Former fusion scientist on why we won't have fusion power by 2040

[@pollywanda]

This project is worth keeping an ion.

[@davidastle9472]

You might get "charged" for that one.

[@LordZontar]

@@davidastle9472 Are you positive about that?

[@wizzyno1566]

Superb.

[@bittechslow]

Yeah, I see what you did there, bruh.

[@bitcoinski]

Nerd.

[@drmodestoesq]

Someone once said that physics is math constrained by the limits of reality. And that engineering is physics constrained by the limits of money.

[@sastrugi4471]

We've kinda solved the money problem, in these new days of QE and massive magic tax cuts. At least for now.

[@Mernom]

@@sastrugi4471 Actually building something is a problem of money constrained by greed. AKA how much of the money will be pocked away with nothing to show for it.

[@sastrugi4471]

@@Mernom all money is relative. Greed is just an aspect of markets. Greatest failure in most projects on the money and time parts is constantly changing specs midstream.

[@hypothalapotamus5293]

Fusion tech is perfectly at home among vaporware projects. Profitable Fusion energy that will solve all of our problems is always two decades away. It was that way when my dad was born. It was that way when I was born. It will probably be that way when I die.

[@justgivemethetruth]

Love it!

[@fujatv503]

Improbable Matter: "If there is enough interest I will make a follow-up video..." KZbin algorithm: "you are now a fusion-power youtube channel, bitch."

[@Myndale]

Nah, it's more like: Me: "Hey, this video that just popped into my feed looks interesting, I wonder what it's ab...uh oh." KZbin and Google: "Lol, interested in fusion, eh? Good to know, good to know..."

[@greatcesari]

@@Myndale I like the first iteration a little more.

[@truthsRsung]

The topic must be EVIL if KZbin likes it.

[@napoleonbonerfarte6739]

@@truthsRsung is this really the way you think?

[@truthsRsung]

@@napoleonbonerfarte6739 ....Use examples to persuade me otherwise. I like numbers. Tell me, after Einstein demystified the power of the sun, how many nuclear reactors we built as opposed to how many nuclear weapons? Now go look at the most popular uTube videos and rate them on their potential of EVIL on a fifty shades of grey scale.

[@adrianmillard6598]

Wow. A guy who has a reasoned attitude towards fusion AND cites sources. I think you're my hero. :)

[@JonesBeiges]

But this fortune teller has been proven wrong already.

[@karenrobertsdottir4101]

I disagree. This is the dumbest video I've seen on this topic in quite a long time. * Spends most of the video talking about the absolute basics of fusion power rather than his hypothesis (no fusion power by 2040) * Literally the only support for his timeline is "airports take a decade to build". Hey, have I news for you, Tesla builds entire car factories (some of the world's largest) in 1-2 years from announcement to first customer-vehicle production. Now, there's usually at least a year of non-public negotiations and planning behind the scenes, but your notion of "airports take a decade means fusion power plants will take much more" is beyond ridiculous. * Fission power plants can take a decade, but unlike fusion they face the risk of runaway reaction (whereas with fusion the challenge is keeping it going at all) and massive production of *extremely* toxic materials. Whereas with fusion you not only produce far less, far slower, but you have control over what gets produced via what the reactor is made out of (rather than "essentially everything" as per fission and its decay chains), and thus can ensure that nothing remains "hot" for long periods. Fission *should* take far longer than fusion to permit and certify! * He spends his entire video attacking straw men rather than mentioning *actual, specific fusion projects* and criticizing said actual projects. * He then goes on to praise ITER at the end as a great example of success. When even ITER scientists I've spoken with see it as an over-budget behind-schedule dead end that produced useful science but is pursuing a technologically obsolete dead-end rather than making use of lessons learned and advancements elsewhere. * His one commercial project he praises is Commonwealth Fusion, and how he thinks they're legit and a solid approach (but says he couldn't find a timeline from them). Hey, guess what? Their CEO *has* talked timelines, and he said that if everything goes well, they could have a commercial reactor by 2030. Now, expect delays, but still: the ONE time in his "refuting of very optimistic claims" that there will be fusion power before 2040, in which he actually mentions a commercial company, he says that they're legit, and it turns out, said company is targeting as early as *2030* . This video is terrible. He doesn't even address the reasons *why* there's suddenly a boom in interest in fusion power. Perhaps the biggest one being the commercial availability of REBCO tapes, which simply wasn't the case when ITER was in the design stage. Decreases the size of a tokamak or other forms of magnetic confinement by literally an order of magnitude for a given gain factor, as well as providing a number of other benefits, such as in usable magnet coolants and liner replacement processes. The thing about tokamaks is, the gain factor is readily computed. There's no magic to it; the challenge is that to get a good gain factor requires massive scale. But reducing the scale by an order of magnitude reduces costs likewise by an order of magnitude, and dramatically simplifies peripheral aspects as well.

[@VeganSemihCyprus33]

They have enslaved and fooled you 👉 The Connections (2021) [short documentary] 💖

[@adrianmillard6598]

@@VeganSemihCyprus33 I'm rolling on the floor laughing at you.

[@adrianmillard6598]

@@VeganSemihCyprus33 How do you know if someone is a vegan? - Don't worry they'll tell you.

[@garycooper9319]

Great video:: I remember when I was a young electrical engineering student in the 1950s in the UK when I read an article about a fusion machine which I think was called ‘Zita’ that was supposed to have achieved fusion and was predicted that this would eventually be able to supply the world with unlimited energy. Later it was decided that the machine had not achieved fusion but that within 10 or 20 years of development it would. I am now 85 years old and i am still waiting.

[@Veritas-invenitur]

I hate to break it too you but fusion reactors that produce enough power to make them worth it are over 100 years away.

[@Muonium1]

The machine was called "Zeta", if you want more information.

[@MyKharli]

@@Veritas-invenitur never , we haven't got 100 years !

[@Veritas-invenitur]

@@MyKharli You know, if humans really wanted fusion to work then they could accomplish it in 5 years. They just do not want to accomplish it in such a dirty and contradicting manner. The real problem with fusion is not getting it to produce more power than you put in. The real problem is getting it to produce more power than you put in without utilizing dirty technologies. You see. You can build a fusion reactor that nets a gain if it also utilizes additional fission reactions to maintain the containment field. But no one wants to use such dirty and dangerous methods.

[@willybird3377]

@@MyKharli not with Biden in charge

[@NotAnIlluminatiSpy]

Thumbnail implies that OP is the reason we won't have fusion power. Someone should stop him.

[@carlosandleon]

lmao

[@vivechjorviani5440]

He’s too powerful to be left alive

[@trydodis690]

The Antifusion, we must stop him.

[@HangTimeDeluxe]

The video implies otherwise, you should watch it.

[@NotAnIlluminatiSpy]

@@HangTimeDeluxe Couple things. 1. You're adorable. 2. Video is clearly propaganda.

[@moosefactory133]

I remember when I was in 5th grade during the 1968/1969 school year watching a video about fusion energy and it stated that it will be about 50 years away. In my young mind I could not even imagine being alive a half century later. Half a century came and went and fusion energy is still not a reality but what is a reality is I am still alive and kicking.

[@mitseraffej5812]

I hear you. I’ve had a life of extremely poor health requiring many many surgical procedure, I’m just flabbergasted that I’ve made it past 60 and what’s more I’ve fathered many children. See all things are possible, even nuclear fusion.

[@mitseraffej5812]

@@no3ironman11100 Where did you get that stereotype from?

[@taherpatrawala_]

@@no3ironman11100 This comment was so unnecessary

[@raffaeledivora9517]

@@no3ironman11100 Imagine when you will be old... how will you feel when people who don't even know you will spew shit on you just based on prejudices. Absolutely disgusting

[@henryD9363]

@@no3ironman11100 you have done your very best to contribute here. You can do no better. Congratulations

[@masterrafferty4065]

Has anyone considered harnessing the energy produced by the power of friendship?

[@doomsdoor]

Guns do have a lot of power

[@breakthecycle5238]

Commeees tries that 😂

[@94namnam]

So... Soviets were originals fans of My little pony?

[@xAfroMetalHead1990x]

Not enough true altruism for that to be viable

[@colchronic]

Seems like the real fusion was the friends we made along the way

[@MassMoment]

As a mechanical engineer, I want to thank you for pointing out how efficiencies play into this struggle; they are rarely discussed. Nevertheless, I feel that the hype generated by small gains is still important. The excitement attracts funding for further research, which is needed for many years to come.

