Financial Times: US scientists boost clean power hopes with fusion energy breakthrough

[femmedem]

US scientists boost clean power hopes with fusion energy breakthrough
Net energy gain indicates technology could provide an abundant zero-carbon alternative to fossil fuels

US government scientists have made a breakthrough in the pursuit of limitless, zero-carbon power by achieving a net energy gain in a fusion reaction for the first time, according to three people with knowledge of preliminary results from a recent experiment.

Physicists have since the 1950s sought to harness the fusion reaction that powers the sun, but no group had been able to produce more energy from the reaction than it consumes — a milestone known as net energy gain or target gain, which would help prove the process could provide a reliable, abundant alternative to fossil fuels and conventional nuclear energy.

The federal Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, which uses a process called inertial confinement fusion that involves bombarding a tiny pellet of hydrogen plasma with the world’s biggest laser, had achieved net energy gain in a fusion experiment in the past two weeks, the people said.

Although many scientists believe fusion power stations are still decades away, the technology’s potential is hard to ignore. Fusion reactions emit no carbon, produce no long-lived radioactive waste and a small cup of the hydrogen fuel could theoretically power a house for hundreds of years.

More: https://www.ft.com/content/4b6f0fab-66ef-4e33-adec-cfc345589dc7

[Chainfire]

1. I can't help but to think back to my time in elementary school, when they told us that with

nuclear energy fueled power plants that were coming on line, that electricity would become too cheap to even meter. Times change, don't they? I have heard promises on fusion for most of my life as well. In a few months we will probably hear that the data on the new process was incorrect and that they actually did not net energy output.

The last really commercial fusion was in 1928 When Reese's cups were invented.

[femmedem]

2. I'm reading that there will be a press conference on Tuesday.

I'm no scientist so I'll be relying on the scientific community's reaction in order to understand just how big or not big this news is.

I do understand your skepticism.

[NNadir]

3. I am a scientist. Don't expect much. n/t.

[femmedem]

4. Thanks for chiming in. I was hoping you would.

Of course, I was hoping you'd say, "This is the breakthrough we've been waiting for!" so I could believe it.

If you're interested, here's a link to an unrolled twitter thread by Nick Hawke, the founder of First Light Fusion, Obviously not an unbiased source, but if you have time and interest I'd love to hear your take.

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1602018412422733825.html

[qazplm135]

5. Eh a breakthrough has to happen eventually

We aren't talking about something that's impossible, just really really hard.

A minor net energy gain is probably a small step, but it's not insignificant.

[hunter]

6. That's not true.

Building commercially viable fusion power plants may be impossible for reasons we don't yet understand.

It's research worth doing but we can't bet our biosphere or civilization on the promise of fusion power.

[qazplm135]

7. I see no reason that's true

No one is even proposing the latter so that's a straw man.

[hunter]

9. Nearly everyone is doing the later, so it's no "straw man."

Everywhere you go deluded people truly believe wind, solar, batteries, fusion power, and batteries are going to magically displace fossil fuels, in spite of solid evidence to the contrary.

It's just another flavor of climate change denial.

Meanwhile the fossil fuel industry is thriving.

These false hopes will destroy the natural environment as we know it and our civilization as well.

The thermodynamics of fusion are extremely complex. We simply don't know if commercial fusion power plants are possible or not.

It seems unlikely to me that it is, especially when you consider how rapidly the technologies of flight, electronics, rocketry, molecular genetics, and fission power progressed once the basic principles were established.

Mark Oliphant first demonstrated fusion reactions ninety years ago. In comparison to the other technologies mentioned above progress in fusion power has been excruciatingly slow. It's possible the physical reality of this universe is stacked against us. Our beliefs, our hard work, and our money won't change that.

[qazplm135]

10. So now you think

Work on alternative fuels, all alternative fuels is harmful to the climate because you don't think any of them will ever work? Lol

Ok, well let me go ahead and bow out of this crazy conversation.

[hunter]

11. I'll leave you with a happy thought:

It's possible these difficulties with fusion power prevent us from building cheap and largely fallout-free fusion bombs.

Humanity might no longer exist if just anyone could build a fusion bomb using little more than conventional explosives and magnets.

It's a fortunate thing that it takes a very difficult-to-build fission bomb to set off a hydrogen bomb. Maybe the universe did us a favor by making fusion so difficult.

We do know that commercial fission power plants work, and we know how to do it safely. Nuclear power is a well established seventy year old technology.

[hatrack]

8. I'll be delighted to rejoice when the process can produce MW outputs for weeks or months . . .

Until such time, I'll hold back.

By all means, let's continue to work the problem and see what's possible, but the amount of techno-salivation induced by this announcement seems to be way out of proportion to what was announced.