3 ms·

Fusion potentially solve a lot of the problems of renewables: 1. Can be built anywhere, not just where there's wind/sun/hydro. 2. Can provide baseload power b

Fusion potentially solve a lot of the problems of renewables: 1. Can be built anywhere, not just where there's wind/sun/hydro. 2. Can provide baseload power because the output can be controlled. Renewables (excepting hydro) require storage for baseload power. 3. Can be centralized which makes it more compatible with existing electrical grids.

epistasis 8y ago
So if we take existing natural gas plants, and ignore the emissions, they are identical. We've been ignoring emissions forever. So I don't see what is a "black swan" event at all about fusion. At best it's a drop in replacement for what we have now. But it looks to be immensely expensive, far more expensive than renewables plus batteries.
- mtgx 8y ago
  I tend to agree. What if solar plus batteries are actually another one of those black swans but one with a (very) slow fuse rather than a big bang breakthrough?!
  - candiodari 8y ago
    Solar plus batteries comes with 1) massive investment (at the moment at least) 2) enormous physical footprint, which needs to be solved either through reserving large amounts of space for it, or by having a large transmission grid and all the services required around that 3) lots of greenhouse emissions to produce 1 and 2 in the first place
    - epistasis 8y ago
      Neither of these are difficult to deal with. For battery costs, I posted this recently: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18808842 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18808842 Batteries are dropping in cost far faster than nearly anybody realizes, and people seem to think we're paying 8088 costs when we're up to pentium costs for computing. Space concerns are pretty minor, it really doesn't take much compared to current human land use. In addition to covering land that's already used by humans for parking or building, we will likely see more farm land that's currently producing things like soybeans or field corn converted to solar farms, and solar is more environmentally friendly to those ecosystems than the current farming practice. Neither of these have significant greenhouse emissions, and as the energy supply chain lessens its carbon use so will all the manufacturing and recycling.
      - candiodari 8y ago
        > Space concerns are pretty minor, it really doesn't take much compared to current human land use. Well, sure. But in absolute terms that's still a pretty large space which we can't just allocate near every city. By contrast, current power plants are the size of a large apartment block, which we can allocate, even inside the cities. And if we build that solar infrastructure away from cities where land is available and cheap, then we need to connect it and we need to build the grid to support that, which also isn't cheap, and has other problems.
        pfdietz 8y ago
        We can judge the importance of space concerns by cost. What fraction of solar/battery installs is the cost of land? Answer: it's pretty small in most of the world. In particular, land in desert regions is almost free.
- CptFribble 8y ago
  Natural gas plants are supplied by a network of hundreds of thousands of gas wells, each of which carries risk of groundwater contamination, and frequently noise/light/air pollution as well. Many gas wells impinge on residential property a little bit as well, in states where mineral rights are sold separately to "surface" property rights, like West Virginia. All of that is a non-issue with fusion, so it's not quite a drop-in replacement.
  - epistasis 8y ago
    Ok, so take away all those risks that you talk about. Is that a "black swan" type of improvement?
    - burgerboy 8y ago
      How dense are you to not see the benefits of a fusion reactor Jesus christ
- fgonzag 8y ago
  Gas plants require gas. That means drilling, processing, and transporting. Gas plants require huge amount of backing logistics to be able to operate. Nuclear plants use readily available resources in very small quantities, no pipelines, no supporting logistics. You can literally build one anywhere where there is an electrical grid, without logistical considerations.
  - epistasis 8y ago
    Fine, so eliminate those logistical considerations, what sort of big advantage is there? Turns out, about none. What new applications are opened up? What is now possible? Not much. And most fusion that I've heard does require massive processing to get enough input fuel, just read through all the technical discussions down below. Take a coal plant (or bigger), and remove the need for fuel and the emissions. What's the big benefit over what we have now? And I say this as somebody who views climate change and carbon emission as the biggest issue of our time. I just can't get the least bit excited about fusion. Solar, wind, and batteries will deliver, we know now that they will be cheap enough to outcompete gas and coal and everything within a decade or two. I maintain that the only thing that was ever promising about fusion was the potential for cheap electricity, the fabled "too cheap to meter" type of energy. However it's really clear now that fusion will never deliver that, unless there's also huge technology gains in direct conversion. And we've known this a long time. Go back and look at articles from 50 years ago, and you'll see different criticisms of fusion that still apply today. Today, we also have the decreasing cost of renewables + storage. In developing countries, we will likely see solar and storage built, without even needing that hugely expensive transmission grid. That's more of a black swan event than what fusion can hope to provide.
    - fgonzag 8y ago
      I guess our differing point of view comes mainly from the fact that I don't see energy storage solutions become viable in the near or medium future. I believe battery tech is progression slower than fusion. We will also need a clean baseline power solution, and AFAIK only fusion can give us that.