[@JonFrumTheFirst]

You assume that the funding won't be wasted.

[@raffaeledivora9517]

@@JonFrumTheFirst You should put foot in a real experimental lab before talking about wasting funding. It's extremely insulting, and shows you know nothing, nothing about research, which is generally nothing but dramatically underfunded.

[@sajadbilgrami6809]

It’s a fools errand..put effort on Fission

[@JonFrumTheFirst]

@@raffaeledivora9517 Don't cry, baby - you'll get over it. You think it should be funded? YOU pay for it.

[@forwarduntodawn285]

@@JonFrumTheFirst bruh, return your Papa's phone to him and go do your algebra homework .

[@keysersoze3987]

I worked at Princeton Plasma Physics Lab (PPPL) for 32 years leaving in 2011. When I started in 1979, they said "We'll have fusion commercially in 20 years"! We did achieve fusion with a D T reaction in 1996 and we did produce 14 MeV neutrons. It was a lot of fun working there!

[@monkmoto1887]

I made a fission reactor in my garage but if anyone finds out they’ll come for me

[@Spartan0430]

@@monkmoto1887 this comment was sponsored by Nord VPN

[@Duomaxwell02M]

@@monkmoto1887 Is your real name Sheldon Cooper?

[@yourlogicalnightmare1014]

In other words, nothing that benefited society.

[@tonyjones7373]

@@yourlogicalnightmare1014 Exactly . Its all 'Pie in the Sky '

[@Ryarios]

I worked on a fusion reactor back in the 80’s. They swore the next version would be a full scale commercial reactor. Parts of it were already on site! Here we are nearly 40 years later and it’s still 20 years away…

[@mascot4950]

It's a large site, takes a while to move the parts into position and assemble them.

[@MrRedsjack]

I blame the construction permits.

[@Andytlp]

would be foolish to buy into that far back. Fusion isnt fission lol. If fission is taking a sledgehammer to smash something, fusion is a doctor using a robotic scalpel to operate on an ants brain. like 1 to 100 difficulty change.

[@Wingnut353]

@@Andytlp the main issue is field strength... and ITER has relatively weak magnets to what is currently available which is why projects starting to be built today at smaller scale with more powerful magnets are probably going to reach fusion before ITER does...

[@Life-mt8zl]

@@Wingnut353 I thought they used electromagnets

[@brianbutton6346]

I was not expecting the goat on a treadmill. Delighted you included it.

[@reachforthesky1576]

Agreed. A beautiful and very telling change of pace.

[@MessyTimes]

No one ever expects the goat on the treadmill! That and the Spanish Inquisition!

[@Narokkurai]

Actual Fusion Researcher: The problems facing fusion power are real and significant. I see no current technology that can solve these problems, nor can I reasonably predict when such technology will be developed, if ever. Commenters: But have you tried just like... THINKING HARDER???

[@TherandusGaming]

While generally I do agree with your statement pointing out the responses of commenters. At the same time, perseverance, hope, creativity and many failures is how new technological advancements throughout history have been born. As a scientist, if you ever want to be successful you need to not be pessimistic or even realistic, you need that optimism in order to make the impossible possible. So it actually makes me sad seeing videos like this. Great things are never easy and always seem impossible.

[@davekosak5215]

You're not thinking hard enough! For shame.

[@ClockworkGearhead]

@@TherandusGaming Yeah, no. "Just ignore reality." That's not how science works.

[@Small_Vocaloid_UTAU]

At the end he pointed out that the technology being developed at the moment is making steady progress. He didn't say the technology might never be developed. In my view, fusion technology is showing steady progress and will start to be available around 2050. ITER has a great contribution in this, although I hope that Wendelstein 7-X will provide scientists and engineers sufficient knowledge to create a new generation stellerator which supplies more energy than the whole system uses.

[@jansonshrock2859]

meanwhile in India: fusion power? what do you mean problems? ours works just fine!

[@techman2553]

This can't be true. I saw a working hydrocarbon based Mr. Fusion running on the back of a DeLorean, and it was producing at least 1.21 Jigawatts.

[@champ8605]

It's actually gigawatts no idea why they said jigawatts because that ain't a thing.

[@NRDavis-wl8vn]

@@gwh0 But I saw it on T.V. so it must be true.

[@charlesbrowne9590]

@@champ8605 Gigawatts is correctly pronounced with a soft ‘g’, similar to the word ‘gigantic’. It may also be pronounced with a hard ‘g’ since there is no soft form in Greek. The English word is not old enough to have a preferred pronunciation.

[@elefanny1106]

Jigga what?

[@bakedbeings]

@@elefanny1106 Jigga who?

[@DragNetJoe]

One of the biggest downsides of overly optimistic fusion predictions is it delays or stops new modern fission plant development. I think somebody will crack the nut on fusion with some novel approach, but in the meantime we should be building GEN3+ fission plants that we actually know how to make. It is also entirely likely that even if the fusion nut is cracked the cost to build will be economically prohibitive. Fusion is the hail-Mary, but fission should be 6 yards over the middle, again and again.

[@ptrkmr]

Yes, but we need to switch to entirely Thorium-based fission. I think it’s the only way to obtain public support and also try and reduce the radioactive shit we’re making until we get fusion. Also renewables need to be used more on small scale grids (I.e. neighborhoods and stuff)

[@TheAlgorath]

@@ptrkmr hell yeah, put the "breed" in "reactor"

[@DragNetJoe]

@@ptrkmr Thorium certainly has promise, but we could have/should have been using breeder reactors and re-burning waste for decades. Thorium remains largely unproven on industrial scale. I would argue we need a combination of technologies and not put all the eggs in one basket.

[@usr7941]

@@ptrkmr does public prefer to have no electricity?

[@Kyle-hz8kj]

Never thought I’d read someone using football plays to describe nuclear fusion, but I’m definitely here for it.

[@lagunastreets9637]

New fusion start-up mantra: Fake it till you make it.

[@gaypirate]

That's every start-up

[@adamdanilowicz4252]

I wish advanced fission had the same hype and financial backing as some of these fusion start-ups. It's honestly remarkable how much more progress can be made with fission technology, both in terms of efficiency, fuel utilisation, and waste managment.

[@mightyfinejonboy]

i used to be against fission nuclear power until the quote that I heard was"we cannot control co2 emissions but we can control waste" it's the lesser of 2 evils. fusion generating grid power will never happen, it simply exists to suck up funds for research that pays mortgages.

[@MMuraseofSandvich]

If anything, the current perception of nuclear fission power (i.e. Simpsons nuclear power where every nuke plant is nothing more than a bomb that didn't go off today) is evidence that _disinformation_ is more powerful than even the best efforts at informing the public about nuclear. Before _Radio Bikini_ and TMI, the main concern environmentalists had vs. nuclear was the loss of wilderness. But because people like David Brower convinced moms that nuclear plants would mutate their babies, we now have a fleet of aging reactors with no concrete plan to build better plants or reprocess spent fuel-- our plan is to kick the can down the road so our grandchildren can deal with the problem with the climate burning down around them and no resources to even get started solving the problem.

[@tjsbbi]

@@mightyfinejonboy That might be more accurately put as we _could_ control waste, but we won't.

[@dilbertjunkmail]

We refuse to employ safer reactors as originally developed by the Air Force in 50s. Molten Salt Reactors offer more hope than Fusion and they already have a proof of concept. The famous Thorium Reactors hype of last twenty years could work as a fuel. Silence from media but offers greater benefit to cost.

[@petesjk]

@@dilbertjunkmail You blame media, but the truth is, if the power companies wanted Thorium reactors, they would build them.

[@CrniWuk]

"You will be lucky to build an airport in 9 years" This guy knows Berlin!

[@julien-francoiscollin9843]

AHAH true! Also look at London Heathrow extension (new runway) will probably take 10 years!

[@hadrienlart]

And BER is a terrible airport ! So many problems. And special shout-out to the confusing signs

[@Boog_masskway]

Or how long it takes to get a subway built in Toronto

[@element_m2498]

HAHA!!- Damn right you are! Greetings from Germany.

[@magnaviator]

not in China

[@LordZontar]

I love one of the listed Direct Costs of coal: "Souls payment processing at the Company Store".

[@ImprobableMatter]

You're the first person to comment on that little joke, I was hoping more people got the reference.

[@Rheinhard]

@@ImprobableMatter paging Tennessee Ernie Ford…

[@jeffreysoreff9588]

@@ImprobableMatter I noticed it too, but LordZontar commented first. Congrats!

