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U.S. physicists rally around plan to build fusion power plant
- ilaksh 6y agoHow much of the excess renewable energy is being wasted rather than stored? Maybe fuel generation like hydrogen or ethanol, or kinetic can help make nuclear less crucial?
- est31 6y agoRight now it's cheaper to deploy fossil fuels than using one of the more expensive storage technologies. Hopefully with time the price will come down though. Trends are quite promising.
- tomrod 6y agoYes, but my understanding is that this relative cheapness is in large part due to externalizing the environmental costs to future generations
- gibolt 6y agoDon't forget the literal Trillions of dollars big oil gets annually, just from the U.S. Take that away and the wells lose their competitiveness really quickly
- pjc50 6y agoVery little; the term to look for is "curtailment", and it happens a few days a year.
- pfdietz 6y agoIf you go to the real time price page for ERCOT, you'll see prices often go negative there. Not just a few times a year, either. http://www.ercot.com/content/cdr/contours/rtmLmp.html http://www.ercot.com/content/cdr/contours/rtmLmp.html Right as I post this there's a spot in NE Texas where the wholesale price of electricity is negative 6.275 cents per kWh. There's a good reason everyone gave up building nuclear power plants in Texas.
- throwaway316943 6y agoEthanol is wasteful, hydrogen is a beast to store, kinetic requires too many moving parts. If you want to store renewables you should turn them into methane, best storage volume, safe and proven hardware for storage, transportation and power generation. It’s even better if you can efficiently obtain atmospheric CO2 for the reaction, closes the loop. Honestly, fission is probably the best 0 carbon power technology though, it just blows everything out of the water. We’re almost recovered from the no nuke nonsense of the 60s and the rumblings of new power plant designs and companies are growing louder so there’s hope yet.
- pfdietz 6y agoStoring hydrogen underground is demonstrated, practical, and very cheap.
- ilaksh 6y ago> blows everything out of the water I guess that's kind of what I am afraid of. Plus the issue of waste storage.
- throwaway316943 6y agoTake a look at the actual volume of waste produced. It’s tiny even when not compared to the garbage we put into the atmosphere, mine tailings, oil spillage, etc. Nuclear fuel is highly compact and you only have to change it every 6 years, that’s about 16 changes in a century. What other fuel source can compete with that and have the same energy output. As for accidents and deaths just compare the numbers to any other power source. More people fall off ladders installing solar in a year than have died from nuclear accidents.
- tahoeskibum 6y agoI think that solar/wind + battery (e.g. Tesla Megapack) will make fusion irrelevant.
- est31 6y agoWon't batteries run into the Lithium problem? I heard somewhere that the global Lithium reserves allow us to convert the entire car fleet of humanity to electric, but not anything beyond that, certainly not allowing large scale battery deployments that would make a dent.
- Retric 6y agoThere’s more lithium in earths crust than Lead yet we mine ~50x as much lead. The only limitation on mining lithium is how concentrated is making it more or less expensive to extract. Currently raw Lithium is extremely cheap, it’s highly refined battery grade lithium that’s somewhat expensive. Rank 33: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abundance_of_elements_in_Earth%27s_crust https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abundance_of_elements_in_Earth...
- est31 6y agoAbundance in the crust is one thing, ability to mine it is another. That's why you need to look at reserves [0] instead of resources. And there are way more lead reserves (88 million tons in 2016 [1]) than lithium ones (17 million tons [2]). [0]: https://newpacificmetals.com/mining-101/mineral-estimates-reserves-vs-resources https://newpacificmetals.com/mining-101/mineral-estimates-re... [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead#On_Earth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead#On_Earth [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium#Reserves https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium#Reserves
- Retric 6y agoProven reserves are dependent on actual mining. “Worldwide lithium resources identified by USGS started to increase in 2017 owing to continuing exploration. Identified resources in 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2020 were 41, 47, 54, 62 and 80 million tonnes, respectively.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium#Reserves https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium#Reserves There is little to suggest this trend will suddenly stop unless we simply stop looking. Further, a 5x increase in lithium has minimal impact on the long term EV or grid storage economics. That’s a lot of wiggle room for more expensive extraction.
- Animats 6y agoThis is more like "Fusion physicists rally around plan to improve message asking for more money". It's not like there's a serious plan to build a power plant. Except at Lockheed's Skunk Works, which is quietly plugging away on their own.
