Reply To: General Fusion Inc

[Tim1]

nemmart wrote: We know that a heat engine can achieve 40% efficiency

… errrrrrrrrrr… not quite. Those kinds of thermal efficiencies are achieved at the expense of very high operating temperatures. Temperatures in the thousands of degrees C.

The most anyone has ever postulated for the output of an FF cooling stream is at ~700-800 degC… i.e. maybe 20-25% thermal-to-electrical conversion efficiency. That’s game over for a thermo-electric FF, I’m afraid.

… still would be a great x-ray source, though.

Actually ultra supercritical steam turbines run at ~600 degC and supercritical CO2 turbines could have an efficiency of 50% and run at ~550 C. Their main problem is cost. Also CO2 turbines are in the research phase.