[@jimofaotearoa3636]

Ya load 16 tons and whaddya get, another day older and deeper in debt...

[@michaelz6555]

Doo, doo, doo, doo, doo do doo dooooooooooo...

[@Xsuperkraft]

Thank you - great video and great explanation!

[@LiborTinka]

It's similar in chemical industry - a yield over 80% of a single step in organic synthesis is considered very good, and over 90% excellent. If just one step has say 50% yield, then the total yield of the whole process gets halved.

[@jendlti]

So walter white is a god? Hehe

[@tonypaca3015]

There’s a company that got 120 millions Celsius for 101 second. Any progress here?

[@LiborTinka]

@@jendlti Pretty much yes. Just the chemical workup (getting the products out from rxn mixture) and purification have significant losses. One would have to go for some fancy enzymatic process to get 97+% efficiency of an organic reaction and then some very tedious and energy-intensive workup the get all the product out of the reaction medium. It's never like baking a pie, where you just shove it in the oven, bake it (and shake it :D) and you're done. Even if the reaction efficiency is very high, the yield will be lower due to workup.

[@danapeck5382]

Hugh Loweth once quipped over lunch, "There's probably a reason the closest functioning fusion system is 98 million miles away." Classic Loweth.

[@gabrielesteves7498]

I understood that reference!

[@gabrielesteves7498]

It didn't work well in spider-man

[@danapeck5382]

@@gabrielesteves7498 Loweth was a classic.

[@ThePocketMedic]

Thermonuclear bombs are basically inertial confinement fusion systems.

[@danapeck5382]

@@ThePocketMedic minus the "confinement" ...

[@RacinJsn]

I think the takeaway is we should see how possible it is to scale up goats walking on treadmills to solve energy demand issues...

[@carlodave9]

I'm on it. All I need is 12 billion dollars for 8 goats, and my project will show 8-times the output efficiency of all the best fusion reactors yet created. Number go up!

[@TheReaverOfDarkness]

That's not the takeaway. Fusion *IS* a very, *very* good energy source. It's just *very* difficult to make it work. Goats on treadmills would be easy, except that it *can't* work.

[@mikedrop4421]

@@TheReaverOfDarkness bet you're fun at parties.

[@TheReaverOfDarkness]

@@mikedrop4421 Oh I'm definitely not. Not usually anyway.

[@Shachza]

@@TheReaverOfDarkness Sounds like your parties need more goats! ;)

[@TheUnsungVil]

My physics professor once predicted: “Building a functioning fusion reactor would require nothing short of yet another _Manhattan Project_ … thousands of nuclear scientists, supported by a tenfold of construction workers, plant operators, security staff, drivers, cooks, cleaners, etc. - all in one spot in the middle of nowhere for espionage and sabotage deterrence… working 24/7… consuming the economic output of a mid-sized country in the process… for years on end… with uncertain outcome.“ And frankly, if there were an endeavor with such a magnitude of effort, they were able to conceal it quite well - or word had gone out by now.

[@cam609lee]

Fusion is an incredibly hard feat for sure.

[@JKenny44]

Energy efficiency = 100% (Rounded up from 70%) Love that bit

[@catherinev9847]

That there is some real maths

[@lenOwOo]

Need 0. Before that 70%

[@tuttt99]

100% is not possible according to simple physics. The best thermal to electrical conversion efficiency is ~ 60%.

[@dmitrizaslavski8480]

@@tuttt99 lol, it is not about thermal to elecricity, but energy in/out reactor.

[@joeywilliamz3838]

Very Confusion 🤔

[@neuvocastezero1838]

"... just as soon at their time machine division completes their project." lol

[@Jazman342]

What do we want? Time travel. When do we want it? It's irrelevant.

[@f1reguy587]

Logical, get the time machine, go back with info, evolve tech faster… love the concept, but like politics, it’s just saying stuff to get a positive response.

[@ohhansel]

Ah good old nerd humor.

[@IBeforeAExceptAfterK]

Step 1: Invent time machine Step 2: Go to the far-off future of 2015 Step 3: Buy a Mr. Fusion brand home fusion reactor Step 4: Return to the present year 2019 to show your new compact fusion reactor to the world

[@hg2.]

Fusion is a stupid boondoggle.

[@TCBYEAHCUZ]

An incredibly sober take on the whole subject of actually commercially viable fusion energy.

[@Sullaban]

Chaim Goldbaum I keep trying to leave this site and the author keeps bring up valuable points. I guess I will stick around. Yes he is making a lot of incredible points. Here is a link on another topic, a topic of mine on a topic of importance. Worth a look thanks. these videos are not on topic but they are important they are worth a quick look studio.kzbin.info0i1fekgBW6Q/edit kzbin.info/www/bejne/epyyg5h_rtmChpY

[@TM-cm4gb]

its insane how muc hfalse information is in the system...

[@sl5311]

Bums me out.

[@Ergzay]

Important note about the graphs around 8:40 is that the figure assumes classical low temperature superconductors with significantly reduced magnetic fields than are available in modern high temperature superconductors. That GREATLY reduces the major radius required and so changes the graph significantly.

[@maekong2010]

How you managed to make this subject entertaining, and not only entertaining, but hysterically funny, will always be beyond my reach. You, sir, are indispensable to the sciences. I wish I could ring the notification bell, like fifteen times.

[@ImprobableMatter]

Thanks. I'm running out of ideas for dry humor for the upcoming video, but I will try.

[@maekong2010]

@@ImprobableMatter Don't worry. It's more important to be interesting than humorous. Besides, I think the humor may sometimes happen unbeknownst to even you. Just don't stop educating, no matter what. You, and others like you, are all we've got left.

[@Toro_Da_Corsa]

@@ImprobableMatter Why do we need to bother with cold fusion and all this stuff ? Because of people's ignorant sentiments about conventional nuclear waste ?

[@changcheng73]

One prominent soviet physicist once said about that matter: "fusion power will be there as long as humanity will need it". The amount of money spent on fusion problem in 10 years is 50 times less than Pentagon spends every single year!

[@alexii911]

And it's still more than enough to build 30+ nuclear power plants every year that will be producing power constantly, cheap and safe.

[@matthewfors114]

@@alexii911 yes and no, it would be cheap and safe if they used thorium, but thorium was never really used because it wasnt as good for nuclear weapons. i guess its way better for power plants and less radioactive if there was a meltdown. we could have endless power already from thorium

[@matthewfors114]

@@alexii911 just make sure to advocate thorium if you talk about nuclear power. using uranium is bad and creates loads of waste(although im sure they could find use for the waste) but keep thinking THORIUM THORIUM THORIUM lol

[@alexii911]

@@matthewfors114 could you please elaborate on loads of waste? Because as far as I know byproducts of nuclear fission mostly get recycled. If you don't know, please end this argument, because you are very likely to make a fool of yourself.

[@azurelmao]

@Alex Hell Yeah. If people actually wanted clean and safe energy, they would have already replaced most power plants with nuclear. Radioactive waste has nothing to do with this, it's safe when it's surrounded by meters and meters of concrete, which is how they contain it as far as I know.

[@JoseJimeniz]

XKCD Researcher Translation: "10 years" means "We haven't finished inventing it yet, but when we do, it'll be awesome."

[@sc149]

Something being invented is also not at all that it will be instantly brought into use on a large scale. We finally achieved energy neutral fusion recently. I genuinky think energy positive fusion by 2040 is a gimme, very uncomonly in laboratory like test settings. Still gonne be a lonnnnnnng time for it to be usefuly integrated into any national grid as anything other than a vanity or similar project.

[@fernandobernardo6324]

@@sc149 We didn't achieve what you think we did. Look for Sabine Hossenfelder nuclear con fusion video to understand what they really did.

[@jaewok5G]

* if only you'd give us all the money

[@LoneWolf-wp9dn]

yeah anything 10 years away is just vaporware

[@DevinDTV]

@@sc149 yeah no shit. you kinda missed the point there

[@FromTheHeart2]

Just discovered your channel! Fan already! Thanks a lot for sharing!

[@phonsely]

its a bunch of misinformation

[@alistermathie8485]

This is the best video I've seen on Fusion engergy production, why it's difficult and why a seemingly postive gain isn't good enough! Great work!

[@victorcercasin]

I'm happy there are actual scientists talking about this stuff, not just DNews or the other 500 channels like them

[@sgtjonmcc]

Scientists are talking about this stuff all the time, just through peer reviewed journals and not youtube.

