Nuclear "con" Fusion.

[Tantris]

I recommend that you watch the video and do some very simple maths. Current actual efficiencies (Q total)are around 10% (0.1). Based on current steam turbine efficiencies, you could hope to recover around 50% of the heat generated as electrical power. VERY, very simple maths indeed - 20-fold increase in efficiency to break even.

20-fold increase in efficiency due to scale-up alone!! Just to break even?

To get 50% more out than goes in would require an increase in efficiency of 30-fold. Even a 10% gain would require a 22-fold increase.

Fantasy

No fantasy. You'd realise that, and the flaws in your assumptions, if you had taken the time to do some proper reading on this subject, rather than relying on google & youtube videos.

 

[simon g]

Space Solar Power may well become a reality. 2 current ideas on how to transmit the power and, no, they don't involve long cables! Laser beam and microwave are favourites. Worth reading up about; could be a real game changer if this technology becomes real and practicable.

 

[a.palfreyman]

Yes remember all the hype in the 70s, JET project and all that. The problem with 'technological' solutions is that they always require new leaps that in themselves are very difficult. I'm much of the opinion that simpler answers are better. An interesting article here (https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sou...YQAQ&usg=AOvVaw3ih1fcpq6HI6h764QTbHcK&ampcf=1) about algae looks promising. This sort of thing is where investment should be put IME.

 

[Sue Pertwee-Tyr]

Space Solar Power may well become a reality. 2 current ideas on how to transmit the power and, no, they don't involve long cables! Laser beam and microwave are favourites. Worth reading up about; could be a real game changer if this technology becomes real and practicable.

Not sure I like the idea of megawatts of concentrated energy being beamed down from space, TBH. I wonder what happens if a jet flies through the power transmission beam, or the beam drifts off target and sprays a town with high-power microwaves? Not to mention the risk to wildlife - birds, esp flocks of migrating birds would seem likely to be vulnerable.

 

[gintonic]

I am building a fusion reactor in the garage. Large spheres of liquid lithium are on back order at Screwfix

 

[Sue Pertwee-Tyr]

I am building a fusion reactor in the garage. Large spheres of liquid lithium are on back order at Screwfix

Maybe try Tokamakro?

 

[cutting42]

I am building a fusion reactor in the garage. Large spheres of liquid lithium are on back order at Screwfix

I filled a few jerrycans with some a few weeks ago before the shortage, I am sure we can come to an arrangement ;-)

 

[Tantris]

This is a good summary of progress, current status of different approaches using ITER as a reference, the importance of new high temperature superconductor technology, with plausible power production projections that address some of the scepticism on this thread - the key point being that as Q-plasma approaches 2, Q-total begins to exceed 1. It's also candid about some of the principal challenges remaining;

 

[Rana]

They work fine for short distances but the voltage required to efficiently export power from Australia to the UK over copper would make things tricky.

Yes, fission plants may well get cheaper in the future. As long as people need to fuel them, service turbines etc and store the waste though, it's going to be difficult to compete with solar which plummeted 85% 2010-2020 and continues to fall.

I think nuclear is at its best providing baseload low carbon power - not competing with solar and wind. We may find out (hopefully not though!) that you can't put a price on electricity when wind and solar aren't able to provide sufficient juice to the grid. No-one I ask at work has been able to answer the mega battery bank "solution" question in terms of CI and LCOE impact so far.
By the way, nuclear fuel raw material is cheap at the moment, and even if it goes up a few multiples, it's still a minor part of the cost equation for a major reactor, although less so for a SMR.

 

[x21]

Simple. We use fission. With new MSR reactors this becomes even more safe. My country already has one of the largest nuclear power plants in the world. (Bruce nuclear generating station) in addition to Darlington and Pickering.

 

[nostromo]

This new HB11 company seems to have a great idea... side stepping many of fusions problems.

 

[Sue Pertwee-Tyr]

This new HB11 company seems to have a great idea... side stepping many of fusions problems.

Here's hoping. But I was struck by one comment, that the lab experiments are already producing results a billion times better than expected. Doesn't that raise a few questions about the science?

 

[nostromo]

Here's hoping. But I was struck by one comment, that the lab experiments are already producing results a billion times better than expected. Doesn't that raise a few questions about the science?

Yes it does.

But at the back of my mind while watching that video was 'Cold Fusion' not for ridiculing this idea, but I remember they used Boron rods as cathodes. Boron has an amazing ability to adsorb hydrogen gas....almost unbelievable amounts as I recall. Don't quote me but I recall or imagined so much that the atoms would be pushing into each other's diameters. I just wonder if in the HB11 reactor the high energy laser could just push the already highly dense hydrogen to fuse. In short perhaps Flieschman and Pons needed a powerful laser in those days. There was definitely a rather impressive strange reaction going in with 'cold fusion' that released a lot of stored energy. We all now know it wasn't fusion', but something...maybe... something wonderful can come from adsorbing hydrogen onto Boron after all.

I also love the fact that the HB11 idea produces He nuclei ... i.e positively charged ions which are an electric current ready to flow!

https://hb11.energy/