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civilrunner t1_j2mp8aq wrote

Reply to comment by Crypt0n0ob in A Drug to Treat Aging May Not Be a Pipe-Dream by Mynameis__--__

Fusion energy has been progressing steadily towards working though.

Battery breakthroughs also happen fairly often. Solid state batteries are genuinely approaching market readiness in 2025 and 2026.

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Crypt0n0ob t1_j2mub7b wrote

I thought so as well especially after recent announcement but just find out that it was mostly publicity stunt like every previous fusion related news.

Joe Scott explains it better than me https://youtu.be/SpuS7axls7k

We definitely are at better place when it comes to fusion than we were 20 years ago, but fusion energy isn’t going to power our houses at least for few more decades.

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civilrunner t1_j2mwfbu wrote

Yes, however laser fusion was never the closest thing to market viability. You have to look at high temperature super conductor magnetic fusion like commonwealth fusion and others.

Even ITER will likely be outdated by the time it turns on.

Quantum computing (which is expected to be useful in early 2030s or even late 2020s) will allow for simulating material properties especially for high temperature super conductors to rapidly iterate on materials to find better ones. Then higher temperature super conductors enable stronger magnetic fields by having an increased electrical current capacity while super conducting. This increased magnetic field makes one need a far smaller arc radius to achieve sustainable fusion, the smaller arc radius dramatically reduces on iteration time and therefore massively accelerates our ability to reach a grid ready fusion reactor.

Higher temperature super conductors are so useful for fusion that a room temperature one would enable even micro reactors with an arc radius of less than an inch to achieve the pressures needed for fusion to take place. The energy output scales linearly with the arc radius, but to the cube of the magnetic field which scales linearly with the super conducting temperature threshold.

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