[@ImprobableMatter]

@@sgtjonmcc Why not both?

[@raifikarj6698]

@@ImprobableMatter yeah with the succes of two minutes paper. There is really a need (and market ;-) for peer viewed video for us KZbin scholar

[@TheAwesomeMister]

This is a very comprehensible and straight forward take on the whole fusion phenomenon. Thank you a lot! It's always hard to find some decent information on a hyped topic. Yours is outstanding helpful, honest and well sourced.

[@lucasrem1870]

Corruption that is, Merkel, Putin, Communist skum, Allah! Shell Exxon BP, we love dirty people in power!

[@johnindermuehle7632]

I work for CFS, thanks for the shout out haha.

[@eduardocavanagh]

Congratulations for this excellent presentation, thorough and realistically detailed with no hype

[@tsreasonify]

Thank you for this overview. I'm especially thankful that you clearly pointed out the logic of market manipulation for some of the more unscrupulous companies - the pump and dump that is well known from penny stocks and now crypto currencies - buy low, hype up, sell with profit and abandon the project.

[@HerlingGA]

That's what I was thinking. At least I'm not the only one who thinks so.

[@surfernorm6360]

That sounds like how we have nuclear waste superfund sites all over the country or at fukushima where the money providers declare bankrutpcy and leave the cleanup to the government and working taxpayers or the one at Hanford Wa. Of coarse that was for defense research so its defendable. I wonder how soon Homers 3 eyed salmon will take

[@incognitotorpedo42]

@@surfernorm6360 3 eyed fish? Um, forever? Don't get your facts from anti-nuke cartoons.

[@cosmic_gate476]

That my friend, is called an exit scam. Hyping a project to get investment then running away with the money

[@christianlingurar7085]

you DID understand, that he's doing exactly that? this is not a scientific video, this is a manipulatory, untrue and badly biased opinion video. the presented figures are partly wrong or outdated and show only limited aspects of the whole. I guess the author is profiting from traditional energy sources or even trying to manipulate the stock price of some fraudulent bogus "venture capital" funded "fusion energy is here" stock exchange construct share... as you said, but it works the other way around, too, like "buy low calls, realize it was an error, hype down the shares, sell the calls" - while the shares never get that low again. btw, what exactly is a "FORMER fusion scientist"?! what is he now?!

[@philipwatson2407]

I've followed this topic now since the mid-1970s, and we have been told consistently that fusion power is 'twenty years away'. I am inclined to suspect that two hundred years would probably be a closer estimate.

[@holretz1]

Then look at the facts....

[@nia.d33]

I think its a mental trick we play to make us do the hard early work we will never live to see the results of. We tell ourselves that fusion will be here in 20 years so that people dont get discouraged and stop work on it as i suspect many would if they realised it would take 400 years to finish and not even their grandchildren might live to see it.

[@holretz1]

@@nia.d33 There is a clear timeline now. It's not science anymore, it's engineering.

[@DBZHGWgamer]

@@holretz1 No, it's not just engineering. The tech to make workable fusion still doesn't exist. The timelines that exist are for the most part complete BS someone pulled out their ass, except for some of the timelines that don't yet have an end date.

[@holretz1]

@@DBZHGWgamer I think you should keep your paranoid conspiracy theories for yourself....

[@marcocoelhohome]

It is interesting to see you mention ITER in a positive light. I was under the impression the ITER project was mostly a "show off" nuclear fusion reactor using a bunch of untested, experimental technology and approaches, but without any intent to achieve real fusion breakthrough, the real purpose would be to test other technologies. Glad to know there are people actually commiting to the original view and what was written on the paper.

[@NA-lp2re]

The fact that he doesn’t say it will never be possible is really encouraging.

[@mickberick8575]

As an A grade Electrician with 33 years experience I find this absolutely fascinating ,I've been avidly following the Tocomac and other reactor designs so your simple concise explanations - The analysis provided is clear and understood ,I'd be fascinated to see and actual breakdown of all the coils,pumps and other equipment to fully understand the power requirements of the input energy and then the outputs including losses and efficiencies . Also permanent energy inputs versus generator outputs . Follow up videos as you mentioned. would be marvelous if you get the time . Thanks for your well presented and informative work .

[@rodericklenz5030]

The ITER website has a good rundown. The coils in their reactor contain something like 100,000km of wire.

[@jerryg50]

This is one of the best explanations I have viewed about the reality of creating a usable fusion reactor! This type of project makes for an interesting research.

[@jonathannetherton6727]

One of my uncles was a slave to a company store. They had a paper currency; the millers and extractors called souls. Almost shot by the state troopers for protesting being charged for certain waste disposal. I appreciate the zing! Good to see a sober-eyed view that isn't demonizing. Thank you.

[@kapytanhook]

Thank you so much for this voice of reason. I can't believe I have never heard of the engineering efficiency when that is all that matters. I get so sick of the KZbin channels just blindly reading press releases with 0 thought. It is especially bad in the green energy field.

[@Hongobogologomo]

Just seeing the word green used as a pronoun for energy makes me cringe. It's such a bastardized topic, contaminated by clueless and hostile imbeciles.

[@touristguy87]

"I get so sick of the KZbin channels just blindly reading press releases with 0 thought." um, YT is a great magnet for the largely ignorant yet still slightly curious. Do you expect more of YT?

[@lcunash8093]

This video was extremely well made, I hope KZbin blesses you with a larger audience.

[@sthanstigger2328]

Many thanks for this video. I’ve been trying to follow the progress of fusion research for 25 years now. The recent claims of start-up companies has left me bewildered. Your video is comprehensive and easy to understand 👍🏻😊

[@legitbeans9078]

Okay this is a great video. You know to put the music right in the background so its not distracting. And your narration is legit. Theres a slight echo from the room youre in though. Maybe get some sound proofing. Either way im subbing this is great.

[@oman636]

Great video, would love to hear about the other technical hurdles. Fusion does seem to be over hyped so it’s good to be brought back to ground

[@Yora21]

Oh fusion is amazing. How easily and cheaply it can be done is overhyped.

[@JamesSarantidis]

Chad ITER vs Virgin SPARC. Leaving the academic taunts aside, my uttermost respect to any of the researchers, investors and people in general that help our species climb the Kardashev scale.

[@ToxicityAssured]

If it's a dead end or not so possible tech, then we are not climbing the scale... We would be going the wrong way.

[@ianmeade7441]

@@ToxicityAssured worst case scenario: we get really good at building superconducting magnets

[@JamesSarantidis]

@@ToxicityAssured Even in that case, that's how science works. The wonderful people that work in these projects will examine experimentally why it is a dead end or not possible, so that the next tech will flourish. The only true wrong way in science is to stop asking questions. Hopefully, it is the right way. But time will tell.

[@Nostradevus1]

@@ToxicityAssured You never know what we may discover while in the process of trying to harness fusion reactions. NASA made major contributions to the creation of MRI's even thought they had no real interest or directive to research medical technologies.

[@charminjarmin1234]

Ah yes the kardeshev scale very cool comment I never thought of it like that have my like.

[@Christian-id1is]

“Despite humanities best effort to cover the earth in blanket of greenhouse gasses” I ducking died.

[@matttzzz2]

Poor duck

[@MaximilianonMars]

Get well soon.

[@tehnosan5769]

maybe a dumb question, but anyhow. What about if the reactor would be set up in space, would that allow us to forgo the energy needed to create vacuum and the cooling of the whole thing? Not saying that we should go to space to do it, but in case we do make it there in some higher capacity would this be more feasible there?

[@ImprobableMatter]

There are a few problems, not least that it is very expensive to launch a reactor into space. Some of the fuel recombines into a gas at the edge of the reactor. You would still need to have some sort of wall to keep this fuel (it's not confined by magnetic fields because it's not a plasma) from escaping. You also would need to pump out the Helium-4 produced. So not much of a benefit for a huge cost.

[@richardschaffer8740]

It would be even harder to cool it in space what are you on about?

[@wibblewobbler9104]

You're definitely right about overly optimistic dates being given, but its hard to say what the future holds. MIT's higher temperature superconducting magnets was a huge breakthrough. If we have another 3 or 4 truly major breakthroughs in the technology, that could significantly decrease the time to the first fully operational reactor.

[@marka1000]

That pesky cell wall material and tritium breeding is gonna bite our behinds. Plasma control too has got to be super tight.

