[HN Gopher] After years of doubts, hopes grow that nuclear fusio...
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       After years of doubts, hopes grow that nuclear fusion is near
        
       Author : jseliger
       Score  : 71 points
       Date   : 2021-12-25 17:15 UTC (5 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.bostonglobe.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.bostonglobe.com)
        
       | leephillips wrote:
       | "These advancements aren't incremental; they are quantum leap
       | improvements." I hope that physicist Dennis Whyte was being
       | misquoted here.
       | 
       | We need to rapidly ramp down the use of fossil fuels and replace
       | them with technology that works today, such as photovoltaics and
       | nuclear fission (in the interim). Aspirational projects that
       | might possibly have a working proof-of-concept in a decade or
       | five are not part of the solution to the climate crisis.
        
         | mlindner wrote:
         | He is correct however. There's no possibility of replacing all
         | power with renewables energy within 10 years, so having a 5
         | year time scale for a working prototype is completely
         | reasonable. We're not even going to have all cars converted to
         | electric vehicles within 20 years even in countries with the
         | most strict rules, let alone all power generation and fossil
         | fuel use for other applications. (Even if fossil fuel sales
         | were forbidden tomorrow, it would still take 20 years for the
         | existing vehicles to be taken out of the used market.)
        
           | willis936 wrote:
           | Climate predictions end in 2070, but the world does not.
           | "We're fucked" isn't a reason to throw our hands up and not
           | try.
           | 
           | Fusion is "too late" the same way every other decarbonization
           | tool is too late. It doesn't matter. Do it anyway. In 200
           | years the people who threw up their hands will be seen as
           | short-sighted.
        
         | andi999 wrote:
         | Or just depopulate regions in the world which require heating
         | to survive.
        
           | echelon wrote:
           | All of Canada and every state north of Kentucky?
        
           | syspec wrote:
           | What about places that require massive amount of cooling in
           | the summer
        
         | Jiro wrote:
         | >I hope that physicist Dennis Whyte was being misquoted here.
         | 
         | Why? Because quantum leaps are small? The metaphor is not
         | comparing it to the size of the quantum leap; the metaphor is
         | that quantum leaps are _discontinuous_.
        
           | leephillips wrote:
           | I thought he also believed that the advances were of
           | significant size, but maybe I'm wrong and he did, in fact,
           | mean to admit that this recent, discontinuous progress was
           | minute.
        
         | kiba wrote:
         | If we are serious about ramping down the use of fossil fuels,
         | we should start with the eliminations of vehicles that we don't
         | need, such as cars.
         | 
         | In order to eliminate cars, however, it will require a drastic
         | readjustment of our urban planning policies. Land use policies
         | are what made cars viable and public transport unviable.
        
           | rindalir wrote:
           | I would also like to see a more walkable future, but I've
           | given up hope that such a big transition will happen within a
           | timeframe small enough to make a difference for things like
           | GHG emissions. I guess I've made my reluctant peace with a
           | rapid electrification of the world's vehicle fleet (which,
           | yes, isn't exactly clean either).
        
           | pengaru wrote:
           | How about instead we get rid of the people we don't need, so
           | _everyone_ driving cars involves a much smaller multiplier
           | and we can preserve a high quality of life without trashing
           | the place.
        
           | mlindner wrote:
           | > If we are serious about ramping down the use of fossil
           | fuels, we should start with the eliminations of vehicles that
           | we don't need, such as cars.
           | 
           | Whenever people state things like this it shows that this
           | person is out of touch with reality.
        
           | leephillips wrote:
           | I totally agree. But another big contributor to the over-use
           | of cars is the shared illusion that everyone has to "go to
           | work". I think the extended pandemic is contributing to
           | shattering that illusion.
        
