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Hey now, we could also use this technology breakthrough to move water from a low elevation to a higher one.
Now here’s an idea - we boil the water to turn turbines, and then have the steam collect and pool in an upper chamber before running through another turbine into the first boiling chamber below?
I’m talking about pumped hydro power. It’s all the excitement of using water to turn turbines(as it’s released to gravity), but none of the boiling.
Oh, I understood - your comment g actually triggered a curiosity in me as to why we don’t combine the two methods (boiling and falling) to “double-dip” on electricity production.
I’m sure there are plenty of practical reasons why not, but I genuinely don’t know.
Well if you remember from school, energy is defined as the capacity to do work. And if the rising steam does the work of turning a turbine, it’ll have a lot less kinetic energy left afterwards and won’t rise nearly as far.
One of the fusion startups says they can use the plasma B field directly. Basically making the plasma the rotor in an electric generator to induce current in a wire.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_CFCyc2Shs I don’t listen to Lex much these days, but that was a fun discussion.
This plasma. Does it contain any water vapor?
The one im aware of uses deuterium, aka hydrogen2, to generate helium 3. One of the byproducts being tritium, aka hydrogen3. This means there’s potential for 2 deuteriums to mix with an oxygen molecule,this creating ²H2O, aka heavy water.
I’m neither a chemist, nor physicist. So someone could probably prove me wrong at the drop of a hat, but Im calling it close enough.:p
It’s boiling water all the way down.
Seriously though, it’s over 100,000,000° so probably not.
Water decomposes above 3000 C
First, fusion has 0 theoretical economic potential, but there is some potential for energy gains from 2250* + steam. Water deconstructs above this temperature into powerful HHO gas, that when ignited gains another 2500* that will chain react with higher pressure steam to make the steam even hotter/higher pressure. Minor problem of melting all known turbine material, is avoidable through just higher volume of pressured steam.
There’s a great video by Improbable Matter on YouTube breaking down the issues with helion , well worth a watch https://youtube.com/watch?v=3vUPhsFoniw
Which one? My first impression is that ignoring all the energy in neutrons should be pretty inefficient
Helion, probably.
Yeah, I found what they do here
So they chose deuterium-helium 3 fusion where there is less neutron radiation. Still they need to breed helium 3 where a lot of energy is lost. Curious to see if they will reflect that in the energy production balance.
They seem to have a two stage reactor, where supposedly, the He3 is generated with a ~small energy surplus and then Fred into the bigger reactor.
the only things i’ve been seeing from those guys recently are investor pitches…
I really like this concept, wonder how viable it really is though.
It seems promising, they’re acting like they’re close. They’ve been promising concrete deliverables, I think they’re supposed to have a working model that can actually capture the energy next year
You never know, but they’re called Triton if you want to check them out. They don’t share progress often, but when they do it seems pretty candid about their progress
I’m guessing something like most of the magnets contain the plasma, but some transfer energy off it?
Please don’t let it be another Theranos, please don’t let it be another Theranos 🙏
It’s not. Maybe they’ll fail, maybe it can’t math out, but it’s not vaporware
I’ve been watching these guys for a while. They have a real shot at getting something on the grid before ITER is even fully operational.
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Maybe it’s based on this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetohydrodynamic_generator
Dihydrogen monoxide is potent greenhouse gas that has caused many deaths, and we should stop using it to generate power.
Everybody who has been exposed to dihydrogen monoxide is expected to die at some point.
It’s in schools, hospitals, and even beer.
While tragic, those losses were necessary sacrifices for the continued success of the dihydrogen monoxide industry.
Let’s gloss over how the average human being now consists of 60% dihydrogen monoxide, though.
Before we can even try to crack fusion, we need to clear out the last of the 2000s pop bands and their videographers.
I mean, not necessarily.
They could use a magnetohydrodynamic generator to siphon off some of the helium, though TBH it’s better suited for fission:
“Dyson Spheres? Look, playing with sunlight and mirrors was a fun side project, but you want to know a much more advanced method of generating power?”
“Please dont…”
“Thats right! By hurling entire water worlds into a star, we then capture the released steam which powers our gravitationally locked dynamo network.”
Nah. You’ll probably want several shells operating above any sane temperature for steam. You don’t want to lose that extremely high temperature by just heating water to 600 °C or so.
Throwing water into a star wouldn’t get you steam, it’d just fuel the star XD
You gotta seal the planet in a heat-safe bag, and make sure to not drop it out of orbit, or you’ll lose the water, as you say.
Hydrohomies!
We need this on lemmy
We have it already! ^^ <3
The only viable electric generation that doesn’t involve spinning a turbine is solar and not even all solar.
That depends on how you define “viable”. And “generate”.
Peltier devices generate a voltage from a heat differential passing through a bi-metalic matrix. It’s not a huge voltage, so the definition of “viable” comes in there, but it can be used to power low power things and works well for heater accessories. I first saw its use for wood stove fans that get powered just by sitting on the stove. I’ve also seen them power USB chargers for pellet stoves.
And then there’s batteries that generate a voltage from submerging two types of metal in acid. And more modern battery designs might be doing it a bit differently but still no spinning magnets and coils. Obviously they are viable for powering many things, but usually themselves are powered from another source rather than using fresh acid for each charge, so the “generate” bit comes into question.
I think there’s some others. Like fiction can be used to generate a static voltage and I’m pretty sure I’ve seen some tesla coils that use friction to generate their voltage. If you continuously generate that voltage, you could make a circuit out of it rather than shock high school kids or make their hair stand up, though I don’t know what kind of amperage you could generate like that (that 5 figure voltage isn’t fatal because of a lack of amps).
I asked an AI out of curiosity and, while I won’t paste the response (feel free to ask one yourself), it gave a list of 20 methods, though I’d say this thread on its own covers about 9 of them, since some are different specific ways of doing similar ones (eg there were 4 based on moving something relative to a magnetic field).
Viable meaning used for power plants or as an alternative to power plants to generate power for the grid.
Like fiction can be used to generate a static voltage
sounds ficticious.
Something about spelling nazis spinning in a grave attached to a magnet and coil setup…
Low key this is a great way to convince people to switch away from fossil fuels.
Most people seemingly don’t know that coal/gas stations work by essentially boiling water. Most are horrified at how trashy and underdeveloped the concept is compared to high tech alternatives like solar, wind, or hydro.
You can transfer gas to electricity without boiling water. But it is much more efficient to combine it with boiling water
Well, hydro is just spinning water again, wind is spinning air. Solar is stealing electrons from the sun (i think?) So that’s cool
Getting electronics knocked around by photons.
Domestic Appliance Violence
They pump water through it. The water gives energy, all our energy is hydrogen baby
Well, the sun is sending them to us, so it’s not really stealing!
I promise I’ll return them when I’m done with them.
stealing
reappropriating :D
That’s why room temperature and cold fusion are so important. Duh!
You put a copper wire wrapped around high energy plasma and you get…direct voltage right on the line.
There are a million efficient ways to make heat and tons of new development to be made in making heat in new ways. There is relatively very little development in turning heat into kinetic energy and then electricity when size and weight are no object. The combined cycle turbine is incredibly efficient and is likely to continue to be ubiquitous in power generation for some time.
In addition, with our current grid (and many of the things that run on it), frequency is incredibly important. Having giant, heavy, spinny things with lots of inertia does wonders for naturally maintaining a very constant grid frequency as loads fluctuate.
Steam makes the magnet go spinny
There are actually versions of fusion reactors that use the magnetic fields generated by the plasma in order to make electricity directly.
It’s always been about finding new ways to spin a turbine
