4 ms·

I think energy storage, motors / accelerators and weapons would come first. A superconducting linear motor would probably also make for a great cannon.

ssijak 3y ago
shooting satellites to orbit with cannons
- dgoldstein0 3y ago
  Can this even work? Seems like air resistance would make applying all the force at ground level problematic - you'll have higher max Q and higher energy losses to air than if a conventional ticket delivered the same push over a longer period
DoingIsLearning 3y ago
If we are talking DARPA money, I think working out how to build IC sensors using this stuff would be much quicker to reach manufacturing then a large scale motor winding. I am sure defense folks would have a field day with new sensors with virtually no thermal noise.
dgoldstein0 3y ago
Yeah, you're probably right - fusion has a lot of hard problems to solve. But for it, cheaper superconductors could be the game changer we need. For these other things... We already have energy storage, motors, weapons etc. It's certainly reasonable to think we could build better ones but I'm more excited for fusion, as it has the ability to solve climate change and provide cheap electricity to the billions who don't yet have it at the same time, probably resulting in double digit economic growth in many places.
- coderenegade 3y ago
  I think that's reasonable, though I'm skeptical that fusion would solve climate change even if we perfected it tomorrow. It still has the issue of radioactive waste at end-of-plant-life since all of the critical parts are irradiated. It also doesn't solve the issue of chemical processes that release a good chunk of total CO2 emissions, and are largely independent of energy production. I think the thing solves our environmental issues is actually industrial electrolysis, because then it doesn't really matter what your power source is, you have a means of decarbonizing chemical processes, and an incentive to commoditize carbon. Essentially, waste would have value, because it's a cheap source of carbon that can be used with hydrogen to create methanol, dme, etc. Not to mention, hydrogen salt cavern storage is proven at scale for 4 decades now to the tune of 350GWhs or so, and it lets us decarbonize agriculture and cement production. I guess fusion might help make energy cheaper for these processes, but I don't really see that it matters if they're powered by fission or wind and solar. But if we can't get electrolysis cheap enough, then I don't see these processes being decarbonized until we're almost out of fossil fuels. My 2c, anyway.

ssijak 3y ago

shooting satellites to orbit with cannons

dgoldstein0 3y ago
Can this even work? Seems like air resistance would make applying all the force at ground level problematic - you'll have higher max Q and higher energy losses to air than if a conventional ticket delivered the same push over a longer period

DoingIsLearning 3y ago

If we are talking DARPA money, I think working out how to build IC sensors using this stuff would be much quicker to reach manufacturing then a large scale motor winding. I am sure defense folks would have a field day with new sensors with virtually no thermal noise.

dgoldstein0 3y ago

Yeah, you're probably right - fusion has a lot of hard problems to solve. But for it, cheaper superconductors could be the game changer we need. For these other things... We already have energy storage, motors, weapons etc. It's certainly reasonable to think we could build better ones but I'm more excited for fusion, as it has the ability to solve climate change and provide cheap electricity to the billions who don't yet have it at the same time, probably resulting in double digit economic growth in many places.

coderenegade 3y ago
I think that's reasonable, though I'm skeptical that fusion would solve climate change even if we perfected it tomorrow. It still has the issue of radioactive waste at end-of-plant-life since all of the critical parts are irradiated. It also doesn't solve the issue of chemical processes that release a good chunk of total CO2 emissions, and are largely independent of energy production. I think the thing solves our environmental issues is actually industrial electrolysis, because then it doesn't really matter what your power source is, you have a means of decarbonizing chemical processes, and an incentive to commoditize carbon. Essentially, waste would have value, because it's a cheap source of carbon that can be used with hydrogen to create methanol, dme, etc. Not to mention, hydrogen salt cavern storage is proven at scale for 4 decades now to the tune of 350GWhs or so, and it lets us decarbonize agriculture and cement production. I guess fusion might help make energy cheaper for these processes, but I don't really see that it matters if they're powered by fission or wind and solar. But if we can't get electrolysis cheap enough, then I don't see these processes being decarbonized until we're almost out of fossil fuels. My 2c, anyway.