             | nopenopenopeno wrote:
             | >I think the extended pandemic is contributing to
             | shattering that illusion.
             | 
             | Or, the opposite? How could you be so out of touch as to
             | think society did not depend on all the masses of people
             | who continued going to work continuing to go to work?
             | 
             | Realize these are the low wage workers who will be tasked
             | to pay for your carbon tax, and they won't blink an eye at
             | re-electing Trump, who in such a case would be the left
             | wing candidate regardless of his party affiliation.
        
             | rindalir wrote:
             | In 2017, only about 15% of vehicle trips in the US were
             | taken for commuting [1], the rest are for shopping/errands
             | (45%) and for socializing/recreation (the balance). So even
             | if we eliminate half the commute trips, we still have a
             | long way to go to reduce the miles traveled. [1]
             | https://www.bts.gov/statistical-products/surveys/national-
             | ho...
        
               | SantalBlush wrote:
               | >In 2017, only about 15% of vehicle trips in the US were
               | taken for commuting
               | 
               | This describes commuting as a percentage of total trips,
               | but it would be more useful to find the percentage of
               | total vehicle miles traveled. I imagine that would be
               | higher than 15%.
        
               | TheOtherHobbes wrote:
               | It's not the number of journeys, it's the duration and
               | consumption for each trip.
               | 
               | A daily 55 min commute - which is the average both-way
               | time - generates far more carbon than a daily 20 min trip
               | to the store and back.
        
               | leephillips wrote:
               | I thought it was more; thanks for the information.
               | Although 15%, or say half that after subtracting the
               | people who actually need to be physically at work, is
               | still significant. Also, note that 15% of miles will be
               | more, probably much more, than 15% of the pollution,
               | because those miles are the slowest ones that people
               | travel.
        
               | rindalir wrote:
               | I also thought it was more (I remember reading about 30%
               | in the early 2000's), so I was kinda surprised. I think
               | you are right that miles traveled will be higher, so from
               | an emissions perspective the decrease in commuting is
               | good news. From the perspective of cars being everywhere
               | and making environments unpleasant, as long as people
               | don't think twice about hoping in the car to go Starbucks
               | twice a day, we've got a huge problem.
        
               | leephillips wrote:
               | I grew up in NYC and don't regard cities, like Atlanta,
               | covered in highways, to be cities. I never understood why
               | places like this were built or how people enjoy living
               | there, but clearly some do.
        
               | Turing_Machine wrote:
               | Different strokes.
               | 
               | Other people don't understand why someone would pay
               | $4,000/month to live in an NYC apartment that would maybe
               | qualify as a large closet elsewhere.
        
               | leephillips wrote:
               | That they're willing to pay that should tell you
               | something!
        
               | fennecfoxen wrote:
               | The major premise of such a city is generally that you
               | own more space than you could ever get in New York.
        
               | bparsons wrote:
               | If you live somewhere that requires a long commute to
               | work (ie. an exurb) you are likely completely dependent
               | on a private vehicle for all other aspects of your
               | lifestyle.
               | 
               | Good transportation policy is actually good land use
               | policy, and good land use policy is great climate policy.
               | 
               | We don't need fusion reactors in space to stop climate
               | change. We need walkable neighborhoods, an international
               | carbon price and more trains.
               | 
               | The harmful fantasy being sold to the public is that we
               | can solve climate change while still having the vast
               | majority of people living in far flung suburbs and
               | driving a seven person truck 10km to go pick up a carton
               | of eggs.
        
           | mdp2021 wrote:
           | > _we don 't need_
           | 
           | It's not difficult to imagine a situation in which someone
           | does not /strictly/ need a car (it also seems urban life is
           | quite common these days). It should also be extremely easy to
           | imagine having a car as extremely beneficial.
           | 
           | (By the way: epidemics still being far from forgotten, it's
           | really odd to paint collective, "public" transport as
           | aproblematic.)
           | 
           | Now, to attack the problem, one could also (and in some
           | contexts primarily) hit house heating. There are voices
           | recommending heating limited to 16degC/61degF. The issue is
           | just about quality of life. Including enabling operations.
           | Hacker should be attentive on their instruments, since they
           | are instrument crafters.
           | 
           | Since the control of resources has always been linked to
           | their price (which is also equivalent to, or actually
           | including, an externality tax) - so given a clear alternative
           | -, I am not sure how the whole idea of "we will do without",
           | restricting "freedom" (in abstract terms, as a primary value
           | for constitutional decisors) and operation, came to be.
           | 
           | (Up to not seeing "the car" as a life changing revolution...
           | Reading just recently the first pages of a history text, the
           | car was immediately mentioned as "expanding the possibilities
           | for movement to unimaginable heights even for the richest of
           | fifty years before". It has always been very clearly a most
           | prominent gift of engineering, as if a third dotation of
           | natural limbs: it's odd to now read about it as
           | "negligible".)
        
