Big Announcement Tomorrow: U.S. To Announce Fusion Energy ‘Breakthrough’

[g5000]

U.S. to announce fusion energy ‘breakthrough’​

​

The Department of Energy plans to announce Tuesday that scientists have been able for the first time to produce a fusion reaction that creates a net energy gain — a major milestone in the decades-long, multibillion-dollar quest to develop a technology that provides unlimited, cheap, clean power.
[snip]
Creating the net energy gain required engagement of one of the largest lasers in the world, and the resources needed to recreate the reaction on the scale required to make fusion practical for energy production are immense. More importantly, engineers have yet to develop machinery capable of affordably turning that reaction into electricity that can be practically deployed to the power grid.

Building devices that are large enough to create fusion power at scale, scientists say, would require materials that are extraordinarily difficult to produce. At the same time, the reaction creates neutrons that put a tremendous amount of stress on the equipment creating it, such that it can get destroyed in the process.

[snip]

“There is going to be great pride that this is something that happened in the United States,” said David Edelman, who leads policy and global affairs at TAE, a large private fusion energy company. “This is a very important milestone on the road toward fusion energy.”

It comes as the Biden administration is prioritizing fusion energy research in its climate and energy agenda. The projects are among the front of the line for the tens of billions of dollars in subsidies and grants authorized through the major climate package Biden signed over the summer, called the Inflation Reduction Act.
Over the past several decades, the United States, Russia and various European nations have allocated billions in government dollars trying to master the science, believing that if they could, it would be a boon for the world.


I hope I live to see the day nuclear fusion becomes a viable source of electricity. We are going to need all the power we can muster to desalinate water from the ocean. The world is running out of potable water and this is going to be the single biggest struggle in the near future.

 

[Carl in Michigan]

I hope I live to see the day nuclear fusion becomes a viable source of electricity. We are going to need all the power we can muster to desalinate water from the ocean. The world is running out of potable water and this is going to be the single biggest struggle in the near future

Water never goes away It's an eternal cycle

 

[g5000]

Water never goes away It's an eternal cycle

I guess you have been living in a cave and have not seen all the reports of potable water becoming more and more scarce.

 

[marvin martian]

U.S. to announce fusion energy ‘breakthrough’​

​

The Department of Energy plans to announce Tuesday that scientists have been able for the first time to produce a fusion reaction that creates a net energy gain — a major milestone in the decades-long, multibillion-dollar quest to develop a technology that provides unlimited, cheap, clean power.
[snip]
Creating the net energy gain required engagement of one of the largest lasers in the world, and the resources needed to recreate the reaction on the scale required to make fusion practical for energy production are immense. More importantly, engineers have yet to develop machinery capable of affordably turning that reaction into electricity that can be practically deployed to the power grid.

Building devices that are large enough to create fusion power at scale, scientists say, would require materials that are extraordinarily difficult to produce. At the same time, the reaction creates neutrons that put a tremendous amount of stress on the equipment creating it, such that it can get destroyed in the process.

[snip]

“There is going to be great pride that this is something that happened in the United States,” said David Edelman, who leads policy and global affairs at TAE, a large private fusion energy company. “This is a very important milestone on the road toward fusion energy.”

It comes as the Biden administration is prioritizing fusion energy research in its climate and energy agenda. The projects are among the front of the line for the tens of billions of dollars in subsidies and grants authorized through the major climate package Biden signed over the summer, called the Inflation Reduction Act.
Over the past several decades, the United States, Russia and various European nations have allocated billions in government dollars trying to master the science, believing that if they could, it would be a boon for the world.


I hope I live to see the day nuclear fusion becomes a viable source of electricity. We are going to need all the power we can muster to desalinate water from the ocean. The world is running out of potable water and this is going to be the single biggest struggle in the near future.

Let's hope Joe Biden doesn't sell it to Russia and China before we can do anything with it.

 

[Carl in Michigan]

I guess you have been living in a cave and have not seen all the reports of potable water becoming more and more scarce.

It all evaporates and forms clouds and falls back to the earth. It's an eternal cycle. I've drank the same water as Jesus and Caesar

 

[g5000]

It all evaporates and forms clouds and falls back to the earth. It's an eternal cycle. I've drank the same water as Jesus and Caesar

A great deal of fresh water has been contaminated. And the water that is used or evaporated does not fall back to the same place.

Lake Powell is so low now that the dam which provides electricity to 4.5 million people is in jeopardy of no longer being able to do so.

 

[BackAgain]

Although I am usually a detractor of little g.5, this thread is of some interest.

 

[BackAgain]

Not a single drop of the Earth’s water supply has left the planet (except for a few rockets) since we first got our oceans. It’s all here. Some in lakes and rivers and marches. Massive amounts in the oceans and seas. Some in the atmosphere. Basically, it’s all here.

Hydroelectric plants supplied by dams may not always have the same volume of water behind them. That’s true. Droughts also happen. That’s true. But the water didn’t go away. It just changed location and state.

 

[Care4all]

Water never goes away It's an eternal cycle

Yep, but some times it comes down in the wrong places, like raining mostly in to the salty oceans and seas...

 

[marvin martian]

A great deal of fresh water has been contaminated. And the water that is used or evaporated does not fall back to the same place.

Lake Powell is so low now that the dam which provides electricity to 4.5 million people is in jeopardy of no longer being able to do so.

Really, so DemoKKKrats in California, Nevada, and Arizona blocking EVERY new water storage proposal over the past 40 years while the populations of the western states doubled and tripled was a bad idea after all? Who woulda thought!?!?

 

[Darkwind]

The question is moot if they can simply start and get a net gain but are unable to sustain the reaction for more than a few microseconds, a few seconds, a few minutes, a few hours, a few days, a few months.

Impress Me and have a sustained reaction for years. Then impress Me more by finding a way to harness it.