<story><title>Experts Urge U.S. To Continue Support for Nuclear Fusion Research</title><url>https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/experts-urge-u-s-to-continue-support-for-nuclear-fusion-research/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>devy</author><text>Nuclear fusion is probably still decades away. But I am going tangent here, nuclear fission still have great potentials.
Scientists from the Oak Ridge National Laboratory actually 
helped China to built Molten Salt reactors in the 70s during Nixon administration. [1] And since then thorium based molten salt Gen IV reactors have been having renewed interests around the global. China actually tested the whole system feasibility in Giga Watts scale in recent years. [2]&lt;p&gt;Nuclear power is vital part of the energy infrastructure to curb worsening environment due to climate change - it&amp;#x27;s still considered superior than all the other green alternative energies in terms of either 24&amp;#x2F;7 availability (vs. solar&amp;#x2F;wind) or massive scale (vs. geothermal) or location restricted (vs. hydro) or carbon-free (vs. biomass&amp;#x2F;bio-fuel). China realized that in their dire request to transition out their entire energy reliance on carbon-based energies, it&amp;#x27;s impossible to do without nuclear.
Also, newer reactor designs are much safer and last longer so a lot of the concerns of radioactive waste have largely been alleviated.&lt;p&gt;[1]: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=10229697&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=10229697&lt;/a&gt; (2015)&lt;p&gt;[2]: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=17813614&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=17813614&lt;/a&gt; (2018)</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>njarboe</author><text>There have been a series of breakthrough in helicity injection techniques and the understanding of spheromak physics in the last decade. Some believe that economical fusion power plants are possible with today&amp;#x27;s technology[1] and need a ~$30 million to prove out a scale model reactor before building a full scale one on the order of $2-3 billion of a 1-2 Gigawatt power plant.&lt;p&gt;This is an order of magnitude less cost that the ITER project, which is spending a lot of money on cement and magnets on a probably doomed technology path of commercial fusion.&lt;p&gt;These same breakthroughs are also likely to be able to produce a fusion engine for spacecraft. This is actually an easier problem to solve than electricity generation as the deuterium can be used as fuel and as a propellant ejected straight out of the plasma core at variable ISP up to around 100,000. No inefficient fusion to electricity to rocket engine cycle is necessary.&lt;p&gt;I am not a fusion scientist, but my father is. For more info and technical references, drop me an email (see profile).&lt;p&gt;[1]&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.washington.edu&amp;#x2F;news&amp;#x2F;2014&amp;#x2F;10&amp;#x2F;08&amp;#x2F;uw-fusion-reactor-concept-could-be-cheaper-than-coal&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.washington.edu&amp;#x2F;news&amp;#x2F;2014&amp;#x2F;10&amp;#x2F;08&amp;#x2F;uw-fusion-reactor...&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>Experts Urge U.S. To Continue Support for Nuclear Fusion Research</title><url>https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/experts-urge-u-s-to-continue-support-for-nuclear-fusion-research/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>devy</author><text>Nuclear fusion is probably still decades away. But I am going tangent here, nuclear fission still have great potentials.
Scientists from the Oak Ridge National Laboratory actually 
helped China to built Molten Salt reactors in the 70s during Nixon administration. [1] And since then thorium based molten salt Gen IV reactors have been having renewed interests around the global. China actually tested the whole system feasibility in Giga Watts scale in recent years. [2]&lt;p&gt;Nuclear power is vital part of the energy infrastructure to curb worsening environment due to climate change - it&amp;#x27;s still considered superior than all the other green alternative energies in terms of either 24&amp;#x2F;7 availability (vs. solar&amp;#x2F;wind) or massive scale (vs. geothermal) or location restricted (vs. hydro) or carbon-free (vs. biomass&amp;#x2F;bio-fuel). China realized that in their dire request to transition out their entire energy reliance on carbon-based energies, it&amp;#x27;s impossible to do without nuclear.
Also, newer reactor designs are much safer and last longer so a lot of the concerns of radioactive waste have largely been alleviated.&lt;p&gt;[1]: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=10229697&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=10229697&lt;/a&gt; (2015)&lt;p&gt;[2]: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=17813614&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&amp;#x2F;item?id=17813614&lt;/a&gt; (2018)</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>matt4077</author><text>This reads like a parody of every thread on nuclear technology on HN or, before it, slashdot.&lt;p&gt;It’s always „decades away“, but there’s always pebble bed&amp;#x2F;molten salt&amp;#x2F;thorium&amp;#x2F;whatever technology that’s far better, basically functional, mostly free, and only held up by those darn environmentalists&amp;#x2F;idiot politicians&amp;#x2F;liberals&amp;#x2F;oil lobby&amp;#x2F;NIMBYs&amp;#x2F;Elton John&amp;#x2F;…&lt;p&gt;It feels like the tech community is forever trapped in the science fiction of the 50s, while actual science (and politicians) have created options that, frankly, are far better in every regard, including costs.</text></comment>