             | kiba wrote:
             | _It 's not difficult to imagine a situation in which
             | someone does not /strictly/ need a car (it also seems urban
             | life is quite common these days). It should also be
             | extremely easy to imagine having a car as extremely
             | beneficial._
             | 
             | Interurban rails and other form of mass transit gained
             | prominence especially in the early 20th century. They were
             | eventually outcompeted by cars on a wide variety of
             | factors, including public support for funding of roads.
             | 
             | It's not too difficult to imagine freight traveling on
             | streetcar rails.
             | 
             |  _(Up to not seeing "the car" as a life changing
             | revolution... Reading just recently the first pages of a
             | history text, the car was immediately mentioned as
             | "expanding the possibilities for movement to unimaginable
             | heights even for the richest of fifty years before". It has
             | always been very clearly a most prominent gift of
             | engineering, as if a third dotation of natural limbs: it's
             | odd to now read about it as "negligible".)_
             | 
             | The car is simply not as viable without proper
             | infrastructure and implicit subsidies.
        
               | mdp2021 wrote:
               | > _It 's not too difficult to imagine freight traveling
               | on streetcar rails_
               | 
               | So? What do you mean, what is your conclusion from that?
               | 
               | You wrote that <<we don't need ... cars>>. I wrote that
               | you don't "need" (much) heating either, relevantly to
               | impact, but the impact on quality of life can be massive.
               | Try performing intellectual (reduced motion, in general)
               | activities in the cold. Try buying groceries without a
               | car when living in a very low density, non urbanized
               | area. Maybe you don't care about the advantages of a car:
               | to others they are vital.
               | 
               | > _The car is simply not as viable without proper
               | infrastructure and implicit subsidies_
               | 
               | So? What do you mean?
               | 
               | You dismissed the car as expendable, I noted that it has
               | been called an historical revolution with a massive
               | impact in the quality of one's life, for good.
        
               | toast0 wrote:
               | > The car is simply not as viable without proper
               | infrastructure and implicit subsidies.
               | 
               | Cars work fine on dirt paths. Not as good as on roads,
               | but they still work. Sure, it's tricky to go through a
               | forest, but otherwise they're ok.
        
       | tromp wrote:
       | 12ft.io works as advertized:
       | 
       | https://12ft.io/proxy?q=http://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/12/2...
        
       | maccam94 wrote:
       | There's not much new info here since the last time the project
       | was discussed. The first two comments here link to informative
       | videos about how the reactor works:
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24629828#24634733
       | 
       | News since then:
       | 
       | CFS has now raised $1.8B
       | 
       | They have demonstrated a full-size magnet with a field strength
       | of 20 Tesla
       | 
       | They have started construction on the new SPARC reactor facility.
        
       | ur-whale wrote:
       | https://archive.ph/FbH0D
        
       | anonuser123456 wrote:
       | Getting fusion to happen is the easy part.
       | 
       | Building a reactor that is economical is not so easy.
       | 
       | Fast neutrons, tritium management, corrosive molten salts,
       | beryllium supply constraints...whole lotta material science
       | problems you gotta work out at scale and on budget.
        
         | AtlasBarfed wrote:
         | WHich reminds me of LFTR:
         | 
         | http://transcriptvids.com/v/AHs2Ugxo7-8.html
         | 
         | Molten salts, vessel degradation, etc all need to be dealt with
         | there, but with a far clearer path for positive energy
         | production.
        
