Your tax dollars at work

[living sounds]

Once again basic research funded by the US taxpayer has panned out - net energy surplus fusion has become a reality:

https://phys.org/news/2022-12-scientists-fusion-energy-breakthrough-1.html

 

[JohnRoberts]

Fusion power has been right around the corner for decades. Anybody recall "cold fusion"?

Compact fission reactors (like used in military vessels for decades) are here now and would make a lot of sense to drop in place of old coal plants and whatever. Unclear why the green warriors oppose expanding existing nuclear. Newer nuclear technology is cleaner and safer.

I'll believe cost effective fusion when we see it. They even say "could be" in the headline. I am generally an optimist, but I have been seeing news reports about fusion energy for decades.

JR

 

[pucho812]

Wait a minute
You cannot change the laws of physics.
Creating more than you use to create it breaks a physics law or two if my memory serves me correctly.

 

[JohnRoberts]

Wait a minute
You cannot change the laws of physics.
Creating more than you use to create it breaks a physics law or two if my memory serves me correctly.

no laws of physics are at risk but typical fusion energy prototypes are not net energy generators.

The current technology advancements are related to high temperature semi (super?) conductors used to create the magnetic containment fields to hold the fusion plasma. Smart estimates continue to place this a decade or more into the future, but its been a decade into the future for several decades.

JR

 

[AnalogPackrat]

Once again basic research funded by the US taxpayer has panned out - net energy surplus fusion has become a reality:

https://phys.org/news/2022-12-scientists-fusion-energy-breakthrough-1.html

What, exactly, have we gotten for our tax dollars? Another "promising" fusion development. I'm old enough to remember articles in Popular Science and similar magazines from the early 1970s promising breakthrough technology...just around the corner. And here's a record of US investment in fusion research which started in 1954.

http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2021/ph241/margraf1/
I didn't add up the inflation adjusted column, but it looks to be something over $20B. A more pragmatic approach would be to also invest in less ambitious and more incremental fission tech like Thorium rather than blowing billions on, well, nothing feasible in 68 years. It's hard to think of another technology that has soaked up that much funding for that long with no viable result.

 

[cyrano]

Despite that, the reporter concludes that's far too little money to expect results. But, as usual, you haven't read it, because deep down inside, you fear it's fake.

Besides, as usual, nationalistic policy, like this one, will always fail. Look up "Andrea Rossi", to get an idea. When he was still working in Italy, he was a scammer for the US science press. All he had to do, was move his company and research to the states, he was the next big messiah.

He's neither, but, thanks to polarisation, at least he's on the good side now

 

[living sounds]

It's the first time a fusion process has resulted in a net energy gain (more getting out of it than was put in). This does not violate the laws of thermodynamics, since the energy comes from the fusion process and the energy that was put in was necessary to fascilitate it.

This is the kind of research that needs long-term heavy investment to pan out, and that can not and will not be done by private industry on their own. Similar projects started almost a century ago resulted in the transistor, nuclear fusion, space travel etc.

The point is that taxes and big government can be a very good thing and should not be "drowned in a bathtub" if we want to increase productivity long-term.

It's well documented in the book "The Entrepreneurial State" by Mariana Mazzucato.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Entrepreneurial_State
Every component in you Iphone was developed thanks to US taxpayer funded basic research.

Just a reminder not to let ideology get in the way of progress.

 

[AnalogPackrat]

It's the first time a fusion process has resulted in a net energy gain (more getting out of it than was put in). This does not violate the laws of thermodynamics, since the energy comes from the fusion process and the energy that was put in was necessary to fascilitate it.

Yes. In a lab. After 68 years of effort and tens of billions of dollars spent. What was the opportunity cost of all of that scientific effort?

This is the kind of research that needs long-term heavy investment to pan out, and that can not and will not be done by private industry on their own. Similar projects started almost a century ago resulted in the transistor, nuclear fusion, space travel etc.

Maybe because they aren't really viable with our level of technology. While Thorium cycle fission is, and has been for quite some time.

The point is that taxes and big government can be a very good thing and should not be "drowned in a bathtub" if we want to increase productivity long-term.

What is "very good" about so much funding for so long a time producing so little in the way of results?

It's well documented in the book "The Entrepreneurial State" by Mariana Mazzucato.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Entrepreneurial_State
Every component in you Iphone was developed thanks to US taxpayer funded basic research.

No, they were not. Many were, and those breakthroughs and follow-on commercialization took much less funding, time, and effort to achieve. Once the initial concept (solid state device physics) was proven, it was only a decade before it was widely commercialized and incremental improvements of all kinds followed in the decades since. That's what led us here, not a great giant leap from an EF86 to a super-computer in your pocket. Read The Idea Factory for a glimpse into how Bell Labs operated. Also read Bo Lojek's History of Semiconductor Engineering which gives an interesting insight into some of the detailed semiconductor process improvements that enabled the development of the integrated circuit. Some chapters of Jim Williams' two books also contain valuable first-person accounts of actual in-the-trenches engineering and science from the 60s-90s.

