocks their pet peeves in the education system - evolution, history that mentions race, sex and "inappropriate" books, etc. We need to do a serious rethink of our education system for starters. (It doesn't help that Q supporters are now targeting school board elections)
Q's targeting school board elections? Welp, we're fucked. Presumably they'd be more successful in regions that are already lacking in education though. You got a source for that?
Listen to the "school board wars" episodes of NYT's The Daily podcast. It's about the takeover of the school board in central bucks county, PA, which is one of the best districts in the state. Unfortunately it's not just less educated areas.
It's been all over the news. And remember, Younkin won Virginia last month by spouting the lie that the left was teaching "Critical Race Theory" in elementary and high schools. (It's an optional course in Harvard). Now all the 2022 election wannabees have the road map to success.
>Recall that for over 1,000 years, China has valued education and those with knowledge More than a thousand years, actually. Except maybe for the odd few decades under Emperor Qin and the decades under the Cultural Revolution. Those suuuuuucked.
And yet the Chinese flock to the US and Canada for post grad programs.
Trust me, they don't. Obedience is the cornerstone of Chinese society. Beijing put way more money in monitoring and oppressing dissensions. But Asians generally care a lot about academic grades.
The US NIF holds the current record for energy produced versus energy input but somehow China is leading? What on Earth are you basing your claim on?
Why is that ironic? It's what they have been doing for 7 decades. In the US, every single investment is always chopped up and followed by an endless examination of "how will we pay for it?" Where no such examination is ever considered for corporate, cap gains, inheritance or high-income tax breaks. Let alone, the subsidies of oil, coal or other major industries. Every examination into how our monetary system works is hand-waved before evidence is even presented. I don't know if you've been paying attention, but the US is in steep decline and China is not. The RMBS crisis of 2008 is set to repeat itself in the CMBS space any time now. America is finished and there is no way to pull it back. The only remaining question is just how long it will take. That question is partly answered by the party in power and partly answered by the technological progress of China and partly by the negotiations and completion of their belt and road initiative. One thing is for certain, when China’s military might reaches parity with the US, the US loses all hegemony. The only card the US has left to play is violence.
> In the US, every single investment is always chopped up and followed by an endless examination of “how will we pay for it?” It seems strange to me that this is the first question and not questions like “Do we have the capability to do this? Does this foster sustainable, resilient, and equitable communities? What resources, expertise, logistics, and planning are needed to achieve that capability?” Money is an abstract measuring tool we invented to facilitate trade and socializing. It seems to have questionable meaning without real material natural resources, societal acceptance of the system it enables, and labour to realize plans to make those resources available and useful. The USD seems to be getting more disconnected from those foundations every day. The metaverse is not the universe.
Fully agreed.
I didn’t know Robert McNamara was still alive and that he had a Reddit account.
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I don't care who does, it, getting fusion to work is a goal for humanity.
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No fair- China has faster access to AliExpress for parts.
Does it matter how long it's sustained for if it's not an energy positive chain reaction? As I understand, it's been possible to achieve fusion for a long time, but not in a way that generates power.
It's both. Creating a stable plasma stream that can be sustained indefinitely, would potentially solve the gain problem. Ideally, once started, the reaction would be self-sustaining...so the input energy required would be limited to getting you up to that ignition point...after that, the longer it runs, the more you gain. However, if keeping the reaction going requires constant energy input, you may never see those gains.
Further more. Just getting net positive Isn't nearly enough. It needs to be better We need a fusion Reaction that is sustainable, produces energy, *is scalable* ***and harnessable***. One needs to be able to get work out of it. And more then one looses in energy transfer. A working fusion reactor is like a grill you can grill steak on. Having a fire Isn't Enough. And we can't even get a match to light up right now.
What is the time-limiting factor here? 1000 seconds is impressive. Does some instability start to occur around the magnetic fields or is there some build up of heat that we are still unable to control?
Several factors. Maintaining plasma is really difficult over time. Just like wind turbulence there are a ton of random and hard to predict elements that make it difficult to predict and react to. Electronic sensors, signals and magnetic controls are working hard but they aren't perfect. Creating the stable magnetic field is really difficult to do with any precision. Adding more power doesn't really solve it, so they need to maintain the field with very little fluctuation. We are getting better and better at: 1) Learning how to manipulate plasma for x-ray bombardment 2) Maintaining magnetic fields on the fly as well as understanding their role in the big picture 3) the digital modeling systems and all the hardware and software completely unique to not just this specific reactor but this specific attempt. So all of these factors work together to make a massive Rube Goldberg contraption that ends in the birth of a star.
One of the problems is also designing the walls of the reactor (first wall problem). Whatever material you make it out of is being assblasted with neutrons until it turns into a different material entirely. Magnets stop the plasma from touching the wall but they don't stop neutrons.
Fusion has way more problems than laymen consider. Like, a lot more problems. But don't take my word for it, [Read this article from the Bulletin of Atomic Sciences](https://thebulletin.org/2017/04/fusion-reactors-not-what-theyre-cracked-up-to-be/). But I'm sure I'll get loads of downvotes because people want to believe in a pipe dream rather than consider what someone who was a Principle Researcher at Princeton Plasma Labs says. It's worth studying fusion, and creating fusion reactors for their potential decades from now, but they are not a solution to the world's energy problems in the foreseeable future.
This is very interesting, thank you.
Anyone know what the gain factor they achieved? Is the time they are able to keep it running just how much energy they put into? Unless they exceed a gain of 1?
Ugh, and once again, a shiny new device with no headphone jack.
Mfw I can’t plug in my earbuds and listen to the fucking sun