       | Animats wrote:
       | It's forward progress, but nowhere near being useful.
       | 
       | By "more energy out than they put in", they mean passing
       | "theoretical breakeven", generating more energy as heat than they
       | put in as electricity. Not converting that energy back to
       | electricity and making the thing self-powered. Brief periods of
       | theoretical breakeven have been achieved before.
       | 
       | Ahead lies "sustained theoretical breakeven" - the thing can be
       | kept running for a while. So far, other tokomak experiments have
       | achieved 70 seconds of plasma containment (Korea) and 120 seconds
       | (China). That's below ignition temperature, though. Then "self-
       | sustaining breakeven" - the thing can power itself. Then,
       | someday, "economic break-even" - it can pay for itself. Then,
       | maybe, useful power generation.
       | 
       | There's the problem of getting the energy out in some useful
       | form. This begins with the "first wall" problem of finding
       | something that can survive the conditions just outside the
       | magnetic field. Those conditions include huge numbers of
       | neutrons, which tend to split atoms in the first wall material
       | and cause unwanted transmutation. This causes radiation
       | embrittlement, which is not good for materials.
       | 
       | It's going to be a long haul.
        
         | david_draco wrote:
         | Sabine Hossenfelder essentially called the nuclear fusion PR a
         | fraud, because they do not report true (full-system)
         | efficiencies. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJ4W1g-6JiY
        
           | mlindner wrote:
           | She also overstated things and made things out to be worse
           | than they actually are. Getting to fusion plasma power
           | breakeven IS the hardest part. And it's always been so far
           | away, setting and talking about realistic goals is better
           | than trying to immediately jump to the far end goal.
           | 
           | This is the difference between ITER and projects like SPARC
           | though, they both plan to get fusion plasma power breakeven,
           | but ITER's design has zero hope of ever being economical.
        
             | leephillips wrote:
             | As I recall her point about the deceptive reporting of gain
             | figures was spot-on. It's something I'd observed throughout
             | the 20 years that I followed the field fairly closely,
             | being intermittently involved in several fusion-related
             | projects. Especially in inertial confinement, claims of
             | "break-even" are almost entirely devoid of meaning. So how,
             | exactly, do you think she overstated anything?
        
             | tsimionescu wrote:
             | Extracting useful energy from the plasma, and protecting
             | the reactor (magnets, control etc) from neutron bombardment
             | are also hugely difficult problems.
             | 
             | Not to mention, trying to fool public opinion about how far
             | away we are from any chance of a fusion power plant is
             | still ethically wrong. Let's not forget that even if ITER
             | achieves all of its goals and milestones, we will be able
             | to _start_ on the power extraction problem in 2030.
             | 
             | And let's also not forget that inertial confinement fusion,
             | while also being presented as a potential fusion power
             | plant concept, with great fanfare occasionally, is simply a
             | weapons research program with no imaginable way of
             | progressing to economical power generation.
        
               | gulikoza wrote:
               | How about space propulsion? Maybe I'm naive, but inertial
               | confinement fusion seems like a great candidate for a
               | space engine.
        
               | maccam94 wrote:
               | CFS's ARC reactor design will use a FLiBe molten salt
               | blanket to shield everything except the vacuum chamber
               | itself, which is a steel doughnut with 2cm thick walls.
               | They plan to build a proof of concept reactor by 2025
               | that will have net energy gain (Q > 10), and then a full
               | demo power plant by 2030. CFS believes they can move
               | faster than ITER because the newer stronger magnets that
               | they're using make smaller reactors viable. Smaller scale
               | means cheaper to build, which means a nimbler private
               | company can build it rather than a bureaucratic
               | international project.
        
