Electrode Degradation Solution?

[Aeronaut]

I don’t see the Deuterium and D-T gangs as ‘the enemy’ , but as being irrelevant to their cover stories of safe, cheap power. I think you’re on to something with the edge turbulence modeling. Looking forward to more of your input around the FF forums.

Brian H wrote:

I’m fully aware of what DPF & ITER are. As Brian said, I was trying to suggest that although some may regard the large scale & expensive tokamak projects as ‘the enemy’, there is a lot of valuable research going on in that field to do with materials properties and the interactions of plasmas with solid interfacing components.

Some of this may be applicable to the plasma/solid boundaries in a DPF. We need to take advantage of all the modelling and experimental results they get.

I should disclose my interest – I have just finished a Masters in nuclear physics, and will be starting a PhD in a few weeks modelling edge turbulence and instabilities in tokamaks and stellarators. Initially using data from the Mega Amp Spherical Tokamak (MAST) at Culham, UK and the Large Helical Device (LHD) in Japan.

Although my research may be from the mainstream side (I needed funding), I hope to be able to apply it different scenarios like focus fusion.

James

Did you throw in a reference to global warming implications, just to multiply your funding? 😉 :cheese: Sorry! Just kidding!

[Phil’s Dad]

In my instinctive desire to please all the people all the time I have been thinking about how to deal with the “waste” heat in a way that would satisfy both Brian H and Aeronaut.

Then I remembered that University of Utah physicist Orest Symko demonstrated a couple of years ago how to convert heat via sound into electricity. Symko foresaw using the devices to generate electricity from heat that is currently released from nuclear power plant cooling towers.

It’s only an example of the principle; which is to convert the heat directly into electricity rather than resorting to a steam engine. Can’t hurt the energy I/O balance. What other methods are out there to convert heat into electricity in one or two inexpensive steps?

[Brian H]

Phil’s Dad wrote: In my instinctive desire to please all the people all the time I have been thinking about how to deal with the “waste” heat in a way that would satisfy both Brian H and Aeronaut.

Then I remembered that University of Utah physicist Orest Symko demonstrated a couple of years ago how to convert heat via sound into electricity. Symko foresaw using the devices to generate electricity from heat that is currently released from nuclear power plant cooling towers.

It’s only an example of the principle; which is to convert the heat directly into electricity rather than resorting to a steam engine. Can’t hurt the energy I/O balance. What other methods are out there to convert heat into electricity in one or two inexpensive steps?

Inexpensive is relative. It’s truly hard to get your head around just how cheap ¼¢/kwh really is. See if you can make Symko’s system match it with realistic installation and maintenance numbers.

[Breakable]

Steam turbines is an old and time-proven method to convert heat into electricity.
Possibly this method will be preferred for some time, until other methods are proven.
Of course no one wants to envision FF coupled with such an ancient technology 😀

[texaslabrat]

Phil’s Dad wrote: In my instinctive desire to please all the people all the time I have been thinking about how to deal with the “waste” heat in a way that would satisfy both Brian H and Aeronaut.

Then I remembered that University of Utah physicist Orest Symko demonstrated a couple of years ago how to convert heat via sound into electricity. Symko foresaw using the devices to generate electricity from heat that is currently released from nuclear power plant cooling towers.

It’s only an example of the principle; which is to convert the heat directly into electricity rather than resorting to a steam engine. Can’t hurt the energy I/O balance. What other methods are out there to convert heat into electricity in one or two inexpensive steps?

Stirling engines are another method. Organic Rankine cycle turbines are another for instances when the temperature of the waste heat isn’t high enough to make good-quality dry steam suitable for a traditional Rankine steam turbine. Thermoelectric technology is constantly improving, and might be a contender for low/zero maintenance electrical generation from waste heat in a few years.

However with all that said, in many regions the use of the heat directly in industrial applications as well as residential (space heating, hot water for showering/cleaning, etc) is probably just as valuable as trying to make electricity out of it.

