Germany Just Activated the Largest Ever Fusion Reactor and We're All Still Alive

PatrickJS

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Germany Just Activated the Largest Ever Fusion Reactor and We're All Still Alive

//cdn.themis-media.com/media/global/images/library/deriv/1017/1017015.jpg

On Thursday, December 10th, researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics in Germany fired up a monstrous machine capable of containing a small sun.

19 years after construction began, with 1.1 billion dollars spent and 1.1 million hours worked, the Wendelstein 7-X is ready to capture a sun.

The Wendestein, or W7-X is a type of nuclear fusion reactor called a stellarator. Note the root word there: stellar - this thing is making and harvesting a sun. It is the largest and most complex machine of its kind ever built, and its modern-art-like design was conceived with the help of a supercomputer.

Nuclear fusion could, the theory goes, become the most efficient and clean energy sources our planet has ever seen, but no such device has ever proved to work. The closest cousin to a stellarator, the tokamak, has been built hundreds of times, but has some key weaknesses. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics see the stellarator as an immense step forward in nuclear fusion technology.

The generators work by containing super-heated plasma within a circular cage by magnets fields. The magnets are super-cooled to -270 degrees celsius; the gas that is contained in the machine, flowing by just a metre away from magnet-lined walls, heats to about 100 million degrees.


The design of a tokamak is basically a doughnut shape, or torus. The stellarator, by contrast, flattens and twists the super-heated plasma as it spins through its cage, creating something akin to a mobius strip, or the most nausea-inducing Roller Coaster Tycoon [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/137176-Roller-Coaster-Tycoon-World-Wants-to-Be-Better-than-Roller-Coaster-Tycoon-3] ride I ever built. While a tokamak can only function for minutes at a time before shut down, and cannot produce more energy than it takes to tun it on, the stellarator is expected to work for about 30 minutes at a time thanks its more efficient design.

This is one of the most fascinating cross-sections of science, to me: it took physicists decades to figure out the awe-inspiring task of containing what amounts to a small star using nothing more than powerful magnets; from there, it became a matter of geometry to get the most efficient shape to present itself. And how did we get that shape? A supercomputer.

Any day now, we'll be asking the Last Question [http://www.physics.princeton.edu/ph115/LQ.pdf] for the first time.

Source: Business Insider [http://www.businessinsider.com/germany-turned-on-its-monster-stellarator-2015-10]





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Gethsemani_v1legacy

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It doesn't contain or harvest a star. It mimics and contains the chain reaction that continually takes place within stars. There's a world of difference between the two.
 

MiskWisk

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This was a triumph! I'm making a note here: Huge Success!

OT: Every advancement in nuclear fusion is one that deserves celebration. Hopefully someone will finally crack fusion to make it viable soon.
 

RJ Dalton

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Ah, there is hope that I might one day live to see a fusion reactor that is actually cost and energy efficient. Maybe.
 

vallorn

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Nov 18, 2009
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I enjoyed the reference to The Last Question. Good references to classic, hard sci-fi are always appreciated when it comes to science news.

The reactor itself? It's fascinating but, as always, we need to wait for the results of it's practical application to ascertain whether it is going to be efficient and how it can be improved.
 

Loonyyy

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I'm guessing the background research for this article was mostly Spiderman 2.

Thanks for a headline in a "science" section that casts doubt on, and creates fear, about science.
 

sorsa

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I wonder how much energy is needed to contain that plasma donut. And if one of these devices were to crack open, shit happens, how much damage would the release of a 100 million degree hot plasma cloud cause?
 

Saetha

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*Cackling* Hol-ee shit that design's ugly as sin. Oh, I'm sure it does all the engineer-y stuff it needs to do, but "art-like?" It looks like a junkyard threw up. Maybe don't leave the making of beautiful and elegant artwork to a goddamn computer, or at least, not to one that isn't tailor-made for it.

On the other hand, it does look like modern art, but most modern art looks pretty atrocious too. Also maybe don't compare something to an artistic style that's supposed to look like a pile of trash, unless you're trying to insult it.
 

Redlin5_v1legacy

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So does this mean we'll have sustainable energy before we get Resource Wars and Super Mutants?
[sub][sub]Fusion is cool as all hell.[/sub][/sub]
 

Ukomba

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Was anyone arguing a fusion reactor would destroy the world? I get the fear about the LHC, but how was their fusion reactor supposed to destroy the world?
 

