That's the most common proposal for MHD generators - once it goes thru the MHD proper you use the waste heat to drive a conventional powerplant. Unfortunately MHD requires the production of plasma to be effective, and plasma just does not like to exist, so the engineering practicalities make it... unlikely to ever be even remotely viable outside of incredibly niche applications (although non-plasma MHD has been studied, and I believe there are even some human trials, to power implants in the body like pacemakers and I remember reading about nervous-interface devices in mice that used arterial MHD on to generate the microcurrent needed)

Well, not an engineer myself, either, but generally speaking that would greatly increase the systems complexity, which generally increases maintenance costs, down time, and the initial cost of the system.

You might be able to eke out a bit more power, but there’s more to the decision than total output and how efficient it is.

What I would imagine were a fusion-powered MHD being useful would be as a front end to fusion-based plasma propulsion. (Basically something like the VSIMR, Hall effect or whatever plasma thruster, where the fusion reaction generates both some power to create the thrust and its exhaust plasma is also the reaction mass.(I mentioned I’m not an engineer… right? Just an incorrigible nerd who likes sci-fi.)

There are also some chemical modes of electricity generation (Alkalai batteries, etc). Also using flowing water to move Turbines like dams.

But then the meme isn't as fun here, and those are such a small minority of how we generate powers.

Hydro as well.

Some types of solar are also just boiling water. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_tower

To me, and apparently the Greeks!

It is not known whether the aeolipile was put to any practical use in ancient times, and if it was seen as a pragmatic device, a whimsical novelty, an object of reverence, or some other thing.

The majority of the energy released will be heat, relatively few high energy photons are released so ‘solar’ isn’t a viable option and your suggestion about a particle accelerator just doesn’t make any sense.

Boiling water is literally the best way to capture the energy released.

We've gotten really, really good at extracting energy from steam, steam turbines can be incredibly efficient, I can't recall exact figures but Wikipedia cites 90% as the top end.

You identified the solution. Use a solar panel and let the reactor in the center of our system do the work. Add a batteries to make up for being blocked. Today, solar AND batteries are cheaper than fission reactors. Fusion has promise, but why over invest in a maybe when you can use the technology we have today? Is it because It has an end game where you don't infinity extract resources? Who would want that?

I believe there is a generator with functional prototypes in the US and China that uses supercritical CO2? I mean its basically a steam engine but using a different medium and potentially even more efficient.

donuts?

...they found a clever way to induce a current using temperature differentials between the molten salt and some sort of coolant mass?

🤭🤫yess

Actually, I remember that on iceland they were injecting CO2 into rock, and it was shipped to them from ... Swicerland, I think, in shipping tanks. It was captured from concrete manufacturing plants, which apparently produce a ton if it. So there you go - cheap CO2 is not a problem

I doubt the amount used in what I presume is a closed system like this will be significant on a atmosphere level, but it could certainly be the source. If nothing else would make a great headline.