[Brian H]

Breakable wrote: Steam turbines is an old and time-proven method to convert heat into electricity.
Possibly this method will be preferred for some time, until other methods are proven.
Of course no one wants to envision FF coupled with such an ancient technology 😀

Considering the great inefficiency of turbines and the major installation costs, not to mention the massive and complex structures (boiler, turbine, transformers, etc.) it’s not worth it. Why spend $5 to squeeze a bit more power out of a process that cost $1 in the first place? It really is that bad. Same for thermoelectric, etc. MUCH cheaper just to add another FF generator.

That’s why I suggested doing the math. Get the cost of the “add-on”, and you will discover that the price per kwh is HUGE compared to ¼¢.

[dash]

Brian H wrote: That’s why I suggested doing the math. Get the cost of the “add-on”, and you will discover that the price per kwh is HUGE compared to ¼¢.

Wouldn’t waste heat be a problem at some point? If 20% of the energy comes out as useful work, and 80% is lost as heat (I’m just making up numbers), as civilization expands, won’t that waste heat become a serious issue?

[Aeronaut]

dash wrote:

That’s why I suggested doing the math. Get the cost of the “add-on”, and you will discover that the price per kwh is HUGE compared to ¼¢.

Wouldn’t waste heat be a problem at some point? If 20% of the energy comes out as useful work, and 80% is lost as heat (I’m just making up numbers), as civilization expands, won’t that waste heat become a serious issue?

Brian, as you once posted, heat is the bottom rung of the energy chain. The most energy-efficient conversion is to a lower temperature, so a really motivated engineering team could leverage the working fluid’s convection currents to reduce pumping power, thus various related system expenses (pipe wall thicknesses, structure, etc.). Existing residential and office high-rises are made to order, imho.

Dash, all we know for sure about thermal pollution is that some special interest group will trumpet the excess heat figures to make headlines if we don’t address it early on. Perhaps a group with billions to lose in turbine site construction or mineral rights :coolsmirk:

[texaslabrat]

dash wrote:

That’s why I suggested doing the math. Get the cost of the “add-on”, and you will discover that the price per kwh is HUGE compared to ¼¢.

Wouldn’t waste heat be a problem at some point? If 20% of the energy comes out as useful work, and 80% is lost as heat (I’m just making up numbers), as civilization expands, won’t that waste heat become a serious issue?

Nobody (including the Gore camp) has made any noise about all the ‘thermal pollution’ that our current power production (and transportation) technology creates. And for good reason…it really doesn’t matter given the amount of solar thermal input we receive by comparison. The only time that such thermal pollution seems to make any impact is when it is being dumped into a localized and heat sensitive area such as a river where temperature changes can cause fish kills or contribute to algae blooms.

But yeah, if you had a couple of gigawatts of waste heat flux concentrated in the area of a city block…that might get a little uncomfortable to live in said city block in the middle of summer when there was no cool breeze to help out 😉 Fortunately, such corner-case scenarios are easily avoided through just a tiny amount of planning by spreading things out a tad…that’s just one of many reasons you don’t find multi-gigawatt power plants in the middle of commerce and residential areas.

[Brian H]

texaslabrat wrote:

That’s why I suggested doing the math. Get the cost of the “add-on”, and you will discover that the price per kwh is HUGE compared to ¼¢.

Wouldn’t waste heat be a problem at some point? If 20% of the energy comes out as useful work, and 80% is lost as heat (I’m just making up numbers), as civilization expands, won’t that waste heat become a serious issue?

Nobody (including the Gore camp) has made any noise about all the ‘thermal pollution’ that our current power production (and transportation) technology creates. And for good reason…it really doesn’t matter given the amount of solar thermal input we receive by comparison. The only time that such thermal pollution seems to make any impact is when it is being dumped into a localized and heat sensitive area such as a river where temperature changes can cause fish kills or contribute to algae blooms.

But yeah, if you had a couple of gigawatts of waste heat flux concentrated in the area of a city block…that might get a little uncomfortable to live in said city block in the middle of summer when there was no cool breeze to help out 😉 Fortunately, such corner-case scenarios are easily avoided through just a tiny amount of planning by spreading things out a tad…that’s just one of many reasons you don’t find multi-gigawatt power plants in the middle of commerce and residential areas.
Actually, FF comes off a lot better than that. Its inherent efficiency means that it produces much less “waste” heat than any other way of generating the same amount of power. Therefore, every GW produced by FF actually REDUCES the net heat “pollution”.