[@jackfoster3323]

@@marka1000 As far as I'm aware, ITER (being built in southern France) uses a hybrid design that's not tokamak, but called stellerator or something like that. But i think it's supposed to be more efficient at confining the plasma. Also, tritium will be easy money on the moon, it's everywhere up there. In fact, I think achieving effective fusion power would trigger a new gold rush to the moon, and kickstart the actual colonizing of the moon. Just food for thought!

[@esahg5421]

MIT were only a "couple" of years from cracking cold-fusion and that was back when Val-Kilmer was a teen.

[@wibblewobbler9104]

@@esahg5421 Cold fusion, uri geller bending spoons with his mind... the 80s were a strange time of silliness :D

[@esahg5421]

@@wibblewobbler9104 can you believe it i was a fan of both lol, but been in every avenue i can imagine since. cold fusion sure cost alot of money just like zero-point energy and pyramid power yeah investigate everything but uri now uri was special. what he taught me was "no one trusts a magician" lol 🤣

[@birdshotbill]

Detail in this video was spot on, I also saw the CFS release on the MIT channel and was also very excited about its prospects in the future. Would love for more content on this subject and for a follow up video. Keep up the good work!

[@khaled99069]

I like this guy's humor, voice and way of presenting things

[@louisrobitaille5810]

13:39 I thought D+D gave He^4_2 + photon in the bottom case 🧐. Why would it give off a neutron if the He^4_2 is more stable than the He^3_2 variant? I don't get it and I'm confused 🥲.

[@ImprobableMatter]

Because it would be impossible to conserve momentum and energy if they fused directly to 4He.

[@0sireion]

This is the best and clearest explanation of fusion reactors I have seen yet. It's great that you are a fan and are highly critical (dare I say, sarcastic). I would want all researchers working on fusion to be highly critical. The last thing we need is for someone's sloppiness to go awry. We'd pay for that for centuries.

[@panpiper]

I read at least one article back in the 1960s telling us that fusion could be as close as ten years away. By the 70s though, most of those in the know promised us fusion was just thirty years away. It's now fifty years later and guess what? Fusion is STILL thirty years away.

[@jeffreysoreff9588]

@Peter Cohen Yup, I think I read some of the same article(s?) back in the 60s as a kid. Now, as a 62-year-old, I just think of the real date as: "Not in my lifetime".

[@88Superphysics88]

For 70 years, scientists have been unable to make a thermonuclear reactor. why? The answer is simple - wrong theory! The reactor is therefore not done correctly. Scientists do not yet know how to make a thermonuclear reactor that gives out commercial heat. When do scientists promise to make a commercial thermonuclear reactor? Promise in 40 years! And they don't guarantee that. But, there is a technology that will help make a commercial thermonuclear reactor in two years. The theory is correct, the reactor design is correct.. I offer the transfer of technology for free, under the contract. 70 лет учёные не могут сделать термоядерный реактор. Почему? Ответ простой - неправильная теория! Реактор поэтому сделан неправильно. Учёные пока не знают, как сделать термоядерный реактор, который выдаёт коммерческое тепло. Когда учёные обещают сделать коммерческий термоядерный реактор? Обещают через 40 лет! И это они не гарантируют. Но, есть технология, которая поможет сделать коммерческий термоядерный реактор за два года. Теория правильная, конструкция реактора правильная. Предлагаю передачу технологии бесплатно, по договору. n-t.ru/tp/ie/ts.htm Thermonuclear fusion in the Sun - a new version. Термоядерный синтез на Солнце - новая версия.

[@wowalamoiz9489]

@@88Superphysics88 Scientists definitely have the right theory, otherwise they couldn't create fusion bombs.

[@88Superphysics88]

@@wowalamoiz9489 Сами подумайте. Бомбы сделали, а коммерческий термоядерный реактор не могут сделать 70 лет. Почему? Технология реактора намного проще чем технология бомбы. Think for yourself. The bombs were made, but a commercial thermonuclear reactor cannot be made for 70 years. Why? Reactor technology is much simpler than bomb technology.

[@wowalamoiz9489]

@@88Superphysics88 Because thermonuclear weapons use fission explosions to provide the necessary temperatures and pressure needed for surplus fusion. The reactors so far have not. *BUT* All the fusion reators have done fusion. Doing fusion is not hard, even a high schooler could do it. The only difficulty is to get SURPLUS energy from fusion. To have more output energy than input energy. If the theory was wrong, as you say, these reactors would not achieve fusion reactions. The fact is that they DO. The goal is not to achieve fusion, but to gain energy from fusion.

[@ImprobableMatter]

The first of a multi-part series of shorter videos beginning with the most asked-for topic, "why a fusor won't work (and why only thermonuclear fusion will lead to a gain in energy)", is now up: kzbin.info/www/bejne/aHXdfIuEZtWWrbs Since my video was posted, Sabine Hossenfelder discussed the misrepresentation of fusion gain vs engineering gain in a recent video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/gnuXiGSdYpt9n7s I am making a response video.

[@aeloolindowy]

It is! One of the issues I couldn't find a reasonable answer to is, why can't fusors use electrical arcs/plasma as electrodes. They would be resistant to (almost) any amount of heat and radiation.

[@infiniteuniverse123]

It is always nice to hear someone admit problems in physics. Creating fusion that will produce a net gain is only the tip of the iceberg. How is a containment system going to be created that will create and maintain the reaction while we harvest the heat from it? We are looking for quark plasma. That is why the heat requirements get higher and higher. The Big Bang was our universe turning itself into a gargantuan particle collider. The galaxies are quark plasma shrapnel from this event. Each galaxy began its life as a single black hole. Every celestial object created in our galaxy began its life in the quark plasma state including our own planet. Our moon is the end of the entropy of quark plasma. That is how the conservation of energy and mass is carried out as elements are formed from the outside of the mass inward. Supernovae simply do not exist. Everything was already here when the big bang happened.

[@edemilsonlima]

Instead of a hot plasma, have scientists tried cold fusion by cooling hydrogen to nearly 0 Kelvin and applying electric current and megatons of pressure to it?

[@AlexandreLollini]

Thanks for this information. I was almost there, ad that's why I prefer a short term future with fission as an energy source, possibly switching to Thorium molten salt low pressure with freeze valve gravity stop system. (removing pressure water and other risks) And using nuclear as a temporarily measure until we can make solar systems in orbit from molten asteroids to feed energy via mircowaves or lasers to Earth to gain area for forests and agriculture and stop to rely on Earth rare ressources.

[@reahs4815]

Thanks for the good video!

[@ruifenghuang1029]

07:09, question on this. Why do you need to convert heat to eletricity and then back to heat through cyclotron for maintaining reaction. I guess initially plasma needs to be heated through cyclotron, but shouldn't D+T which generated couple Mega eV (MeV) heat be more than enough at maintaining condition of 30 million kelvin, where average atom has two thousand eV (kT). If the "reheating" through cyclotron is not needed for maintaining 30 million kelvin, it would mean electricity generation right?

[@alfthornton]

It's very refreshing to see this issue discussed in a knowledgeable and digestible way. I would add that the disparity in fusion investment between the 1970s (resulting in the JET data shown at 7:40) and now (we haven't repeated let alone defeated that record) helps to motivate optimism about what is possible if we decide to spend the money. Going from Q=0 to Q=1 at the plasma may turn out to be much harder than going from Q=1 to Q=100. There are many industries around the world which have successfully tackled these nuclear engineering challenges such as tritium handling, neutron blankets, etc., but the stuff we needed to get to Q=1 was entirely novel. Fingers crossed that MIT can make us optimistic again!

[@mrcreed6874]

I'd be glad to hear more about the challenges and progress (so far) around fusion reactors. This has already been very insightful

[@Toro_Da_Corsa]

It is a waste of time. We already have nuclear power that works fine. The limits on it are political and sentimental

[@VeganSemihCyprus33]

They have enslaved and fooled you 👉 The Connections (2021) [short documentary] 💖

[@burnttoast26]

Being able to do something is one thing, making it efficient enough to apply it is something else, and the massive task of infrastructural overhaul is an entirely different matter. I do think that applied fusion will be achieved and utilized at some point in the future, but the time scale for that is 300 years, not 30. We don't even properly have the first step done yet.

[@wdd3141]

So we'll never have Doc Brown's "Mr. Fusion," like "Mr. Coffee."

