5 ms·
At the moment it is very far for clear that fusion will be cost effective. The article says this about the fuel of fusion: "The fuel used to create fusion energ
by phicoh 5y ago
At the moment it is very far for clear that fusion will be cost effective. The article says this about the fuel of fusion: "The fuel used to create fusion energy comes from water, and “the Earth is full of water — it’s a nearly unlimited resource. [...]"
They forgot to say that it is not the H2O that comes out of your tap. The earth is especially not full of tritium.
- apendleton 5y agoThe plan is for them to breed their own tritium, though, so the consumables coming in the front door would just be deuterium and lithium, both of which (while less common than tap water) are not rare.
- eropple 5y agoMy understanding (and I am a layman) is that lithium isn't that accessibly common on Earth, and that we're doing a bang-up job of using as much of it as we can get our hands on already. Are there practical methods of extracting less accessible lithium that don't themselves have nasty side effects?
- apendleton 5y agoYeah, there have been rumblings about recovering it from seawater: https://electrek.co/2021/06/04/scientists-have-cost-effectively-harvested-lithium-from-seawater/ https://electrek.co/2021/06/04/scientists-have-cost-effectiv...
- dodobirdlord 5y agoThe amount of lithium required for these purposes is absolutely trivial.
- rory 5y agoThe fuel for fission comes from rocks. The Earth is full of rocks!
- pfdietz 5y agoThat's actually a reasonable argument if you have breeders. The U and Th in an average continental crustal rock will give that rock 20x the energy output of burning the same mass of coal.
- hutzlibu 5y agoIt's like saying the ocean is full of gold for anyone to pick up. It is. But not worth picking up with the very low concentration.
- baking 5y agoThe fuel is deuterium, lithium, and a smaller amount of beryllium or lead used as a neutron multiplier to assure a net positive tritium production. Yes, tritium is needed to start the reactor, but it can be replenished with lithium tritium breeding in the blanket. Deuterium is plentiful in tap water.