Ukomba

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Saetha said:
*Cackling* Hol-ee shit that design's ugly as sin. Oh, I'm sure it does all the engineer-y stuff it needs to do, but "art-like?" It looks like a junkyard threw up. Maybe don't leave the making of beautiful and elegant artwork to a goddamn computer, or at least, not to one that isn't tailor-made for it.

On the other hand, it does look like modern art, but most modern art looks pretty atrocious too. Also maybe don't compare something to an artistic style that's supposed to look like a pile of trash, unless you're trying to insult it.
She'll make point five past lightspeed. She may not look like much, but she's got it where it counts, kid. I've made a lot of special modifications myself.
 

blackrave

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I'm interested in how exactly this reactor harnesses energy
Is it steam generator or something else?
For example beta fusion reactor is partial steam generator and partial direct generator (according to designers it generates some amount of electricity directly)
My guess would be on mixture of steam generator and "solar" panels, but I may be wrong

Saetha said:
*Cackling* Hol-ee shit that design's ugly as sin. Oh, I'm sure it does all the engineer-y stuff it needs to do, but "art-like?" It looks like a junkyard threw up. Maybe don't leave the making of beautiful and elegant artwork to a goddamn computer, or at least, not to one that isn't tailor-made for it.

On the other hand, it does look like modern art, but most modern art looks pretty atrocious too. Also maybe don't compare something to an artistic style that's supposed to look like a pile of trash, unless you're trying to insult it.
You can put anything into glitter covered plastic box
On functional level most tech stuff looks "ugly"
At least for laymen, specialists most probably fap to this image daily
 

iller3

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This was only the prototype.... The one based on actual alien Craft that's capable of producing more energy than it consumes in containment, is being finalized by Lockheed Martin with an ETA still in the 2020's (so atleast 5 years out). ...which much like Solar power... means another 10 to 20 years of incubation and failures before the technology itself becomes cheap and efficient enough for wide distribution
 

Amaror

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sorsa said:
I wonder how much energy is needed to contain that plasma donut. And if one of these devices were to crack open, shit happens, how much damage would the release of a 100 million degree hot plasma cloud cause?
Barely anything. Fusion isn't Fision. The reaction of Fusion can only happen only very specific circumstances. Any changes to that and the reaction would shut itself down within seconds.
 

dreng3

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Amaror said:
sorsa said:
I wonder how much energy is needed to contain that plasma donut. And if one of these devices were to crack open, shit happens, how much damage would the release of a 100 million degree hot plasma cloud cause?
Barely anything. Fusion isn't Fision. The reaction of Fusion can only happen only very specific circumstances. Any changes to that and the reaction would shut itself down within seconds.
100 Million degrees for a few seconds still sounds bad. Just saying.

Kidding aside, this sounds awesome, we could really use a new energy source.
 

Naldan

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blackrave said:
I'm interested in how exactly this reactor harnesses energy
Is it steam generator or something else?
For example beta fusion reactor is partial steam generator and partial direct generator (according to designers it generates some amount of electricity directly)
My guess would be on mixture of steam generator and "solar" panels, but I may be wrong
Turbines, basically. As with almost all power plants, this is supposed to make heat, which runs turbines. The only other electric power plant I am aware of, which isn't supposed to run turbines, are using the photoelectric effect.
 

Parasondox

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Redlin5 said:
So does this mean we'll have sustainable energy before we get Resource Wars and Super Mutants?
[sub][sub]Fusion is cool as all hell.[/sub][/sub]
Well, it will just be used as a weapon by the top leading nations. Cause, you know, 2077 is just around the corner. Invest in a Vault today from Vault-Tec. Where nothing suspicious is going on.

Nothing.

Okay I don't know how Fusion Power works. Can it be used as a weapon?
 

Lightknight

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Nov 26, 2008
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So, to be clear, this was just a helium plasma test, right? It wasn't actually a full test that generated anything, right?

Hydrogen plasma to come and succeed hopefully.

EDIT: Looks like the helium plasma lasted for a tenth of a second but managed to produce a million degrees. So certainly a promising start though helium plasma is significantly easier to produce than hydrogen plasma.