[Shutsanonofre] Fusion reactors: Not what they’re cracked up to be

[Ray Lutz]

  Fusion reactors: Not what they’re cracked up to be


https://thebulletin.org/2017/04/fusion-reactors-not-what-theyre-cracked-up-to-be

This is an article from about 5 years ago, but it is good to keep these 
concerns in mind.

The recent news about the "breakthrough" where a net positive power 
output was achieved is far from being a reality or "sustainable". It was 
only for a brief billionth of a second, and there is a lot of fudging to 
make it seem that this would produce a net power output. Plus, there are 
many problems.

I'm not against working on this, but it is still pie in the sky. We 
should work harder and not divert funding from renewable power sources, 
that reduce the net heat in the environment, whereas these power plants, 
if we have them, would still have the problem that they are adding a lot 
of energy to our environment. So then, a great amount of this power 
would need to be used to cool the planet. In contrast, solar and wind 
removes energy from the environment.

Also, these power sources suffer from the same issues as nuclear fission 
plants. They are very complex, big projects that do not fit well within 
our free-market optimization system. Solar panels are small and 
relatively easy to mass produce, and they are being improved all the 
time through this competition. Meanwhile, we have the same nuclear power 
plant designs that have known big problems that are not corrected 
because it costs too much to do so.

Thus, this seems like a cheeseless rathole to me.

--Ray

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Ray Lutz
Citizens' Oversight Projects (COPs)
http://www.citizensoversight.org
619-820-5321
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