[@Killerkraft975]

For sure. I believe it will be done within the future but I don't really see it within my lifetime. Possibly due to the climate, running out of fossil fuels, there would be a demand into research within these fields around 2050 or 2060 but I highly doubt it would be commercialized until way after all of us in this comment section are gone.

[@TheLtVoss]

​@@Killerkraft975 mhm im a 98 so with 20 years of building time I might see the first one but I would say it is reached earlyer about 2065 if thing go well with ai (technological singularity) and ITER, Wendelstein X7 etc but definitely not before that 😅

[@ralalbatross]

If you'd asked me 10 years ago, I'd have said 'not a fucking chance we do fusion'. After a PhD in plasmas, and with about half a decade of watching computational sciences go leaps and bounds even beyond what we were doing, the computational stuff dpne these days are able to do in under an hour that would have taken multiple expensive experiments and 5 years to do. The plasma stream guys aren't getting as much benefit because the field geometries are much more complicated to simulate. This is because they need stable plasmas to achieve fusion - which they achieve mostly by using magnets to shout at it to tell it what to do, and the longer the stream the more instability potential you're seeing from the currents. You can't just wrap it around a big MHD sim and hope it pans out across the entire 6m radius. Even so, the tokamak guys are still doing work - just changes in field geometry and plasma heating achieved thirty fold gains in under a decade. ITER will almost certainly develop burning plasma just through sheer brute force, but its the engineering design that I am worried about. The pulsed guys though - there are literally dozens if not hundreds of ways to compress plasma into fusion states just using field geometries alone. ITER relative to these smaller startups has the other big problem - too many cooks. Way too many people deciding what is and isn't done inside the machine. On the pulsed stuff, I lost a bet over NIF never hitting any of their Qs, even the ones they invented. They did it within a few years of the next gen plasma dynamics codes, overcoming impossibly complex plasma instabilities to do it. They actually hit a thermal Q purely through experiment design and given NIFs lasers are decades old monstrosities it wouldn't surprise me if the holhraum designs improve to the point that even ICF becomes viable. Honestly? One or more of the startups might do it before 2030. My bets on Helion though at this point. Their design has so many engineering advantages to its general controllability and scalability as well as sufficient design width in how those systems can be used to actually pulse plasmas that im astonished it hasn't been done before.

[@ralalbatross]

Incidentally. The first step was achieved using NIF. That was our nuclear reactor criticality moment using the least likely method of achieving fusion that, genuinely, most plasma physicists used as a butt of a joke. When NIF got ignition I was so surprised I was at the centre of a circle of shocked plasma physicists who couldn't believe it either and half of us checked the paper to make sure they weren't bullshitting. As far as I could tell, they haven't printed notable or meaningful retractions. That was the moment I realised the entire community had been sleeping on the real problem. Atoms are not complex things. Plasmas are. Modern computational processes are capable of performing experiments that stop experimentalists from going down blind alleys looking for nothing. NIF achieved fusion solely through process. If we can do it with ICF even in that absolutely idiotic NIF facility then more conventional methods are already working. We just haven't built them properly yet.

[@m.streicher8286]

I wish someone like you would make a quantum computing video. This really demystified an almost mythical technology, quantum computing can feel the same way.

[@ImprobableMatter]

One related to quantum computing is coming up, hopefully out next month.

[@m.streicher8286]

@@ImprobableMatter I love you

[@Buddhamaniac]

When I talk to people about the necessity of building new fission reactors they always say 'we don't need them because fusion will be here very soon' which of course is false.

[@mcmarkmarkson7115]

This renewable energy shit without nuclear power is war on the poor. In germany prices skyrocket and we still buy nuclear power from the french. It's pure insanity.

[@yaykruser]

@@mcmarkmarkson7115I thought we had to much electricity? The problem isnt the price of the energy, its the goddamm taxes! Same with gas.

[@tetrabromobisphenol]

No one mentions how they plan to get the tons of deuterium needed to run fusion reactors either. Apparently electrolysis plants run off of lots of hamster wheels, rainbows, and dancing unicorns.

[@zacheryeckard3051]

@@tetrabromobisphenol That would be part of the "reaching net positive energy production" thing. You'd bleed some of the energy production from the reactor to power the electrolysis.

[@acmefixer1]

The fission reactor industry must conquer the two major problems of new nuclear power plants: overruns on the costs in the tens of billions, and the delays for more than 10 years before the plant is commissioned.

[@DemonetisedZone]

This is a great KZbin video Taking away the hype and leaving the hard nosed reality of wtf is actually happening Thank you my friend, i have actually learned something 👍

[@oliverwhittington6434]

Very interesting, really opened my eyes to the hyperbole of these companies. I'm studying mech eng next year and would love to go into this field.

[@ImprobableMatter]

Good luck. Have a look at some other educational videos I have up.

[@craigcarmichael5748]

The numbers being presented by proponents seem to work out well for creating a self regenerating stream of R & D money. I think a better way to make as much electricity as desired would be to make a Tesla Coil and instead of grounding the bottom of the secondary like everybody else, run it though a load to ground. Tesla lit a whole bank of incandescent light bulbs. The excess energy captured seems to come from HE rays/short space rays, in the giga electron volt range, frequencies around 10 to the 24th Hz. Only at last detected I think it was 2007. (Your typical electromagentic spectrum chart ends before that with the gamma ray band.)

[@harikrishnanchandramohan4209]

Its not a matter of science, its economies. The energy required to initiate and sustain fusion reactions is greater than the energy produced.

[@willis936]

I just did a two year stint as an engineer on a stellarator. I learned a lot and this summary is the best lay of the land crash course I've seen. It's what it feels like to have lunch and drinks conversations with the people who really build these things. The talks to the public lose so much of the finer points but this video shows that it's needless. Great stuff.

[@ImprobableMatter]

To be clear, I did not say, and nor do I think that it will never be possible. I only wanted to be realistic about startup predictions.

[@willis936]

@@ImprobableMatter I don't think it's improbable either. The timeline is often oversold. Justifying the investment to society is tricky when everyone is panicked about climate change over the next 50 years. No one considers the world after that. Fusion also has a public perception deficit from a series of charlatans overselling their pseudoscience. It's hard to overcome these things but they need to be faced.

[@ImprobableMatter]

@@willis936 Woops, that comment was my response to someone else. Apparently something gets messed up when I decide to fire off lots of replies. I wanted to say that I gave your channel a sub and I intend to have a simple video out comparing stellarators and tokamaks soon. Will also try to record a conversation with my friend working on W7-X.

[@maikol6851]

@@ImprobableMatter Will you still do this? :D

[@ImprobableMatter]

@@maikol6851 I have multiple videos out about fusion. Did not manage to get in touch with my friend.

[@tomhman6441]

I worked forPrinceton University’s fusion project for 43 years. I was a great and interesting place to work. We had success and I hope for more advancements in fusion science.

[@boruta1034]

This video was very useful to understand recent breakthrough.

[@seattlegrrlie]

Excellent video on the real challenges of fusion.... Like where are we going to get all the tritium we don't have and how do we deal with all the high energy neutrons.

[@puppable]

I had a guy one time arguing at me that we should cancel infrastructure and green energy projects just to invest in fusion energy instead. Not entirely surprisingly, he seemed to have a lot of involvement with recognizable tech organizations. It's incredible the positions you have to try and respectfully debate against.

[@cdgstuff7512]

There is a reasonable position that would appear close to that guy's position. Modern nuclear fission reactor designs are safe, scalable, variable , and a good coal and gas complete replacement. Unlike fusion reactor attempts, fission is practical and tested, although still held back by governments around the world. Concerning green energy projects, not all are an unchallenged good. Some installations damage a large area of previously untouched ground (solar) or use an unreasonable amount of unrecyclable material to be landfilled (wind). Most depend on gas to supplement the varying electric supply, making fossil fuel use an integral part of these green installations.

[@proplejeezus6406]

@@cdgstuff7512 I don't wanna start an internet argument here because those are rarely productive, but dropping all environmental projects to focus on one, single, imperfect, solution is not a good idea. Don't get me wrong, I'm not anti fusion, but it is not a viable single solution. Between being hard to export to newly economically growing countries, the compounding danger of creating many many reactors, the lack of available, and importantly, geologically stable space to store waste products and the simple lack of enough resources, trained staff and public will to create enough nuclear power plants to power continents worth within the next 10-20 years (if we want to hit emission deadlines) makes it impossible.

