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European fusion reactor sets record for sustained energy production

JacksinPA

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The future of energy production on this planet may be via sustained fusion reaction where hydrogen is combined together to produce helium.

The Joint European Torus (JET) reactor recently was used to heat a mix of hydrogen isotopes to 150M deg C for 5 seconds, yielding 59 megajoules of energy.
 
Progress is good but fusion reactors pose many of the same problems as before.
So we are not there yet.
These neutron streams, which is what fusion reactors rely on, lead directly to four regrettable problems with nuclear energy: radiation damage to structures; radioactive waste; the need for biological shielding; and the potential for the production of weapons-grade plutonium 239—thus adding to the threat of nuclear weapons proliferation, not lessening it, as fusion proponents would have it.
In addition, if fusion reactors are indeed feasible—as assumed here—they would share some of the other serious problems that plague fission reactors, including tritium release, daunting coolant demands, and high operating costs. There will also be additional drawbacks that are unique to fusion devices: the use of a fuel (tritium) that is not found in nature and must be replenished by the reactor itself; and unavoidable on-site power drains that drastically reduce the electric power available for sale.
 
Fusion reactors don't have the waste fuel problem of fission reactors, they don't create plutonium at all, and a fusion reactor is not remotely weaponizable. The result of d-t fusion is helium, not plutonium.
 
Fusion reactors don't have the waste fuel problem of fission reactors, they don't create plutonium at all, and a fusion reactor is not remotely weaponizable. The result of d-t fusion is helium, not plutonium.
Some disagree.

Fusion reactors: Not what they’re cracked up to be​

 
LOL, you cut and pasted shit and presented them as your own words, and just handed me the goddamned proof. That's amazing. Just brazen plagiarizing.

So, disagree about what? Nuclear physics? This isn't a matter of opinion. A fusion reactor doesn't produce plutonium unless you design it to do that. Your dumb straw man article waves this off as trivial, tries to give the impression you can just drop a box of uranium into the reactor and create plutonium. That's bullshit. Producing weapons-grade material is a challenging process and any nation capable of doing so inside a fusion reactor is already a nation capable of producing nuclear weapons whenever it wants.

The neutron radiation in a fusion reactor is nowhere near the level of the radioactive waste produced by a fission reactor. That's just objectively true.

Fusion is challenging and not perfect? No shit, sherlock. Wonderful contribution. Magic isn't real, I'm sorry you had to be taught this.
 
Sorry you disagree with Daniel Jassby who was a principal research physicist at the Princeton Plasma Physics Lab until 1999. For 25 years he worked in areas of plasma physics and neutron production related to fusion energy research and development. He holds a PhD in astrophysical sciences from Princeton University.
I doubt if you know more about the subject than he does.
 
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Gambling debts?
 
I am objectively correct that a fusion reactor doesn't produce plutonium unless you design it to do that. He did not disagree with that point.

I am further objectively correct that a nation capable of designing a functional fusion reactor that produces plutonium is already capable of building nuclear weapons. He did not disagree with that point.

I am also objectively correct that the volume of radioactive material involved in a fission reactor is far higher. He did not disagree with that point.

So, what claim are you making, specifically?
 
Simple what he stated.
Fusion reactors have many of the same problems as current nuclear reactors.
 
Fusion articles like this comes out once a month, telling us that its just around the corner. Well, the world has been waiting for about 50 years now... and we're still waiting.
 
Also, anucleonic fusion doesn't have the neutron radition (that would be hydrogen-boron fusion). There are advances on that front too. It might not happen, but if it does, the output would be a protons, and the energy can be captured with a magnetic field, so no radiation, and no need for turbines
 
My (limited) understanding is that deuterium-tritium fusion is the lowest hanging fruit, so to speak, due to the lower amount of force required to get fusion to occur, so achieving an energy-positive reaction is easier.
 
Fusion articles like this comes out once a month, telling us that its just around the corner. Well, the world has been waiting for about 50 years now... and we're still waiting.

60 years really, since the Soviets first built a tokamak. Isn't it weird that it was them who struck upon the best design first time?

The US is still exploring stellerators and inertial fusion, but there's even less progress with those.
 
It's true that you could use the excess neutrons from a fusion reactor to breed nuclear weapon ingredients. But you could use any reactor for that: they've all got neutrons in them.

The problem of turning the machinery into nuclear waste might be partially solved by cladding the inside with light elements and replacing them regularly. Light isotopes are much easier to separate with centrifuges.
 
Whoopee, all of five seconds. Image the reaction if Edison announced he had managed to make a light bulb work for five seconds.
 
Whoopee, all of five seconds. Image the reaction if Edison announced he had managed to make a light bulb work for five seconds.

He'd probably sell them anyway.

"No more dangerous candles on your child's birthday cake! Use Edison Blowouts instead!"
 
You know plutonium is an entirely synthetic element, don't you?

Fission reactors produce a small amount of plutonium just in their regular operation. This is a vital distinction: to build a plutonium bomb using a fusion reactor requires premeditation. You'd have to put Uranium 238 in the way of the neutrons, and then you'd get basically the same fission waste as is stored in fission reactor buildings around the world (also in long term storage).

The proliferation risk from fission plants is greater, because one well-intentioned government can generate the waste, but then a bad actor government separate Plutonium from it. There's also the risk of waste being sold or stolen. Plutonium is much more dangerous to people than Uranium, so waste containing Plutonium would make a "good" dirty bomb.
 
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