Imagine if the majority of funding that went into semiconductor research were instead spent on some massive pie-in-the-sky technology that was far beyond our ability to produce? How far behind would we be now?

Just a reminder not to let ideology get in the way of progress.

Pragmatism is now an ideology. Good to know.

 

[living sounds]

All right. Preaching to the choir is useless, but so is preaching to the ignorant. I rest my case.

 

[Matador]

Preaching to the choir is useless, but so is preaching to the ignorant.

“It is impossible for a man to learn what he thinks he already knows.” — Epictetus

 

[AnalogPackrat]

All right. Preaching to the choir is useless, but so is preaching to the ignorant. I rest my case.

You failed to make a case. But your lame ad hominem is noted.

 

[JohnRoberts]

All right. Preaching to the choir is useless, but so is preaching to the ignorant. I rest my case.

Ignorant?

I don't think any informed person is opposed to fusion energy (like sunlight) but why does the same climate change crowd dismiss fission energy? We have modern cycle nuclear energy capability being downplayed, while asking us to pin our hopes on some new fusion technology still decades in the future, maybe.

By all means keep researching hot fusion, and cold fusion, and all experimental new technologies, but let's take a sharp pencil look at energy generation technology that is here now. You want zero carbon, low impact energy generation then compact nuclear reactors are a no-brainer. Just drop them in place of old coal plants.

Sadly the public debate is not very rational or objective about nuclear.

JR

PS: Yesterday I read a whole chapter from the Epstein out in my carport using natural light, because my house was without electricity for several hours thanks to severe weather (multiple tornadoes in the region). Later I sat inside, in the dark thinking, and drinking cold beer before it got warm. I was successful keeping the beer from getting warm.

 

[living sounds]

Ignorant?

I don't think any informed person is opposed to fusion energy (like sunlight) but why does the same climate change crowd dismiss fission energy? We have modern cycle nuclear energy capability being downplayed, while asking us to pin our hopes on some new fusion technology still decades in the future, maybe.

By all means keep researching hot fusion, and cold fusion, and all experimental new technologies, but let's take a sharp pencil look at energy generation technology that is here now. You want zero carbon, low impact energy generation then compact nuclear reactors are a no-brainer. Just drop them in place of old coal plants.

Sadly the public debate is not very rational or objective about nuclear.

This was not directed at your post. Not sure who the "climate change crowd" is, but I don't dismiss fission energy nor does Greta Thunberg.

But fusion is the future, and the large-scale long-term investment in basic research only governments can and will make will make it a reality. That was the point of the thread. A reminder. To not let ideology determine the thinking.

 

[JohnRoberts]

The recent fusion prototype that returned 50% more energy than input is good but still decades away from commercial use.
===
The anti-nuclear evidence is in government behavior. Germany has not commissioned a new nuclear power plant since 1989.

In response to Putin's invasion of the Ukraine and disruption of Russian gas supplies the looming winter energy shortage has forced Germany to keep 2 of the 3 existing nuclear plants open that were scheduled to be closed down (after Fukushima news).

This is not uniquely a German issue, more likely an unintended consequence of simple democracy and media constantly trying to scare viewers into watching by overstating the dangers of nuclear power plants (I suspect the problems with fusion power are understated but we'll deal with that in time). The only new American nuclear plant (Vogtle) is scheduled to be completed first quarter 2023. This project is $billions over budget and years delayed (just like my local clean coal plant was, now burning NG).

Sorry for using shorthand, there is an anti-impact ideology that opposes all cost effective energy development (even hydro). I don't think these people have bad intentions they are just ignorant (or anti-human). For 8 billion people to prosper they need more cost effective energy, not windmills and solar panels.

JR

 

[AnalogPackrat]

This was not directed at your post. Not sure who the "climate change crowd" is, but I don't dismiss fission energy nor does Greta Thunberg.

Yet research into improved (safer, cheaper fueled) fission has not been a priority in the west.

But fusion is the future, and the large-scale long-term investment in basic research only governments can and will make will make it a reality. That was the point of the thread. A reminder. To not let ideology determine the thinking.

It may be the future...in 30, 40, 50 years. What about now? We need viable and reliable energy in the present (we needed it ten years ago). It was the ideologues of the past 30-50 years who prevented development of better fission technology. I know because in my youth I was part of that "movement." To try to pretend that ideology is somehow to blame for lack of progress in fusion is, well, ignorant. Pragmatic spending on research is important, no?

 

[Matador]

For 8 billion people to prosper they need more cost effective energy, not windmills and solar panels.

The annual Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE) analysis for the U.S. last updated by Lazard, one of the oldest banks in the world, in October 2021,1074 suggests that unsubsidized average electricity generating costs declined on average between 2009 and 2021 in the case of solar PV (crystalline, utility-scale) from US$359 to US$36 per MWh, a fall of 90 percent, and for wind from US$135 to US$38 per MWh (a 72 percent fall), while nuclear power costs went up from US$123 to US$167 per MWh, an increase of 36 percent (see Figure 52).

