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this post was submitted on 06 Apr 2024
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Hot damn! Limitless fusion power is only thirty years away!
Like it has been for the past 30 years (which, I assume, was the joke here.)
If fusion research was funded adequately we'd probably have it by now, but I don't know if it's the energy lobby or what that means that it's chronically underfunded. An actually working fusion reactor design would bring about such an upheaval in the energy markets that I wouldn't be surprised if plutocrats had a hand in making sure the research receives orders of magnitude less money than it should.
Existing energy conglomerates (ie, oil and gas) probably send their army of lobbyists around the world to spread FUD about fusion. Thus minimal funding. 🪦
Not while fusion is 30 years away. They'll wait until it's closer to 2 years.
Maybe. We all (here) wish fusion power was funded better and understand how useful it could be for humanity if we can make it happen, but ….
It’s quite possible that we would have always needed the rest of the world to catch up
Breakthroughs will bring in investment and then things can accelerate if it ends up viable.
It's not limitless, you still need fuel. Especially tritium doesn't really occur naturally because of its extremely short half-life, current plans for ITER involve breeding tritium from lithium in the fusion reactor. The closest to limitless power we have is PV.
Tritium is a convenience, not a necessity. If researchers manage to build a functional fusion reactor which captures the energy, we can find substitutes.
A reactor that produces enough of its own fuel.... It's starting to sound like a perpetual motion machine.
Read again, there are plans to use lithium instead of tritium, still limited.
$10 says fusion power also ends up being the cure for Alzheimer's.
The advancements in magnetic field manipulation will be of great value to the ferrite-infused prostate medicine field! Also: better selfie camera's!