4 ms·
-> As the plasma expands, it pushes back on the magnetic field. By Faraday's law, the change in field induces current, which is directly recaptured as electrici
by engineer_22 4y ago
-> As the plasma expands, it pushes back on the magnetic field. By Faraday's law, the change in field induces current, which is directly recaptured as electricity. This clean fusion electricity is used to power homes and communities, efficiently and affordably.
Charging without wires! /s
Where does the thermal power go?
- thatcherc 4y agoThermal power goes into the expansion of the plasma I'd figure, just like the hot gases in an internal combustion engine cylinder. Only here the work is done against a magnetic field instead of a piston.
- engineer_22 4y agoI wish I understood this better. Isn't it the opposite, it requires work to contain the plasma? The hotter it gets the more work it takes to contain?
- DennisP 4y agoHelion uses a series of pulses, just like an ICE.
- zamalek 4y ago> Only here the work is done against a magnetic field instead of a piston. I understand the theory behind this, but when it is used in an analogy like this it really blows my mind.
- thinkcontext 4y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aneutronic_fusion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aneutronic_fusion
- engineer_22 4y agohttps://sci-hub.se/https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0029-5515/13/4/006 https://sci-hub.se/https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.108... Here's a paper that explains it better than the wikipedia
- thinkcontext 4y agoSeems unlikely to me that they will read that over a high level summary.
- engineer_22 4y agowhy?
- Animats 4y agoThis seems to be a magnetohydrodynamic generator. Shoot a charged plasma through a coil and get electricity out. Experimental MHD plants have been built for fossil fuels.[1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetohydrodynamic_generator https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetohydrodynamic_generator
- trhway 4y agoMHD have pretty low efficiency (otherwise the world wouldn't have bothered with turbines, pistons/crankshafts, etc.). They claim 95% recovery. That is amazing. That would in particular seem to imply that the radiative/thermal losses less than 5%, which is very strange (classic thermal radiative power is 4th power of temperature and add bremsstrahlung to that). You'd usually need high density (or size sometimes can do for it) for the radiation/thermal to not escape much. They seem to have demonstrated efficient recovery at conditions far from the real fusion where such radiative losses would be expected to grow disproportionally.
- Animats 4y agoAccording to Wikipedia, there's an inherent limit on MHD generators due to plasma instability. That's also the problem with most fusion systems, where everybody struggles to maintain a stable plasma for seconds. The idea behind this Helion thing seems to be to run in pulsed mode, so long term stability isn't required. Pulsed fusion systems have been around for a while. There's another startup, First Light Fusion, also claiming to have a commercial energy source Real Soon Now.[1] People have been claiming that for pulsed fusion since at least 1971, when laser confinement was a big thing. [1] https://firstlightfusion.com/ https://firstlightfusion.com/
- trhway 4y agoI personally believe that the pulsed/inertial would be the fusion, be it energy generation or space engine (after all the only net positive artificial fusion device so far - thermonuclear bomb - is "pulsed", and so we have only a matter of engineering to scale it down :). My bet though would be on something like Sandia Z-machine or on laser (as we've had remarkable laser efficiency improvements) as they clearly create fusion conditions (and much closer to the bomb confinement wise) and burn significant amounts of fuel (thus allowing for typical established ways of energy generation) than for example Helion where the plasma clouds don't carry much fuel and thus can't produce significant amounts of energy.
- jxy 4y agoAt least we know it's not written by and for engineers or scientists, but let's be polite and just call it BS. There is so much things need to happen between plasma expanding and consumer electricity in the copper wire. > Helion now needs to figure out how to engineer machines that don’t break This is actually honest. It encompasses all the past, current, and future researches. The rest doesn't matter as much. Wish them the best.
- hef19898 4y agoThe thermal energy is used to power Sam's eyeball scanning crypto orbs, obviously.