         | maccam94 wrote:
         | Commonwealth Fusion Systems plans to hit Q>10 net energy gain
         | in their SPARC reactor in 2025, and then turn on a continuously
         | operating ARC power plant around 2030. They plan to use a steel
         | vacuum chamber which will need annual replacement. The rest of
         | the ARC reactor will be shielded by a FLiBe molten salt blanket
         | which will absorb neutrons and convert their energy into heat.
        
         | mlindner wrote:
         | IANANS (I Am Not A Nuclear Scientist)
         | 
         | > Brief periods of theoretical breakeven have been achieved
         | before.
         | 
         | Source? I'm not aware of any reactor that has done that.
         | 
         | > Ahead lies "sustained theoretical breakeven" - the thing can
         | be kept running for a while. So far, other tokomak experiments
         | have achieved 70 seconds of plasma containment (Korea) and 120
         | seconds (China). That's below ignition temperature, though.
         | 
         | Ignition temperature is not set just by the time you run it.
         | The larger you go the longer you need to run before you can get
         | to ignition. ITER will need something like 1000 seconds, but
         | SPARC will only need 10.
         | 
         | > Then, someday, "economic break-even" - it can pay for itself.
         | 
         | For ITER-like designs that's impossible because the massive
         | manufacturing cost.
         | 
         | > This begins with the "first wall" problem of finding
         | something that can survive the conditions just outside the
         | magnetic field. Those conditions include huge numbers of
         | neutrons, which tend to split atoms in the first wall material
         | and cause unwanted transmutation. This causes radiation
         | embrittlement, which is not good for materials.
         | 
         | Radiation embrittlement is only a problem for certain types of
         | materials. Some material types do not absorb neutrons at fusion
         | energies and simply pass them through. This is a complex
         | materials problems and you can't just use steel but there's
         | already many designs that people are experienced with for this
         | and it's well known because of the history of fision energy
         | research with neutrons.
        
           | pfdietz wrote:
           | All materials have problems with fusion neutrons. The
           | neutrons from DT fusion are sufficiently energetic to cause
           | (n,alpha) and (n,p) reactions, causing hydrogen and helium
           | gas to accumulate. Helium in particular is a problem, because
           | it collects into tiny very high pressure bubbles that rip the
           | material apart from the inside. Simple elastic scattering of
           | neutrons off the atoms cause them to scatter many atomic
           | diameters in the material, scrambling its crystalline
           | structure.
           | 
           | There are also just a few elements that do not produce
           | unacceptably long lived radioisotopes under fusion neutron
           | bombardment. This greatly limits the choice of elements from
           | which to make the reactor structure. Right now, the best
           | choice is RAFM steel, but it has a number of serious
           | drawbacks.
        
             | randmeerkat wrote:
             | What are the serious drawbacks?
        
           | Animats wrote:
           | _Brief periods of theoretical breakeven have been achieved
           | before...Source? I 'm not aware of any reactor that has done
           | that._
           | 
           | Not in a plasma reactor, yet. The laser Nuclear Ignition
           | Facility at Lawrence Livermore Labs claimed "scientific
           | breakeven" back in 2014.[1] That's the setup where they have
           | a huge building full of pulse lasers focused on one tiny
           | target.
           | 
           | This is breakeven for a very weak definition of breakeven:
           | "thermonuclear energy out" > "energy absorbed by the fuel
           | capsule". Not "> energy required to run the lasers." That's
           | for a _very_ brief period, nanoseconds. It 's taken Lawrence
           | Livermore 45 years of zapping tiny targets with big lasers to
           | get to this point.
           | 
           | This was being touted as a potential approach to fusion
           | energy back in the 1970s. It's not, really. It's mostly a way
           | to study bomb-type fusion without setting off H-bombs. It's
           | now part of "stockpile stewardship", keeping some people
           | working on fusion to prevent forgetting how to make H-bombs.
           | 
           | [1] http://www.hiper-laser.org/News%20and%20events/index.html
        
             | leephillips wrote:
             | And it's important to note that "energy absorbed by the
             | fuel capsule" is not measured; it means the absorbed energy
             | calculated by a model using a classified code that no one
             | outside the program is allowed to see.
        