[texaslabrat]

Brian H wrote:

That’s why I suggested doing the math. Get the cost of the “add-on”, and you will discover that the price per kwh is HUGE compared to ¼¢.

Wouldn’t waste heat be a problem at some point? If 20% of the energy comes out as useful work, and 80% is lost as heat (I’m just making up numbers), as civilization expands, won’t that waste heat become a serious issue?

Nobody (including the Gore camp) has made any noise about all the ‘thermal pollution’ that our current power production (and transportation) technology creates. And for good reason…it really doesn’t matter given the amount of solar thermal input we receive by comparison. The only time that such thermal pollution seems to make any impact is when it is being dumped into a localized and heat sensitive area such as a river where temperature changes can cause fish kills or contribute to algae blooms.

But yeah, if you had a couple of gigawatts of waste heat flux concentrated in the area of a city block…that might get a little uncomfortable to live in said city block in the middle of summer when there was no cool breeze to help out 😉 Fortunately, such corner-case scenarios are easily avoided through just a tiny amount of planning by spreading things out a tad…that’s just one of many reasons you don’t find multi-gigawatt power plants in the middle of commerce and residential areas.
Actually, FF comes off a lot better than that. Its inherent efficiency means that it produces much less “waste” heat than any other way of generating the same amount of power. Therefore, every GW produced by FF actually REDUCES the net heat “pollution”.

Indeed…however if the predictions on the ultra-low cost per unit and per kWh hold true…you can bet that there will be millions of them built and then much more overall waste heat will be produced as we consume orders of magnitude more power in our society due to the near-free cost of it 😉 That old supply-and-demand curve thing.

[dash]

texaslabrat wrote: Indeed…however if the predictions on the ultra-low cost per unit and per kWh hold true…you can bet that there will be millions of them built and then much more overall waste heat will be produced as we consume orders of magnitude more power in our society due to the near-free cost of it 😉 That old supply-and-demand curve thing.

No one would ever need more than a megawatt.

Just as no one would ever need more than 640K bytes of memory in their computer.

-Dave

[texaslabrat]

dash wrote:

Indeed…however if the predictions on the ultra-low cost per unit and per kWh hold true…you can bet that there will be millions of them built and then much more overall waste heat will be produced as we consume orders of magnitude more power in our society due to the near-free cost of it 😉 That old supply-and-demand curve thing.

No one would ever need more than a megawatt.

Just as no one would ever need more than 640K bytes of memory in their computer.

-Dave

ROFL absolutely!

[Brian H]

texaslabrat wrote:

Indeed…however if the predictions on the ultra-low cost per unit and per kWh hold true…you can bet that there will be millions of them built and then much more overall waste heat will be produced as we consume orders of magnitude more power in our society due to the near-free cost of it 😉 That old supply-and-demand curve thing.

No one would ever need more than a megawatt.

Just as no one would ever need more than 640K bytes of memory in their computer.

-Dave

ROFL absolutely!

There’s an interesting POV one can explore concerning fusion (or fission) power vs. combustion/hydro, etc. The latter are directly or indirectly released energy stores from solar radiation (through the carbon or hydrological cycles). Nuclear energy, however, is released from stores built up at the time of the Big Bang (fusion) or supernova explosions (fission). As such, they are “new” energy in the terrestrial environment. It is possible, theoretically, that enough could be released to add to the total thermal balance of the planet.

However, since Warm Spells are historically boom times for humanity (and virtually all other species), and Ice Ages are periods of stress, extinction, and suffering, I say ‘Bring it on!’ The more Global Warming the better!

[Phil’s Dad]

Hmm 🙂 You really would need to produce a heck of a lot more energy to produce a thermal inbalance given the amount we get from the sun. Especialy given the low relative heat output of fusion energy. In fact the amount of heat at the surface is less relevant than how long it sticks around. I wonder if we are not just saying “Let it go”. It seems counter intuative right now because of the prsoius nature of current energy supplies, but all that is about to change. :cheese:

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