[@puppable]

@@cdgstuff7512 I would say that wanting greater use of fission is a far cry from the sort of Enron Musk tech saviorism exhibited there, and a far more common position to hold at least nowadays. At any rate, fission has the very important distinction that it actually exists already.

[@Elite7555]

There is a lot of wishful thinking involved.

[@puppable]

@David Floren Please... Brevity is the soul of wit.... Either way... that's not what I was insinuating. The point was that silicon valley tech dudes can be annoying sometimes.

[@avidodd26]

I love how the thumbnail for this video implies that you are the reason we won't have fusion power by 2040

[@ImprobableMatter]

I like to joke that this is my hidden "Among Us" reference.

[@cafemorakanu2535]

Its always good to see a video that backed up by good researches and knowledge. This technology is certainly much harder to be perfected and took longer than previously thought, but I always believe that as long as if there are progresses, we are on the right way, and every failure we discovered along the way will make the tech safer.

[@lucasrem1870]

Corruption that is, Merkel, Putin, Communist skum, Allah! Shell Exxon BP, we love dirty people in power!

[@solaire.j4230]

What happens to the helium generated from the reaction between lithium and a neutron?

[@ImprobableMatter]

The power plant gets to sell it.

[@jeromebloom_gripcraft6031]

Thanks for this. All very interesting and informative! Fingers crossed that there will be some major breakthroughs in the years to come because it would be a great shame if Fusion Power becomes a dead end!

[@ryanbrown982]

I'd love to see a follow-up on p+B reactions. They have their own hangups, but they nicely get around (mostly) the excess neutron problem, and they result in high energy charged helium nuclei, which allows for direct electricity capture. That (hypothetically) gets you up to in the ~70% energy capture range instead of the ~50% with a thermal turbine generator.

[@russhamilton3800]

If you think reaching Q1 is difficult with tritium and deuterium the P+B will really make it hard to get any J(oules)...

[@JoeLambert1000]

A very serious, interesting contribution to the fusion challenge.

[@Gary-zq3pz]

We've got fusion power now. Controlling it is the problem, 'cause H-bombs put out a lot of energy. The trick is to get it in a steady flow rather than one big burst.

[@snetmotnosrorb3946]

Before watching this, I, as a layman, just having studied natural science in the equivalent of high school in my country and being a (home) computer enthusiast, was thinking that fusion energy might be viable in 2080. Considering we still don't have generation 4 fission power plants, and won't have before 2040, and we're just now building a full scale fusion plant with the hopes of producing net energy in the reaction alone, not electricity, I couldn't see how fusion would be even remotely close. With this video I doubt it's even possible, and it will definitely not happen in my lifetime. A bunch of major discoveries and improvements need to be made, and then they need to be perfected.

[@alexanderstone9463]

It’s definitely worth watching his other videos on fusion if you haven’t already. He goes into much greater detail. He hasn’t yet made a video on which approach he thinks is mostly likely to work, but after watching all of his videos (but especially the last one) you will clearly see why he chose to say that it wouldn’t happen by 2040, as opposed to never. He mentioned Commonwealth Fusion at the end and admitted that he’s biased towards them. A lot of physicists and engineers are, as are investors, since they typically raise the most money out of all the startups. The reason for this is not just because they’re affiliated with MIT, or because their approach of using high temperature superconductors makes sense for magnetic confinement fusion, but because a lot of their tests and simulations have gone well. Their current project also has a very specific and narrowly defined purpose, which is always nice. With that in mind, their tokamak is designed to have the same performance as ITER at just 2% of the size. As he mentioned, the “Q value” performance of these devices improves as they increase in size. Therefore, it’s not such a stretch of the imagination to conclude that a reactor using YBCO superconductors (like SPARC does) that’s the size of ITER (which uses much weaker magnets), will increase the performance so much that fusion power will be made viable. Of course, there are uncertainties and problems with this scenario (watch the other videos and especially the last one to learn about them). But the developments in the field are compelling enough that if you asked this guy, he’d probably say that there is a reasonable chance that fusion power will exist by the end of the century (if not earlier).

[@markazulislam5143]

What do you think about the prospects of fusion energy after US energy departments announcement and the new superconductor that just got invented (lk-99)

[@sciencegeekgrandpa8]

I think the thoroughness of your approach would be welcome in a video about molten salt reactors, especially thorium-fueled ones.

[@lucofparis4819]

A dramatically underrated channel! I already knew fusion was much harder than most folks would have others believe, yet remain virtually ignorant on the subject. It's always useful to find videos like this one to hammer home yet another round of nuclear physics into my thick head. 😁

[@mattblack118]

Perhaps if they weren't climatards the channel would be better received.

[@lucofparis4819]

@@mattblack118 Exactly how is this guy supposed to be a 'climatard'?

[@mattblack118]

@@lucofparis4819 All people who try to sell CO2 as a major factor in the climate are climatards. A physicist should know better.

[@lucofparis4819]

@@mattblack118 Regardless of who claims what, do you actually see that the climate is indeed changing for worse than it used to be?

[@mattblack118]

@@lucofparis4819 No. The planet is clearly greening. Name 1 thing that is worse now than 100 years ago in terms of global climate.

[@Pepsimaximo1]

great video. thanks for giving such a level-headed and well-cited breakdown of the current state of fusion energy

[@Krmpfpks]

Please think about covering the stellarator approach, in my layman’s understanding it is similar to the tokamak in principle and in backing by thorough scientific evaluation but it could solve some of the tokamaks problems you did not mention in this video. There is also a test reactor here in Germany (Wendelstein 7-X) that seems to be on track to prove the feasibility of this approach soon (maybe already in 2022).

[@GrimK77]

True that. 7-X Wendelstein solves issue of uneven plasma concentration that results in thermal stress on central part of spherical tokamaks. Easier to cool.

[@Krmpfpks]

@@GrimK77 And I also read it doesn’t need a pulsed magnetic field and hence is easier to operate. W7-X is not designed to ever produce energy, it is to small to achieve that. But last year they achieved fusion and next year they want to show 30 minutes of continuous plasma with fusion. That would be quite a feat and would certainly make the stellarator the best design to scale up. We will see if the tokamak can solve its problems earlier, but given the political overhead it’s unlikely.

[@MyKharli]

Your still stuck with the problem of having to contain 200million deg c and heat water to steam in a reliable efficient way with super cooled magnets all in the mix..crazy or what !

[@wilurbean]

@@MyKharli not really. Neutrons should go through magnets no problem and water is the best neutron catcher. But you do basically need s fission plant to dedicate its output to starting a really power reactor, which is ironic

[@Krmpfpks]

@@MyKharli yes, it would be a remarkable achievement. The tokamak is the most researched design to be able to achieve that and it still has a lot of problems to solve. The stellarator is similar to a tokamak but instead of using a pulsed magnetic field it uses a static but curled up magnetic field. These are the only two designs with a decent chance of scaling up to commercial use and good scientific backing. I hope they get it to work in my lifetime.

[@michaelearl6765]

I'd be very curious to hear your take on the inertial confinement projects, most notably General Fusion, which also has attracted a lot of VC money and is building a proof-of-concept reactor.

[@ChadDidNothingWrong]

That's the only project that seems feasible to me.

[@hk-wt5iu]

ICF is useful for developing and testing implosion-type thermonuclear weapon concepts while avoiding the need to actually detonate a full-scale nuke. For delivering power to the grid, inertial confinement is lagging decades behind magnetic confinement (even with the recent record of fusion energy gain). This is due to the lasers consuming thousands of times more energy than the heating power which reaches the part of the plasma undergoing fusion. A tokamak or stellarator could conceivably be a viable reactor with a fusion gain of 30-50. ITER is expected to reach 10, and the next step after that will be a demonstration power plant. ICF as it currently stands would not be a viable reactor concept even if it miraculously reached a fusion gain of 1000.

[@coalbuster]

@@hk-wt5iu Much of ICF research is classified for the exact reason you stated. It will always be funded due to bomb physics.

[@davescott7680]

@@hk-wt5iu General Fusions design doesn't use lasers.

[@AmienJohaadien]

General fusion is part ICF and part traditional MCF - along with TAE systems.

[@breakablec]

Justified criticism in any scientific area including fusion is appreciated, however I am willing to bet a non-trivial amount of money that fusion will put watts on the grid by end of 2040. They might not have commercial power plants and they might cut some corners but I am certain of this as long as they can get the relevant funding which a lot of approaches have. I support all approaches to fusion as long as they use the scientific method and I hope for tighter collaboration in the fusion community going forward, including peer review and criticism.