         | danuker wrote:
         | > and cause unwanted transmutation
         | 
         | This is a syntagm I did not expect reading on Hacker News in a
         | comment about technology, but about a roleplaying game.
        
       | cletus wrote:
       | The article doesn't really go into detail about this (it's
       | mentioned in the video) but the key breakthrough they're
       | referring to is increasing the magnetic field strength from HTS
       | (high-temperature superconducting) magnets to 20 Tesla [1].
       | 
       | It's hard not to come away from reading any of this without
       | thinking what a huge boondoggle ITER was and is and there was
       | plenty of reason to think that before now.
       | 
       | A lot of talk here is given to net energy production. That is a
       | key milestone but it's not by itself sufficient for commercial
       | fusion power production.
       | 
       | Example: imagine a plant costs $10B and products 100MW of net
       | power. It has a lifespan of 30 years and requires $500m/year in
       | maintenance and staffing. That capital cost and operating costs
       | need to be amortized over the lifespan of the plant so even
       | though it's 100MW of net power production, those numbers simply
       | aren't commercially viable.
       | 
       | I applaud these efforts but I remain skeptical on when (if ever)
       | we'll have commercial fusion power production, for several
       | reasons:
       | 
       | 1. The issues of turbulence with a super-heated plasma;
       | 
       | 2. Power loss through neutrons; and
       | 
       | 3. Damage caused by neutron embrittlement of the reactor itself.
       | 
       | Personally I think solar is still the frontrunner for the first
       | renewable mass-scale power production method that will be cheaper
       | than fossil fuels and thus replace fossil fuel plants for
       | economic reasons.
       | 
       | I'm glad there are a bunch of commercial enterprises focused on
       | this. I hope at least some of them explore some of the
       | alternative forms of fusion (ie other than hydrogen). For
       | example: proton-Born fusion [2]. Aneutronic fusion would have
       | huge advantages.
       | 
       | [1]:
       | https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/energy/a37924936/wo...
       | 
       | [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aneutronic_fusion#Boron
        
         | maccam94 wrote:
         | Commonwealth Fusion Systems has addressed all of those issues:
         | 
         | 1. The higher field strength from the new HTS magnets
         | eliminates turbulence.
         | 
         | 2. The ARC reactor will use a FLiBe molten salt blanket to
         | capture energy from neutrons and breed tritium to be used in
         | the fusion reaction.
         | 
         | 3. The ARC reactor is designed to have a swappable 2cm thick
         | vacuum chamber, which is the component subjected to the most
         | neutron radiation (everything else is shielded by the molten
         | salt blanket). These chambers are expected to last a year, and
         | while they are moderately radioactive waste, the amount of
         | material is relatively small and they should become safe in the
         | order of a decade.
         | 
         | I highly recommend watching Dr. Whyte's talks on YouTube, he
         | discusses the challenges, design, and performance in an
         | approachable way. There's a timestamp index in the comments on
         | this video:
         | 
         | https://youtu.be/KkpqA8yG9T4
        
         | sandworm101 wrote:
         | And look at how much liquid helium is required for the cooling
         | plant. There isn't enough on the planet to build many reactors
         | like this.
         | 
         | https://www.iter.org/construction/cryoplant
         | 
         | >> In order to deliver the cooling fluids to the machine, a
         | large cooling plant has been built at ITER that ranks as the
         | most powerful single-platform cryoplant in the world.
        
           | luckylion wrote:
           | Isn't that to be expected during proof-of-concept builds?
           | Once you can show that it's actually possible, you can start
           | optimizing the process.
           | 
           | Fusion could be a super breakthrough, even if it never gets
           | super cheap and "we power the world by doing this one weird
           | trick and all we need is one building". Provides reliable
           | energy 24/7, is safe to use (as in no melt-down potential
           | that people would be scared about) and does neither produce
           | co2 nor blast coal dust particles all over the world.
           | 
           | I'm sure we could do the same with nuclear power, but it's
           | politically impossible in many countries, because the name
           | short-circuits people's minds.
        
