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At the risk of inciting a flame war that I might not be able to understand, is there any way to characterize current fusion projects against each other? For exa

At the risk of inciting a flame war that I might not be able to understand, is there any way to characterize current fusion projects against each other? For example, what can be said about the promise of ITER vs Wendelstein 7-x? Part of me realizes that there’s no such thing as a “failed” scientific experiment and that diversity of approaches is good. The other part of me thinks that a public and competitive spectacle would also be good.

dukoid 8y ago
ITER will be an actual tokamak fusion reactor producing energy. Wendelstein 7-X is a plasma containment experiment based on the stellarator design. There will be no fusion. Technology for magnetic enclosure was advanced significantly by both. In this regard, they profit from each other. Tokamak reactors require a pulsed operation mode. There is no way to sustain fusion for longer time. The Stellarators design allows continuous operation, putting less stress on the structure. The calculation of the winded enclosure structure is quite complex and it has only become possible to design and implement with sufficient precision recently. If I'd have to "bet" on a design, it would be Stellarator. If you understand German, listen to this podcast. You won't regret it: https://alternativlos.org/36/ https://alternativlos.org/36/
- DennisP 8y ago
  People keep saying Wendelstein won't do fusion but that's not the case. Currently the 7-X isn't doing fusion because they're using hydrogen. But they plan to use deuterium later, just like all the other fusion research reactors, and they'll get fusion reactions when they do. There's really no reason not to; you get more data and it's easy. People fuse deuterium in their garages with home-built fusors.
  - sterlind 8y ago
    Exactly! AFAICT, the trickiest unknown is maintaining plasma stability and not degrading the insides (and then, breaking even on power while doing so.) Wendelstein seems to be on track to steady-state operation; they've held plasma for 100s, and their graphite shielding seems to be delivering cleaner plasma streams. The design for the 7-X wasn't feasible until supercomputers got powerful enough. We know how to run those simulations; fusion should get more practical as computers get faster.
evdev 8y ago
A run down of the various options, from a pro-tokamak perspective: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0KuAx1COEk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0KuAx1COEk
- singularity2001 8y ago
  Thank you so much for the great video! Key takeaway: Thanks to progress in superconductive magnets, a new reactor type developed by the MIT called SPARC might likely become the first Fusion Reactor to achieve net energy output before 2030, producing 200MW in 1/65th the volume of the ITER design, at a fraction of the costs. All based on very solid physics with only littly uncertainty remaining. Wow. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPARC_(tokamak) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPARC_(tokamak) Also: all other designs don't even come close to fulfilling this promise.

dukoid 8y ago

ITER will be an actual tokamak fusion reactor producing energy. Wendelstein 7-X is a plasma containment experiment based on the stellarator design. There will be no fusion. Technology for magnetic enclosure was advanced significantly by both. In this regard, they profit from each other. Tokamak reactors require a pulsed operation mode. There is no way to sustain fusion for longer time. The Stellarators design allows continuous operation, putting less stress on the structure. The calculation of the winded enclosure structure is quite complex and it has only become possible to design and implement with sufficient precision recently. If I'd have to "bet" on a design, it would be Stellarator. If you understand German, listen to this podcast. You won't regret it: https://alternativlos.org/36/ https://alternativlos.org/36/

DennisP 8y ago
People keep saying Wendelstein won't do fusion but that's not the case. Currently the 7-X isn't doing fusion because they're using hydrogen. But they plan to use deuterium later, just like all the other fusion research reactors, and they'll get fusion reactions when they do. There's really no reason not to; you get more data and it's easy. People fuse deuterium in their garages with home-built fusors.
- sterlind 8y ago
  Exactly! AFAICT, the trickiest unknown is maintaining plasma stability and not degrading the insides (and then, breaking even on power while doing so.) Wendelstein seems to be on track to steady-state operation; they've held plasma for 100s, and their graphite shielding seems to be delivering cleaner plasma streams. The design for the 7-X wasn't feasible until supercomputers got powerful enough. We know how to run those simulations; fusion should get more practical as computers get faster.

evdev 8y ago

A run down of the various options, from a pro-tokamak perspective: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0KuAx1COEk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0KuAx1COEk

singularity2001 8y ago
Thank you so much for the great video! Key takeaway: Thanks to progress in superconductive magnets, a new reactor type developed by the MIT called SPARC might likely become the first Fusion Reactor to achieve net energy output before 2030, producing 200MW in 1/65th the volume of the ITER design, at a fraction of the costs. All based on very solid physics with only littly uncertainty remaining. Wow. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPARC_(tokamak) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPARC_(tokamak) Also: all other designs don't even come close to fulfilling this promise.