[@MauryMarkowitz]

I'll take that bet. How much and who will hold it?

[@breakablec]

@@MauryMarkowitz 1000 USD. I can either do it on something like playwager or can ask betrair exchange to set something up for higher profile. What odds you expect 50/50?

[@timlash]

@@breakablec Love it! If I weren't so old I'd match that $1K. But I'll probably need it for incontinent products soon enough.

[@AndDiracisHisProphet]

@@breakablec you guys have to really be clear, though. by "by end of 2040" do you mean the end of the YEAR 2040? or by end of the deacde, so 2049?

[@breakablec]

@@AndDiracisHisProphet I think I would go for year 2040, 49 is too guaranteed in my mind as even DEMO should put watts on grid by 2048 barring further delays

[@francesco5254]

Why didn't I discover this channel before, it's amazing

[@davidgriffiths7696]

One of those occasional gems to be found on Utube. There could hardly be a more important question in respect of the inability of our civilisation to use energy conservatively enough to avoid increasing energy shortfalls and risk. This documentary explains why fusion generated electricity has always been 30 years away, as well as explaining some for me new concepts such as tritium reproduction rate, another challenge which may prove insurmountable. Subscribed and looking forward to more detail regarding engineering and fusion energy budgeting prospects.👍

[@matt-ci8sh]

Great video, question though: with the ITER’s proposed fusion gain of 10, would we expect to see any actual meaningful energy gain (engineering gain of more than 1)?

[@ImprobableMatter]

In principle a fusion gain of 10 should be able to get above an engineering gain above 1 for a conventional tokamak like ITER. The more, the merrier, of course and any future plant should go even higher.

[@Gomlmon99]

ITER I think will run at about 0.6 overall, when it’s at Q=10. If I remember correctly.

[@ImprobableMatter]

@@Gomlmon99 Very hard to say, since the blankets are not continuous and are not connected to electrical generators.

[@TROPtastic]

@@ImprobableMatter According to ITER and partner organizations, the reactor will consume 300 MW of electrical power to produce 500 MW of waste heat in the 2030s. If turbines were installed at ITER to convert that heat to electricity at 50% efficiency, it would result in an engineering gain factor of 0.83. A big step up from most startups, but probably not enough to demonstrate commercial viability. Thanks for the video, your explanation was well done!

[@gyrogearloose1345]

Brilliant! I really liked this. Thorough science and engineering analysis, WITH equal consideration towards Human values. AND exposé of the financial operators conning their clueless investors in the guise of revolutionary scientists. AS WELL the long list of references. Altogether a powerful and valuable piece of work. Thank you!

[@rogerroth7782]

30 years away and always will be. But... new tech will make it 10 to 20 years aeay and always will be. Progress! Wonderful information presented.

[@Buckykatt]

i really enjoyed this video and while complex you made it easily understandable for the layperson. thank you. +1 Subscriber i look forward to future videos and will now binge past videos 11/10

[@matthewgustafson7453]

Great video. Would be good if you could do an analysis on lpp fusion. Their design seems very different from other startups.

[@timlash]

Same, but also covering other aneutronic planned reactors.

[@superdupergrover9857]

Also, there is a cost in producing(refining?) deuterium. The hydrogen and oxygen produced would help to offset the cost, but there is still a huge space requirement.

[@hk-wt5iu]

Fusion releases such massive amounts of energy from a minimal amount of fuel that the cost of producing deuterium is negligible in comparison to other costs.

[@calmeilles]

It's not hugely expensive, about $1 per gram is about the bottom end of commercial prices at the moment.

[@sgpaterno9117]

Hello I am a mechanical engineering student in my bachelor right now, next year I can choose the specialization. But I am really insecure because in one hand I want to do fusion research and with the specialization energy engineering (and a few fusion lectures) i could do it. On the other hand i dont know if i schould dedicate my life on only this thing and maybe do something that has more application than "just" fusion. I really hope you can understand my problem here and maybe someone that has experience in this field can help me or give me a suggestion. Thanks already!

[@ImprobableMatter]

If it's just a module or a year of study and you want to do it - go for it. You aren't locked into working in fusion forever and you'd still get lots of useful experience. What you learn would still be useful whether or not you decide to stay in fusion or move to something else. I have a PhD in fusion energy, but research something else now.

[@sgpaterno9117]

@@ImprobableMatter Hello thanks for replying, well the whole master studies would be on fusion technology, therefore also probably the PhD, so I think I would do this and not learn for example thing with a bigger spectrum. On the other hand I really wanna do fusion, my problem is also that I don't if with engineering I can do a lot in fusion or is it better to be a physicist. I am also thinking if fusion can be economical with job opportunities and so on... Btw I live in Germany... It would also be very nice if you maybe do a Video where you talk about your PhD and experience with fusion ( maybe a more personal video) .

[@ImprobableMatter]

@@sgpaterno9117 That's a good idea, I'll see what I can do. But if you are interested, I suggest you go for it. Even a PhD doesn't mean that you'll work on fusion forever, and you will certainly learn interesting things.

[@Meitti]

"Commercially viable" seems to always be the tricky part. Even with fission plants while we cracked the code and made them actually viable, new plants are still very expensive to construct so a lot of governments are hesitant. While finnish Olkiluoto has finally been finished and its working just fine, it was an embarrassing nightmare project of constant problems and delays for over a decade.

[@samusaran13372]

But that power plant will pay for itself in the long run, just like every other power plant.

[@manuxx3543]

France actually developped bottom of the sea-hydroelectric generator that works with maritime crurent The tech worked, but the governement due to EU legislation didnt have the right to assist on the market to bring down the cost, so nobody buyed it because it was way way to expensive And the company shut down/tech was abandonned for now

[@craigcarmichael5748]

Solar PV became more cost effective per MWH for new power plants than nuclear in 2010. Since then solar PV costs have dropped down by, what, 2/3? And totally scalable -- you can even do it individually, for yourself. I have 18 solar panels that make 3x more power annually than my electric car uses, tho only maybe 30% of my total use. I'm not in a great climate for solar, and that's without going all-out by any means -- there's lots more room on my roof. The issues and costs with adopting it on any scale seem trivial compared to fusion.

[@Meitti]

@@craigcarmichael5748 Solar power is unreliable. Its not always sunny. Especially in Finland where most of the year is spent in darkness. The closer you get to equator, better solar panels become but they are not very effective the closer you get to the Arctic circle or Antarctic. Its a great auxiliary to get cheap extra energy every once in a while but you cannot rely on it as the primary energy source.

[@craigcarmichael5748]

@@Meitti Too true. I'm at just 53 deg. north (Haida Gwaii BC) and I get lots in summer but very very little in winter. (The tree shadows cover everything.) Storing energy overnight is one thing, storing it for months is quite another. More promising for experimenters: now I think I know how Nikola Tesla got free electricity from his Tesla Coils, while after him they have only been used for fancy displays of ionizing air, "lightning". Everyone grounds the bottom of the secondary coil. That's shorting out the free energy to ground. (It comes from the recently discovered "high energy" or HE band 1000 times higher frequency and energy than gamma rays - most electromagnetic spectrum charts still don't even show it - or the new VHE band even farther up.) Tesla must have connected the bank of light bulbs between the bottom of the secondary and the ground. One instruction for making a Tesla Coil says "Don't ground the secondary to your electrical system ground. It will fry everything in the house." That kind of energy isn't just coming from the power supply to the coil.

[@boblynch2802]

Back in 1986, I once worked for an individual who worked at the Princeton facility. The problem with fusion I was told was not doing fusion, that is easy. the problem is sustaining the reaction. there were question like how do you introduce fuel into the reactor without disturbing the magnetic field? Once the field is disturbed the magnetic field collapses and fusion stops.

[@laszlozoltan5021]

very interesting bit of info- thx

[@alyssahayes268]

Now THAT'S what I call good science communication

[@jje984]

It seems to me we ought to spend this time and money making fission reactors even better. That proven technology can be made even better and safer with more R&D. And we know it can be used to make commercially viable electricity.

[@aquanano1]

Indeed. Besides, tehnology is now mature enough for this, and more importantly we have both the experience of 3 major disasters,. No kidding here, as we humans, as a specief, seem to learn only from such events...

[@cam609lee]

Actually we should just keep burning fossil fuels and also fool around with wind/solar. Fission is so so dangerous. Nuclear fusion will be here in a year or so. (JK)