             | tsimionescu wrote:
             | > Provides reliable energy 24/7, is safe to use (as in no
             | melt-down potential that people would be scared about) and
             | does neither produce co2 nor blast coal dust particles all
             | over the world.
             | 
             | None of this is really plausible for any fusion plant,
             | especially in the early phase. The first plants will likely
             | be plagued by expensive time consuming periodic
             | maintenance. They will be prone to catastrophic failures if
             | plasma containment fails, easily killing everyone in or
             | near the plant. They will be constantly spewing radioactive
             | tritium. They will require fission plants to produce new
             | tritium. They will require rare materials to create the
             | superconducting magnets and others.
        
               | luckylion wrote:
               | Sure, I'm not claiming that they'll be there next year
               | (or possibly ever). _If_ the predictions
               | /promises/whatever you might want to call it, hold true,
               | they'd be great, and it's not totally crazy like the
               | perpetual motion people.
               | 
               | If not, then we've spent a few billions and probably just
               | learned a lot of interesting stuff and improved a bunch
               | of scientific areas.
        
               | heavenlyblue wrote:
               | > They will be prone to catastrophic failures if plasma
               | containment fails, easily killing everyone in or near the
               | plant.
               | 
               | I think that is impossible because plasma isn't actually
               | that dense and if you turn off the magnets it immediately
               | stops being plasma.
        
               | sandworm101 wrote:
               | >> if plasma containment fails, easily killing everyone
               | in or near the plant.
               | 
               | That couldn't be further from the truth. "Magnetic
               | containment" doesn't mean the magnets are holding in the
               | reaction. The magnets are compressing/heating everything
               | to start and _sustain_ the reaction. Any containment
               | failure will cause the reaction to stop instantly.
               | Letting the plasma touch anything solid, any metal
               | /wood/ceramic, would be like throwing a bucket of ice
               | water on a burning candle.
               | 
               | The far more dangerous aspects of this project are the
               | same any any large industrial process: compressed gasses
               | in big tanks. High power electrical lines. Fire. Confined
               | spaces. Gas leaks resulting oxygen displacement. Normal
               | industrial only dangerous to those persons inside the
               | building. But I wouldn't want to have any metal fillings
               | too close to those magnets when they power up. At 20
               | teslas they might start moving though your head like a
               | bullet.
        
       | tekno45 wrote:
       | Does anyone know of non energy generation related things we've
       | learned doing this?
       | 
       | Seems like space research in the same way that just trying will
       | yield dividends.
        
         | redis_mlc wrote:
        
       | sandworm101 wrote:
       | >> known as ITER, which the United States and other countries are
       | building in southern France to generate 10 times more power than
       | it took to generate the fusion reaction.
       | 
       | ITER is a physics experiment, not dissimilar to the LHC. It is
       | not going to generate "power" but _energy_. The goal is to
       | provide a steady fusion reaction from which to then develop
       | potential technologies to turn that energy into usable
       | electricity. ITER is not a powerplant. It is a scientific
       | reactor.
       | 
       | https://www.iter.org/proj/inafewlines
       | 
       | >> ITER will be the first fusion device to produce net energy.
       | ITER will be the first fusion device to maintain fusion for long
       | periods of time. And ITER will be the first fusion device to test
       | the integrated technologies, materials, and physics regimes
       | necessary for the commercial production of fusion-based
       | electricity.
        
         | maccam94 wrote:
         | This article is not about ITER, it is discussing a new reactor
         | being built by an MIT spin-off company called Commonwealth
         | Fusion Systems. They plan to build a demo reactor by 2025, and
         | a full scale power plant by 2030.
        
       | _robbywashere wrote:
       | Is nuclear fusion this centuries perpetual motion machine?
        
         | rfrey wrote:
         | No. There is nothing similar to perpetual motion except that
         | both use the word "energy" a fair bit.
        
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