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That's kinda not what people like Whyte at MIT say. They make the case that the scale of a complex device is the cause of an exponential increase in costs - bot
by sgt101 6y ago
That's kinda not what people like Whyte at MIT say. They make the case that the scale of a complex device is the cause of an exponential increase in costs - both capital and operational. For example removing delicate low level radioactive magnates for servicing is easy if they weigh a kilo, a pain if they weigh 200 kilos, a big undertaking if they weigh 1000k and harder and harder and harder the larger they get.
You can see the cost increase with fission reactors - a full on big reactor like sizewell C is slated at £8bn.
- Retric 6y agoIf it’s radioactive enough to be a safety hazard then you need remote handling equipment either way. Further, we aren’t talking 1/200th the size, a ~1GW reactor can only be so small because the amount of heat being transferred. That said, ITER is a very old design based on outdated limitations. But, again the goal is research not low cost power generation, a stable design is more important to them than an efficient design because the secondary equipment is so critical.
- aaronblohowiak 6y agoTime is more important than cost wrt fission development and global warming
- Retric 6y agoBased on data we have, fusion seems unlikely to be economically viable for a long time even if it’s technically viable. Various advancements like better superconductors might change the situation, but without that there seems to be little hurry needed. At least after talking with people in the field the reactor design seems like the least important problem.