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We are researching fusion technology. It would take a reactor many times larger to get more energy out of the facility than you put in. The technology still nee

We are researching fusion technology. It would take a reactor many times larger to get more energy out of the facility than you put in. The technology still needs to mature before a reactor that size would be financially responsible.

aeyes 3y ago
In the German Alternativlos podcast the Wendelstein team (Prof. Dr. Thomas Klinger, Dr. Adrian von Stechow) recently stated that it is already feasible, they estimate a cost of ~€20B and a 5 year construction time for a commercial fusion power plant if we started now. https://alternativlos.org/51/ https://alternativlos.org/51/
- KyleBerezin 3y ago
  Yea, but compare the financial burden of that compared to a solar farm of the same output. Not to mention the technical risk.
  - fizigura 3y ago
    Solar farms on farmland? That won't scale to the energy needs of 8bn+ people if we still want to keep feeding them. Especially a non-vegetarian diet.
    - KyleBerezin 3y ago
      I'm just saying the money doesn't back the idea yet. I'm not anti-fusion.
    - bmicraft 3y ago
      No, solar farms in the desert with a HVDC lines obviously.
      - angiosperm 3y ago
        The desert is the worst place to put a solar farm. Hot, dusty, far away.
    - pfdietz 3y ago
      Where did he say on farmland?
      - fizigura 3y ago
        Well, most land is either farmland, forest or desert. Forest is out of the question for any solar installations unless you want to cut down the trees. Desert is not easily accessible for most parts of the world and provides terrible conditions for solar cells that have sharply declining efficiency with heat and don't like dust. Leaves farmland, if you want to do this kind of thing at any sort of required scale. (Sure you can put solar cells on barn roofs, but the premise was scale magnitudes beyond that.)
    - angiosperm 3y ago
      Hint: solar on farmland does not interfere with use as farmland. Look up agrivoltaics. Solar on pasture is even easier, and protects livestock from weather extremes.
      - fizigura 3y ago
        Farmland is literally converting solar energy into sugars. It's natures solar plants. Sure, you can get a bit of shade for your cattle. But the hundreds of millions of acres used for crops are directly competing for sunlight with your solar cells.
        angiosperm 3y ago
        You imagine that is so, but the science says otherwise. In fact, most plants can only use sunlight for a few hours a day, and must then endure the heat for the rest of the day. A few crops -- wheat, corn -- offer slightly reduced yields when shaded, but many others -- particularly peppers -- yield better with partial shade. Even where yield is reduced, the extra year-round revenue and radically reduced water loss may even the score.
- t0mas88 3y ago
  For less than 15 billion euro you could buy enough solar to power a country the size of the Netherlands. With 5 billion to spend on batteries you might even make it through night time usage. Or in other words: Fusion is too expensive at this point to be useful.
  - jahnu 3y ago
    That seems amazingly cheap! Are we really down to that low level of cost?
    - sp332 3y ago
      Grid-scale solar is $33/MWh (+) https://emp.lbl.gov/publications/utility-scale-solar-2022-edition https://emp.lbl.gov/publications/utility-scale-solar-2022-ed... and the Netherlands uses 1,000,000,000 MWh/year https://ourworldindata.org/energy/country/netherlands https://ourworldindata.org/energy/country/netherlands so it's only off by a factor of ~2. (+) These numbers are for the USA. I found a mention of a cheaper project in Chile https://about.bnef.com/blog/cost-of-new-renewables-temporarily-rises-as-inflation-starts-to-bite/ https://about.bnef.com/blog/cost-of-new-renewables-temporari... but I don't know what the situation is in Europe. And wind might be even lower.
      - aeyes 3y ago
        Chile is an outlier, the plants are in remote locations in the Atacama desert where you have two compelling reasons to build solar plants: There is a lot of space where nobody lives and the sun is always shining. There are mountains but there are also lots of places which are flat for as far as the eye can see, an example would be the Cerro Dominador plant which probably didn't require any ground preparation. On http://generadoras.cl/tipos-energia/energia-solar http://generadoras.cl/tipos-energia/energia-solar scroll down to "Capacidad por región", Antofagasta and Atacama are the desert regions in the with over 90% of installed capacity. In Germany or the Netherlands it is a bit harder to find space for large solar plants.
        3y ago

aeyes 3y ago

In the German Alternativlos podcast the Wendelstein team (Prof. Dr. Thomas Klinger, Dr. Adrian von Stechow) recently stated that it is already feasible, they estimate a cost of ~€20B and a 5 year construction time for a commercial fusion power plant if we started now. https://alternativlos.org/51/ https://alternativlos.org/51/