epistasis 8y ago

So if we take existing natural gas plants, and ignore the emissions, they are identical. We've been ignoring emissions forever. So I don't see what is a "black swan" event at all about fusion. At best it's a drop in replacement for what we have now. But it looks to be immensely expensive, far more expensive than renewables plus batteries.

mtgx 8y ago
I tend to agree. What if solar plus batteries are actually another one of those black swans but one with a (very) slow fuse rather than a big bang breakthrough?!
- candiodari 8y ago
  Solar plus batteries comes with 1) massive investment (at the moment at least) 2) enormous physical footprint, which needs to be solved either through reserving large amounts of space for it, or by having a large transmission grid and all the services required around that 3) lots of greenhouse emissions to produce 1 and 2 in the first place
  - epistasis 8y ago
    Neither of these are difficult to deal with. For battery costs, I posted this recently: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18808842 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18808842 Batteries are dropping in cost far faster than nearly anybody realizes, and people seem to think we're paying 8088 costs when we're up to pentium costs for computing. Space concerns are pretty minor, it really doesn't take much compared to current human land use. In addition to covering land that's already used by humans for parking or building, we will likely see more farm land that's currently producing things like soybeans or field corn converted to solar farms, and solar is more environmentally friendly to those ecosystems than the current farming practice. Neither of these have significant greenhouse emissions, and as the energy supply chain lessens its carbon use so will all the manufacturing and recycling.
    - candiodari 8y ago
      > Space concerns are pretty minor, it really doesn't take much compared to current human land use. Well, sure. But in absolute terms that's still a pretty large space which we can't just allocate near every city. By contrast, current power plants are the size of a large apartment block, which we can allocate, even inside the cities. And if we build that solar infrastructure away from cities where land is available and cheap, then we need to connect it and we need to build the grid to support that, which also isn't cheap, and has other problems.
      - pfdietz 8y ago
        We can judge the importance of space concerns by cost. What fraction of solar/battery installs is the cost of land? Answer: it's pretty small in most of the world. In particular, land in desert regions is almost free.
CptFribble 8y ago
Natural gas plants are supplied by a network of hundreds of thousands of gas wells, each of which carries risk of groundwater contamination, and frequently noise/light/air pollution as well. Many gas wells impinge on residential property a little bit as well, in states where mineral rights are sold separately to "surface" property rights, like West Virginia. All of that is a non-issue with fusion, so it's not quite a drop-in replacement.
- epistasis 8y ago
  Ok, so take away all those risks that you talk about. Is that a "black swan" type of improvement?
  - burgerboy 8y ago
    How dense are you to not see the benefits of a fusion reactor Jesus christ
fgonzag 8y ago
Gas plants require gas. That means drilling, processing, and transporting. Gas plants require huge amount of backing logistics to be able to operate. Nuclear plants use readily available resources in very small quantities, no pipelines, no supporting logistics. You can literally build one anywhere where there is an electrical grid, without logistical considerations.
- epistasis 8y ago
  Fine, so eliminate those logistical considerations, what sort of big advantage is there? Turns out, about none. What new applications are opened up? What is now possible? Not much. And most fusion that I've heard does require massive processing to get enough input fuel, just read through all the technical discussions down below. Take a coal plant (or bigger), and remove the need for fuel and the emissions. What's the big benefit over what we have now? And I say this as somebody who views climate change and carbon emission as the biggest issue of our time. I just can't get the least bit excited about fusion. Solar, wind, and batteries will deliver, we know now that they will be cheap enough to outcompete gas and coal and everything within a decade or two. I maintain that the only thing that was ever promising about fusion was the potential for cheap electricity, the fabled "too cheap to meter" type of energy. However it's really clear now that fusion will never deliver that, unless there's also huge technology gains in direct conversion. And we've known this a long time. Go back and look at articles from 50 years ago, and you'll see different criticisms of fusion that still apply today. Today, we also have the decreasing cost of renewables + storage. In developing countries, we will likely see solar and storage built, without even needing that hugely expensive transmission grid. That's more of a black swan event than what fusion can hope to provide.
  - fgonzag 8y ago
    I guess our differing point of view comes mainly from the fact that I don't see energy storage solutions become viable in the near or medium future. I believe battery tech is progression slower than fusion. We will also need a clean baseline power solution, and AFAIK only fusion can give us that.