4 ms·

At 45 min in, they mention that FLiBe is ideal, but NOT required. Any low-Z liquid would be acceptable: https://youtu.be/KkpqA8yG9T4 https://youtu.be/KkpqA8yG

• pfdietz 9y ago
  No, "any low Z liquid" is not acceptable. It absolutely must contain 6Li to breed tritium. And it's quite likely that strong neutron absorbers would not be acceptable unless they also made tritium. The beryllium serves as a neutron multiplier -- the 5th neutron has the lowest binding energy of any neutron in a stable nucleus -- so without it the neutronics will suffer. DT reactor concepts already have issues breeding enough tritium to overcome inevitable losses. Dismissing something as "an engineering problem" is typical of plasma physicists. Fission has only "engineering problems" and yet those are quite sufficient to render a technology uncompetitive.