- garmaine 6y agoThere's also Commonwealth Fusion and TAE, not to mention General Fusion (Canadian, but with American investors and a number of American employees).
- willis936 6y agoThe skunkworks program has no published details and what has been published has been put in the “been-there, tried that” category by physicists. The slunkworks program is little more than a way to funnel money.
- lambdatronics 6y agoIf you read between the lines, the private companies got their wish: a change in emphasis for the federal program toward doing the supporting work on nuclear materials science that (for example) Commonwealth Fusion has been suggesting. The other wishlist item is to build support for doing cost-share programs with industry to implement the larger facilities. If this gets traction, then the government wouldn't actually build the power plant, it would be more like NASA COTS where they help sponsor private companies that actually carry out the work. The INFUSE and ARPA-E fusion programs are tentative steps in this direction. Edit: BTW, rallying around an improved pitch is big deal for the federal fusion program. Budgets have generally been in decline ever since it peaked in the 70's, and for many years there was nothing much in terms of a vision for the next steps.
- wcarss 6y agoSerious question: how does an article like this get written without mentioning SPARC[1] once? They're hardly secretive, they're MIT's people, they're moving on a plan to get results in ~5 years, and they're talking about the same kind of things: tokamaks, better computer modeling, and easier to make higher temperature superconductors for stronger magnets. I'm just a layperson, I only know pop science level stuff here, but they seem clearly like the best game in town -- so, seriously, can a person in the physics world shed some light on why they aren't at least a small part of every article about fusion, but ITER is? 1 - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPARC_(tokamak) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPARC_(tokamak) (And, for those with an interest who still haven't seen Zach Hartwig's absolutely excellent 2017 talk: https://youtu.be/L0KuAx1COEk https://youtu.be/L0KuAx1COEk -- watch it!)
- free_rms 6y agoGod I wish we could Manhattan Project this shit. I'm a layman too but I get the impression that the theory is basically there and we just need to figure out the engineering. That's a solvable problem with lots of money and lots of teams. Are we going to wait until the sea level rises 20 feet and then say, geez, compared to the costs this imposed, fusion would have been easy?
- kortilla 6y agoFission is a solved engineering and science problem though and we’re still blocking it to let the sea levels rise. Point being, nobody actually cares about climate change enough to make hard decisions so a Manhattan style project is highly unlikely.
- orthecreedence 6y agoYes, I've been saying it over and over: raise the price of oil until gasoline et al are $20+/gallon. Then nuclear will be cheap. Why are we letting a silly thing like scarcity, supply, and demand dictate whether we self-destruct?
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- spo81rty 6y agoMeanwhile, reportedly China has already built one and is testing it now. So the USA is 20 years behind?
- hurrdurr2 6y agoThe timing on this announcement sure is interesting considering what you mentioned that china just accomplished.
- ampdepolymerase 6y agoBuilding one is not the same as getting useful power out of it.
- Lammy 6y agoYep, USA will make sure of that if Iran is any indication: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuxnet#Affected_countries https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuxnet#Affected_countries
- 535188B17C93743 6y agoSource?
- sam 6y agoI’m guessing you’re referring to HL-2M which indeed in testing. But that tokamak is not designed to generate electricity but rather to study long pulse durations (~5s) at reactor relevant temperatures.
- jmholla 6y agoAny articles you'd recommend on their work?
- thewileyone 6y agohttps://phys.org/news/2020-12-china-nuclear-powered-artificial-sun.html https://phys.org/news/2020-12-china-nuclear-powered-artifici... I'd say that China will have a fully functioning plant in 3-5 years.
- gameshot911 6y ago2040s? 20+ years from now!?! Too fuckin slow!! For all Musk's faults, he recognizes such timelines are untenable, and pushes people to do the 'impossible'.
- howardr 6y agoI read a letter in the Financial Times over the weekend... > Forty years ago, when studying for my engineering degree, I learnt a rule of thumb that said that nuclear fusion is always 20 years away. I was therefore reassured by the date given in the report (“Sites sought for Step change in energy supply”, December 3) for the Step nuclear fusion plant — 2040. (Edit: Unfortunately it’s behind a paywall but will include the link anyway https://www.ft.com/content/e5af6548-a3a9-451f-8f92-268679d5d7b1 https://www.ft.com/content/e5af6548-a3a9-451f-8f92-268679d5d...)
- garmaine 6y agoFor most of my life fusion has been perpetually 30 years away. Now it is only perpetually 20 years away. That's progress!