For example, the LCOE of solar PV dropped by 50% between 2010 and 2014, which has made it increasingly competitive at the utility scale (IRENA 2015). Total installed costs of utility-scale PV fell by 29% to 65% (depending on location) in that same time period, resulting in electricity prices of US$0.08 per kWh (without financial incentives) for the most competitive utility-scale projects (see Section 2 for more detail). While LCOE is only one metric used for investment decisions that must account for resource diversification, regulation and policy goals, as well as market design and dispatch decisions, the comparative cost of electricity generated from new fossil fuel power plants typically ranges from US$0.045 to US$0.14 per kWh (without incentives). As the least cost source of electricity available today, onshore wind LCOEs fall either within the range or lower than for fossil fuels, where the most competitive wind projects globally deliver electricity for roughly US$0.05/kWh without financial incentives (IRENA 2015; see Section 2 for more detail).7

On the point of "yeah but if it were really cheaper then everyone would be doing it"...

The economic profitability of a power generation facility thus hinges on a weighted average of the future technology-adjusted unit revenues to exceed the life-cycle cost of energy generation...
For NGCC power plants in California, we find that falling capacity utilization rates have been counterbalanced by increasing dispatchability price premia. These two countervailing trends have resulted in steady but distinctly negative LPM [Levelized Profit Margins]. In Texas, by contrast, profit margins for NGCC plants have improved due to higher utilization rates at times of higher power prices. This finding is consistent with the general observation that in Texas natural gas and wind power have gradually replaced coal-fired generation.

So it turns out that in many cases fossil fuel plants are actually more profitable, because utilities can increase prices to reflect volatility in the fossil fuel energy markets. In other words, it's better to switch off the renewable plant, and start up the natural gas plant, because you can increase prices above-and-beyond the increased fuel costs to the plant. After extensive research, it turns out that sunlight and wind are free, and aren't subject to price fluctuations as a fuel source, meaning there is no fuel incentive under which prices can be increased.

But what about all the demand for energy when the sun isn't shining?

It turns out that most of aggregate demand happens when people are awake, and running heating and (especially) cooling. There appears to be a correlation between demand for air conditioning and periods of time when it is hottest, which is apparently when the sun in shining.

 

[living sounds]

What about now? We need viable and reliable energy in the present (we needed it ten years ago).

Non sequitor. This thread is about the future. Everything we've got today we have because people were thinking about the future. Or just doing research. When James Clerk Maxwell wrote down his equations the TV, the computer, the internet were not even conceiveable. With the low-hanging-fruit long gone today's basic research is much costly. But the future payoffs are just as outsized as they were then.

 

[AnalogPackrat]

Non sequitor. This thread is about the future.

Today, when we need reliable generation, was the future 10 years ago when nothing was being done to invest in perfectly possible fission tech. China did it, but the west did not.

Everything we've got today we have because people were thinking about the future. Or just doing research.

But very, very few things we have today had 68 years of big research investment with nothing to show for it except a couple of short-lived lab results. Big difference.

When James Clerk Maxwell wrote down his equations the TV, the computer, the internet were not even conceiveable.

Sure. Maxwell and others were way ahead of available technology. Did they suck down large sums of public research funds for seven decades doing it? No. Later on scientists and engineers utilized his work (and that of other trail-blazers) to build commercially viable products. They also didn't suck up huge sums of public funding for seven decades doing it. Big difference.

Look at the transistor. The concept of a FET was decades old before it was possible to make one. In a few short years a small team at Bell Labs developed the first transistors and the theory of solid state physics that helped improve them. Within a decade commercial products were being manufactured using transistors. Incremental improvements and developments led to our current state of the art only 75 years later. Those research dollars (both public and private) have paid off.

With the low-hanging-fruit long gone today's basic research is much costly.

Not true. Thorium is proven technology. There's plenty of stuff out there that's lower hanging fruit than fusion.

But the future payoffs are just as outsized as they were then.

Not proven, Nostradamus.

 

[JohnRoberts]

Instead of taxpayer funded, government directed research, how about R&D investment tax deductions?

Business probably has a better idea of what technologies are viable to develop for the near future.

JR

 

[JohnRoberts]

There has been a lot of arm waving over the $1.7T omnibus spending bill pushed through at the last minute. I can't remember the last time we saw regular order used to negotiate a sensible annual budget.

It is the nature of politics to inflate the significance of minor things to cast aspersion on opposing parties. One budgetary feature that seems to come and go is "earmarks" the practice of giving individual legislators impressive local spending projects for their home district, so it looks like they are carrying home the bacon. This is yet another diversion to take our eyes off the real prize.

Earmarks this time are something like $15B. Not nothing but only 1% of the total massive spending bill... Maybe focus on the big stuff.

JR

PS: I say this half in jest but we should be taxing the Mexican cartels. They are making huge profits from human trafficking and illegal drug sales.