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same shit every day, on god (mander.xyz)
submitted 11 months ago by to c/science_memes@mander.xyz
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[–] 128 points 11 months ago (15 children)

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.

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  • [+] 65 points 11 months ago (5 children)
    [deleted]
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  • [–] 51 points 11 months ago (4 children)

    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

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  • [+] 10 points 11 months ago (4 children)
    [deleted]
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  • [–] 13 points 11 months ago (2 children)

    It's boiling water all the way down.

    Seriously though, it's over 100,000,000° so probably not.

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  • [–] 2 points 11 months ago

    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.

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  • [–] 6 points 11 months ago

    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

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    • [–] 120 points 11 months ago (27 children)

    Why don't we just pipe our water all the way out to the sun and pipe the steam back to earth.

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  • [–] 129 points 11 months ago (12 children)

    That's silly.
    Clouds would knock the pipes down.

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  • [–] 37 points 11 months ago (10 children)

    I was thinking you could put giant fans on it to blow the clouds away, but then the moon would also knock it down once you got up that high.

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  • [–] 18 points 11 months ago (9 children)

    What if… hear me out… we pipe straight up into space, and then use a 90° bend to angle the remaining pipe to the sun. Shouldn’t Be too difficult, but I bet those plumbers would charge an expensive ass trip fee.

    We’ll need a shit ton of that purple PVC glue though.

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  • [–] 18 points 11 months ago (2 children)

    Then we have to wait until the purple PVC glue goes on sale

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  • [–] 8 points 11 months ago (2 children)

    We’ll need a shit ton of that purple PVC glue though.

    Nope, because you can't use PVC for piping steam. You're going to need to use metal pipe. Iron pipe is the cheapest bet but it's such a pain to work with. Personally I'd run copper. I think that's to code for low pressure steam anyways.

    Wait, if it's going into space then whos building codes are we using?

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  • [–] 4 points 11 months ago

    pump ammonia! Can evaporate at PVC compatible temperature.

    A very minor problem with this scheme is the mile thickness insulation needed to not lose much of the sun's heat to space, on the trip back. A 2nd minor problem is the actual pipe section close to the sun.

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  • [–] 4 points 11 months ago

    I GOT IT! I FIGURED IT OUT!!!

    We make a single straight pipe the diameter of earth's orbit, and just slightly offset it to go near the surface of the sun.

    We pipe water at one end and send it off while earth continues it's orbit. We wait six months and we'll meet the other end of the pipe which will have nice hot steam arriving from the sun. We use the hot steam for six months until it condenses back to liquid water, then restart the process when we meet the other end of pipe again.

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  • [–] 24 points 11 months ago (4 children)

    How long is that gonna take? A few decades?

    -Sam Altman, when he hears about this

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  • [–] 8 points 11 months ago (3 children)

    I'm curious if it would even be thermodynamically possible. If we could magically run a pipe that far, would the heat from the water radiate into space before it reached earth to do anything useful?

    Someone get XKCD to do a video short on this.

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