KyleBerezin 3y ago
Yea, but compare the financial burden of that compared to a solar farm of the same output. Not to mention the technical risk.
- fizigura 3y ago
  Solar farms on farmland? That won't scale to the energy needs of 8bn+ people if we still want to keep feeding them. Especially a non-vegetarian diet.
  - KyleBerezin 3y ago
    I'm just saying the money doesn't back the idea yet. I'm not anti-fusion.
  - bmicraft 3y ago
    No, solar farms in the desert with a HVDC lines obviously.
    - angiosperm 3y ago
      The desert is the worst place to put a solar farm. Hot, dusty, far away.
  - pfdietz 3y ago
    Where did he say on farmland?
    - fizigura 3y ago
      Well, most land is either farmland, forest or desert. Forest is out of the question for any solar installations unless you want to cut down the trees. Desert is not easily accessible for most parts of the world and provides terrible conditions for solar cells that have sharply declining efficiency with heat and don't like dust. Leaves farmland, if you want to do this kind of thing at any sort of required scale. (Sure you can put solar cells on barn roofs, but the premise was scale magnitudes beyond that.)
  - angiosperm 3y ago
    Hint: solar on farmland does not interfere with use as farmland. Look up agrivoltaics. Solar on pasture is even easier, and protects livestock from weather extremes.
    - fizigura 3y ago
      Farmland is literally converting solar energy into sugars. It's natures solar plants. Sure, you can get a bit of shade for your cattle. But the hundreds of millions of acres used for crops are directly competing for sunlight with your solar cells.
      - angiosperm 3y ago
        You imagine that is so, but the science says otherwise. In fact, most plants can only use sunlight for a few hours a day, and must then endure the heat for the rest of the day. A few crops -- wheat, corn -- offer slightly reduced yields when shaded, but many others -- particularly peppers -- yield better with partial shade. Even where yield is reduced, the extra year-round revenue and radically reduced water loss may even the score.
t0mas88 3y ago
For less than 15 billion euro you could buy enough solar to power a country the size of the Netherlands. With 5 billion to spend on batteries you might even make it through night time usage. Or in other words: Fusion is too expensive at this point to be useful.
- jahnu 3y ago
  That seems amazingly cheap! Are we really down to that low level of cost?
  - sp332 3y ago
    Grid-scale solar is $33/MWh (+) https://emp.lbl.gov/publications/utility-scale-solar-2022-edition https://emp.lbl.gov/publications/utility-scale-solar-2022-ed... and the Netherlands uses 1,000,000,000 MWh/year https://ourworldindata.org/energy/country/netherlands https://ourworldindata.org/energy/country/netherlands so it's only off by a factor of ~2. (+) These numbers are for the USA. I found a mention of a cheaper project in Chile https://about.bnef.com/blog/cost-of-new-renewables-temporarily-rises-as-inflation-starts-to-bite/ https://about.bnef.com/blog/cost-of-new-renewables-temporari... but I don't know what the situation is in Europe. And wind might be even lower.
    - aeyes 3y ago
      Chile is an outlier, the plants are in remote locations in the Atacama desert where you have two compelling reasons to build solar plants: There is a lot of space where nobody lives and the sun is always shining. There are mountains but there are also lots of places which are flat for as far as the eye can see, an example would be the Cerro Dominador plant which probably didn't require any ground preparation. On http://generadoras.cl/tipos-energia/energia-solar http://generadoras.cl/tipos-energia/energia-solar scroll down to "Capacidad por región", Antofagasta and Atacama are the desert regions in the with over 90% of installed capacity. In Germany or the Netherlands it is a bit harder to find space for large solar plants.
      - 3y ago