Fusion Power

[ReformedCharacter]

It means that produce the 2.1 MJ of optical energy used to initiate the fusion, about 500 MJ of electricity was required to power the lasers. The so-called "wall plug efficiency" of lasers can be very low.

OK. That's what I feared. If so, then this sounds even further away from being a source of "fusion power" than magnetic confinement!

Where did you get those number from, Lawrence Livermore? They aren't in the Telegraph article.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/dec/12/breakthrough-in-nuclear-fusion-could-mean-near-limitless-energy

RC

[odysseus2000]

Video of the official announcement of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory inertial fusion demonstration:

https://www.youtube.com/live/kegZe0gab50?feature=share

Starts around 30 minutes in.

There is the usual US politics everywhere & in the questions it is revealed that the wall plug power in is very many times the 2 Mega Watts of laser power.

In some sense it is a remarkable achievement and they do not shy away from making it known that this is for fusion weapon research & that any commercial reactor is decades away.

Regards,

[XFool]

There is the usual US politics everywhere & in the questions it is revealed that the wall plug power in is very many times the 2 Mega Watts of laser power.

It would be interesting to know how much "wall plug power" is used by JET, for comparison.

In some sense it is a remarkable achievement and they do not shy away from making it known that this is for fusion weapon research & that any commercial reactor is decades away.

Well, yes! That's what I thought...

[Bminusrob]

It would be interesting to know how much "wall plug power" is used by JET, for comparison.

I once visited JET at Culham. They are very conveniently located more or less next door to Didcot power station. However, they have a rather amusing toy which they use for energy storage. They have a very large lump of solid concrete, about two metres on diameter, and three metres wide, on an axle. They use electric power to spin the concrete incredibly fast, then when they need power for tests, they use the power stored in the rotating concrete to generate the electricity they need.

The person who showed us round gleefully told us that if the axle snapped when the concrete was spinning fast, the momentum of the concrete would take it as far as the centre of London.

Does anyone have a hacksaw?

[scotia]

It would be interesting to know how much "wall plug power" is used by JET, for comparison.

I once visited JET at Culham. They are very conveniently located more or less next door to Didcot power station. However, they have a rather amusing toy which they use for energy storage. They have a very large lump of solid concrete, about two metres on diameter, and three metres wide, on an axle. They use electric power to spin the concrete incredibly fast, then when they need power for tests, they use the power stored in the rotating concrete to generate the electricity they need.

The person who showed us round gleefully told us that if the axle snapped when the concrete was spinning fast, the momentum of the concrete would take it as far as the centre of London.

Does anyone have a hacksaw?

A paper on the flywheel generators at Culham
https://scientific-publications.ukaea.u ... PR1728.pdf
I think you can safely say that JET needs a lot of "wall plug power"

[scotia]

I think you can safely say that JET needs a lot of "wall plug power"

Scanning through the data, it appears that the highest fusion power output to the injected power input that JET achieved was 16MW out to 24MW in, however the "wall plug power" was around 500MW, peaking at 1000MW.

[odysseus2000]

Thinking about the result & the method of creating the heating & compression, by firing lasers into the area around the pellet & utilising the x-rays from these lasers, reminds me of the big discovery on the road to big bombs.

At one point, as I understand matters, the “super” required extreme cooling & compression, but they realised that in the initial fission component, a lot of the energy was in x-rays & that was enough to fuse the tritium, deuterium explosive, creating a mass of neutrons that split the surrounding uranium core releasing a huge amount of energy. In the by & by the us went from 20 kilo tonne to 20 mega tonne.

What they have created looks like an ideal tool to study the x-ray compression of fusion explosives.

It may be possible to do this in a commercial power plant but the obstacles are immense.

Regards,

[stewamax]

Fusion on a commercial scale may be mind-bogglingly difficult, but there is also an unbelievable commercial opportunity for the winners.

Remember when DNA was first sequenced and took bucket-loads of computer power, lab time and money?

And given a war and more-or-less unlimited US government $$, the building of the A-bomb and, not that much later, the H-bomb – only forty or so years from Einstein’s revelations?

Room-temperature superconductivity (albeit at high pressure) is almost there after 100 years: another big ££ opportunity in the wings for anyone who can scale it up at an acceptable price.

Not forgetting Nikola Tesla with AC polyphase generators and induction motors. Edison poo-pooed (he was a DC man) it but Westinghouse and Wall Street backed him. The result is today’s country-wide generation and power grids.

I am an optimist: if fusion can be done, and if there is sufficient money to be made, it will happen.

[JohnB]

I wish people (and the press) would understand the difference between energy and power. Energy is in Joules, power is Joules per second. So 3.6MJ can be provided by a 1kW wall socket in one hour. JET do not draw 500MW from Didcot power station.
A Joule is not a lot, so talking about MW and MWh makes more sense, and imagine that 1kW powers a house and the industry/transport needed to support it.