- gbh444g 6y agoSo the horizon is approaching us at a what? logarithmic scale? What can we infer from this about the topology of the planning surface?
- mchusma 6y agoBoth ITER is scheduled to be done and SPARC are trying to make net energy in 5 years. They probably won't hit those dates, but we aren't really talking about 20 years anymore. (I agree with several commenters on this thread that any project with a 20 years to completion timeline should be shelved for things with <10 year timelines).
- garmaine 6y agoThose are research plants, not regulatory approval for commercial designs. We're still at least 20+ years away.
- coliveira 6y agoThe big problem with fusion is the enormous costs associated with producing energy. I guess we need to generate large amounts of energy to justify the expenditures. Based on that, I believe that China is the only country that has both the money as well as the large-scale need to make fusion practical.
- fnord77 6y ago> to prepare to build a prototype power plant in the 2040s this doesn't seem terribly "ambitious"
- lambdatronics 6y agoI agree. However, it's better than not having any concrete plan at all, which was the case up to this point.
- pontifier 6y agoOk, say I've got a new design for a fusion reactor, but it takes me 5 years to convince anyone that it's worth investigating. Fusion power has been set back 5 years. Someone please help me evaluate my design. Please! http://www.DDPROfusion.com http://www.DDPROfusion.com
- jl6 6y agoI can’t evaluate your design but I can evaluate your messaging. You need to do something to distinguish yourself from cranks and scammers, like write it up in a paper and get it published - and stop referring to yourself in plural.
- alimw 6y agoNot sure about the plural thing? In my own field a paper using singular forms would really stand out. Why remind readers and reviewers that you are working alone in every single sentence? Genuinely interested to hear your reasons! This is an issue for the paper I am currently working on. Naturally I would prefer to use the singular where it is accurate, and if I were better established I would.
- jl6 6y agoThis answer explains nicely why the “editorial we” is OK in papers...: https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/2945/choice-of-personal-pronoun-in-single-author-papers%20/ https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/2945/choice-of-... Short version: because it can be read as “we, the author and the reader”. But the site above uses phrases like “we have been granted a patent”, which come across as somewhat dishonest, making it appear on first glance as though this is the work of a team, corporate body, or at least two collaborators (and two is a huge step up from one in terms of credibility of any idea). I’m not saying there was any dishonest intention on the part of this author - I’m just suggesting that radical transparency is a good technique for introducing an idea to a skeptical audience, in a domain which is very noisy with bad actors.
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- divbzero 6y agoAre at an inflection point for fusion power? With interest and funding for it finally gaining steam? I’ve noticed several announcements about independent efforts this past year [1–6] but not sure if (a) it’s always been this way or (b) my view is skewed by HN. [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21806334 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21806334 "General Fusion" [2]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23979608 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23979608 "ITER" [3]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24629828 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24629828 "SPARC" [4]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24986528 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24986528 "MAST Upgrade" [5]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25209666 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25209666 "NIF" [6]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25261068 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25261068 "KSTAR"
- lifeisstillgood 6y ago>>> b) my view is skewed by HN. Making us anti-fake news?? :-) However I also have the same impression, and HN is one of my leading indicators so it could well be coalescing.
- ashtonkem 6y agoWhy would HN be the indicator? I’m sure we all personally enjoy the ego boost of participating in such a “smart” forum, but let’s not get too ahead of ourselves here; the primary speciality that HN caters to are software engineers and startup people (usually both). There’s no particular reason to believe that HN would be a reliable indicator for such heady topics as fusion power other than “a bunch of curious nerds comment there”.
- lifeisstillgood 6y ago“a bunch of curious nerds comment there” beats well over 80% of new sources. Of course the Fusion Power discussion board that still uses PHP4 powered text boxes will be way better. Of course we must be aware of our "me,me,me" tendencies, its a good warning.
- wallwart 6y agoSerious question: what happens after? Will it literally be 'free energy'? And are we ready as a society to handle this properly? How do we ensure that this will benefit everyone and not create an enormous imbalance by itself? I guess the existing economics will be broken at some point if the cost of everything will be driven down in such a way. Are there any articles/works that explore this issue?
- lambdatronics 6y agoNo, the cost structure of fusion is going to be much like fission: the cost of building the reactor has to be spread over time (with interest). Even though the fuel is cheap, you are (in a financial sense) 'burning' the reactor, which is expensive and must be bought up front. We don't know for sure how it will work out, but none of the predictions I've seen show fusion producing dramatically lower cost of electricity.