Edited to add source Im not an expert but someone pointed out yesterday [0] that this technology is a bit further from practical than implied by the article. T

Edited to add source Im not an expert but someone pointed out yesterday [0] that this technology is a bit further from practical than implied by the article. This milestone of ‘ignition’ is declared because the laser energy making it into the fusion fuel is less than the energy produced by the fusion fuel. But this is ignoring the fact that there is significant (85% if I remember correctly?) loss of energy as the laser travels through the housing around the fuel. And even more importantly, the laser itself is very inefficient and loses something like 99% of the energy that it pulls from wall power. So even in lab conditions, we need to produce several times more energy to even call it ‘ignition’. And this is not mentioning the many and difficult issues with scaling from lab scar to real-world power plant scale. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28213763 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28213763