The requirements goals of fusion are

1) Temperatures of 100 million K -- done a long time ago
2) A certain plasma density so energy out > energy in -- just about done at NIF ignoring laser inefficiencies
3) Confinement times > 10 s before plasma destroys itself. -- 4 s done at JET, once you get to 10 its effectively forever

So the building blocks are in place, but the engineering challenges to convert the energy out (very high energy particles and radiation) to power the laser, and electromagnetic heating coils are huge. The big projects like ITER move very, very slowly, much more promising are "tabletop fusion" companies like https://www.tokamakenergy.co.uk using ex-JET scientists, who's cycle time for designs is a few years rather than a few decades. But we are still many design cycles away from commercial use.

[scotia]

I wish people (and the press) would understand the difference between energy and power. Energy is in Joules, power is Joules per second. So 3.6MJ can be provided by a 1kW wall socket in one hour. JET do not draw 500MW from Didcot power station.

Have a look at the reference I provided yesterday to the flywheel generators for JET at Culham. They each stored 2600MJ of energy. The pulses lasted a few seconds. So assuming a 10 second pulse, each could provide 260MW power. The paper also maintains that these supplemented the 575MW Grid supply. This figure is also quoted in Wiki.
From another source, https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1243/PIME_PROC_1986_200_013_02 it appears that the Flywheel Generators could peak at 400MW each for short periods.
So I think my quoted figures for the "wall plug power" of 500MW to 1000MW during the few-second pulse which peaked at 16MW fusion output power was in the correct ball park. Working in energy terms - if the comparison is carried out over the time period of the pulse, then the ratio will also be in the same ball park. But if you include energy expended during the run up and run down of the experiment, then clearly the ratio would be a lot worse.

[odysseus2000]

One of the problems with fusion is widely held & circulated belief that a Fusion reactor would be low cost to operate, clean & safe.

Every fusion energy grant proposal I have ever seen uses these belief somewhere, but creating a machine that can survive very high neutron fluxes, be maintainable & operate for say 20 years is in itself a huge challenge.

Then there will be disposal costs & the very radioactive materials will have to be kept safe, certainly for much less time than fission products, but long enough to be expensive.

As I understand most of the designs they are still fusion to steam which limits efficiency to circa 50% & one would not want the pressure vessel exploding or even developing cracks,

All of these things will make getting approval for prototype reactors very difficult & will introduce large overheads.

Fusion power will neither be inherently safe, low cost or clean.

I doubt whether any scientist working on the project has any interest in any thing but weapons research & one imagines that they will be testing & refining super computer models & it is well established that fusion bombs work, so the whole enterprise looks a little pointless, save for keeping all the scientists in jobs.

Regards,

[ursaminortaur]

One of the problems with fusion is widely held & circulated belief that a Fusion reactor would be low cost to operate, clean & safe.

Every fusion energy grant proposal I have ever seen uses these belief somewhere, but creating a machine that can survive very high neutron fluxes, be maintainable & operate for say 20 years is in itself a huge challenge.

Then there will be disposal costs & the very radioactive materials will have to be kept safe, certainly for much less time than fission products, but long enough to be expensive.

As I understand most of the designs they are still fusion to steam which limits efficiency to circa 50% & one would not want the pressure vessel exploding or even developing cracks,

All of these things will make getting approval for prototype reactors very difficult & will introduce large overheads.

Fusion power will neither be inherently safe, low cost or clean.

I doubt whether any scientist working on the project has any interest in any thing but weapons research & one imagines that they will be testing & refining super computer models & it is well established that fusion bombs work, so the whole enterprise looks a little pointless, save for keeping all the scientists in jobs.

Regards,

I'd think that the scientists involved would be much more interested in high energy plasma research and in the case of tokamak type reactors the control and manipulation of powerful magnetic fields rather than weapons research* since we already have working fusion bombs and it seems unlikely that research on fusion power stations would vastly improve or change their design.

* Though of course almost any advance in science could be perverted into weapons research so it's conceivable that improved control of magnetic fields and/or plasmas might eventually lead to new weapons of some sort. Maybe something similar to a light-sabre with a magnetically confined plasma beam ?

[odysseus2000]

ursaminotaur

I'd think that the scientists involved would be much more interested in high energy plasma research and in the case of tokamak type reactors the control and manipulation of powerful magnetic fields rather than weapons research* since we already have working fusion bombs and it seems unlikely that research on fusion power stations would vastly improve or change their design.

* Though of course almost any advance in science could be perverted into weapons research so it's conceivable that improved control of magnetic fields and/or plasmas might eventually lead to new weapons of some sort. Maybe something similar to a light-sabre with a magnetically confined plasma beam ?

US government scientists are well versed in Whitehouse changes of direction causing them to lose their jobs.

The commentary at the start of the video looked to be all about saying how vital this work was to national security & later on they dropped non subtle hints about the work needing new lasers etc. To me the whole thing was about more funding & continued support.

It was also interesting that most of these modern day mass killers were female. The arguments that if women were in charge the world would be peaceful & productive didn’t fit.

Plasma cuttters will cut all conductors & even the bottom of the market ones like mine will go through 10 mm mild steel. Whether one could make a light saber I don’t know, but if one did, a counter would be a conductive mist like a spray of water.

There are proposed long range versions of tasers were a charge is put on a suitable small vessel, a surround insulation keeps the projectile safe as it flies before shocking the victim. Whether they are practical I don’t know.

Regards,

[9873210]

* Though of course almost any advance in science could be perverted into weapons research so it's conceivable that improved control of magnetic fields and/or plasmas might eventually lead to new weapons of some sort. Maybe something similar to a light-sabre with a magnetically confined plasma beam ?

It's hard to call this a perversion. War and murder have been the driving force for technology since we started sharpening rocks. Even fields like agriculture and medicine were mostly viewed as how can I get more soldiers and how can them get back to killing faster.

[Lootman]

*Though of course almost any advance in science could be perverted into weapons research so it's conceivable that improved control of magnetic fields and/or plasmas might eventually lead to new weapons of some sort. Maybe something similar to a light-sabre with a magnetically confined plasma beam ?

It's hard to call this a perversion. War and murder have been the driving force for technology since we started sharpening rocks. Even fields like agriculture and medicine were mostly viewed as how can I get more soldiers and how can them get back to killing faster.

Mao understood this: "Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun".

[odysseus2000]

Neil deGrasse Tyson’s comments on the fusion discovery (circa 5 minutes):

https://youtu.be/lnsQ_9EIRTk

I have always had my doubts about whether Neil deGrasse Tyson presented something resembling reality or something geared towards what he thought would give the best reviews for him.

This interview removed all doubt. He makes a relentless series of super enthusiastic & positive comments that for anyone with any knowledge of this field bring on guffaws. For a leading physics educator & professional physicist to behave like this is imho inexcusable.

The most basic physics is what do you put in & what do you get out. As is the result showed that what you put in from the wall sockets is very many times the small gains that took expert analysis over a week to verify.

Regards,

[odysseus2000]

*Though of course almost any advance in science could be perverted into weapons research so it's conceivable that improved control of magnetic fields and/or plasmas might eventually lead to new weapons of some sort. Maybe something similar to a light-sabre with a magnetically confined plasma beam ?

It's hard to call this a perversion. War and murder have been the driving force for technology since we started sharpening rocks. Even fields like agriculture and medicine were mostly viewed as how can I get more soldiers and how can them get back to killing faster.

Mao understood this: "Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun".

This is a widely held & false view.

Fission grew out of a strong & powerful economy with sufficient resources to support the Manhattan project & then continue it to make hydrogen bombs.

Without all the tax $ we would never have developed nuclear weapons & that applies to almost all modern war technologies.

Mao sent all the educated Chinese out to the fields in his cultural revolution. Clearly being able to force people to do this was indicative of political power, but without all these educated folk contributing tax $ the Chinese economy did not prosper.

Regards,

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Discussion of politics is off-topic here. Please keep contributions on-topic for the Science board (chas49)

[XFool]

Despite the hype, we shouldn’t bank on nuclear fusion to save the world from climate catastrophe

The Guardian

Last week’s experiment in the US is promising, but it’s not a magic bullet for our energy needs

[Bhoddhisatva]

Interesting thread - my last employment focussed on materials and their properties and from long conversations with folk involved in current nuclear power plant and researchers into fusion, they all said materials and the limits of them were the biggest issue holding back fusion.

As Odysseus said, they’ve worked out how to do the temperature and are working on long term control of the plasma and it’s containment, but what do you use for the physical containment when over the long time, one said, almost every nucleus of whatever material used will be hit by neutrons generated?

They’ve considered methods for swapping wall panels out while sliding new ones in, or wacky ideas like molten metal running down the walls .., it’s not easy!

Sadly the old joke about commercial fusion being 50 years away, and has been for over 50 years, still holds true.

[mc2fool]

May be of interest to some (I won't be able to make it or watch it live, but may catchup on the recording, assuming they do so!)

The Tokamak Energy ST40 device
Friday, 24 March 2023, 16.00 - 17.00. In person at Imperial College, South Kensington, or online by Teams Livestream.
Speaker: Reza Mirfayzi, Head of particle diagnostics at Tokamak Energy

This talk will provide an overview of the ST40 plasma with reference to its recent 100M achievement. Here I discuss the Tokamak Energy ST40 device, and then we will dive into the diagnostics deployed around tokamak and which aided the 100M degree milestone measurements. This includes a brief discussion on the reactor operation.

https://www.imperial.ac.uk/events/160792/the-tokamak-energy-st40-device/

P.S. "recent" is actually a year ago. https://www.tokamakenergy.co.uk/2022/03/10/tokamak-energy-moves-closer-to-commercial-fusion/