
Amazon's Jeff Bezos Backs Nuclear Startup General Fusion - hornokplease
http://gigaom.com/cleantech/amazons-jeff-bezos-backs-nuclear-startup-general-fusion/
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neutronicus
Disappointed, for selfish reasons, to hear that he's sinking money into fusion
instead of thorium-based fission.

Still cool, though.

As a title nitpick, using the N-word to cover both fission and fusion glosses
over how utterly different the two things are.

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VladRussian
there is completely different regulatory landscape and thus price to enter the
game. Any fission work would involve radioactive elements from the start.
Licensing and approval on all the levels from federal to local require
investments and political power on the scale well beyond ...

An even if you manage to develop and prototype the fission reactor, the
deployment is still and even more subject to that approval problems.

The nuclear fusion work, as long a it is deuterium based (tritium can be bread
during the process) and no dual-purpose equipment is attempted to be bought
(like very large power lasers or extremely short-impulse discharge devices)
can be conducted in your garage ... well until you start getting real neutron
flux (or gamma flux before it if you're going fusor way) - either you and your
neighbors get serious health damage/killed or you start installing protection
from the flux - that would involve money and questions on why would you need
so much of boron concrete :)

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neutronicus
The fission startups out there (most notably TerraPower) do all of their work
_in silico_ , and that's representative of fission reactor design in general.
Fission reactors aren't prototyped, they're simulated exhaustively, approved,
and then built.

You're right, though, that securing the materials for a fusion prototype is
less legally fraught.

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baggachipz
The author's assertion that this project will be impacted by the Japanese
disaster shows that she doesn't understand the technology. Fusion != Fission,
and in this case there isn't even any radioactive material in the equation. If
anything, the Japanese disaster will put _more_ focus on fusion research and
development.

/facepalm

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cperciva
_Fusion != Fission, and in this case there isn't even any radioactive material
in the equation_

Fusion reactors spew neutrons which can create a variety of radioactive
isotopes. Most of these are very short-lived, fortunately -- but they do
exist, and reactor designs need to take these into account.

(Also, some reactor designs use tritium as fuel, which is of course
radioactive to begin with.)

~~~
jeffreymcmanus
It's worth mentioning here that coal-fired power plants also spew
radioactivity into the atmosphere.

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lispm
Especially old coal power plants which have not upgraded with filters...

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billswift
Actually, a large part of the radioactivity is in the form of C-14 in carbon
dioxide which is unaffected by filters.

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lispm
'Large part'? Numbers, please.

C-14 is not much contained in old fossil fuels due to radioactive decay. The
literature also discusses the Suess effect, which shows that coal power plant
reduced the effect of C-14.

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Apocryphon
What's with that photo? The shaven head, leather armchair, and expression,
juxtaposed with the story about nuclear reactors, make it look like he's
channeling a supervillain. Paging Hank Scorpio.

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ck2
Wait, there is a viable chance at (controlled) fusion within the next decade?

That would be massive news, I mean of the century, no?

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mortenjorck
Probably not the next decade. I've seen fusion researchers referred to as "the
cathedral builders of our time"—their work will take decades, and they might
not see success within the span of their careers, or even lifetimes.

But yes, controlled, sustained, repeatable fusion reactions could be a black
swan on the order of the internal combustion engine for the 21st century.

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jjordan
Glad to see someone with a long-term vision. Tapping fusion power will solve
the world's energy issues, and that is a good thing.

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wcoenen
_Tapping fusion power will solve the world's energy issues, and that is a good
thing._

Is it though? Exponential growth always has to end in disaster sooner or
later.

Global energy use in 2008 was estimated at 474 exajoules. At a 8% yearly
growth rate in consumption, it would take only 120 years to increase that to 5
million exajoules, thereby producing more waste heat than the energy which the
earth receives from the sun. It's likely that we would be in serious trouble
long before that.

(If the 8% growth rate seems high, I took it from the growth rate in oil
consumption before the first oil shock in the 1970s. This seemed like a
reasonable model for growth in a world with limitless energy supply.)

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jeffreymcmanus
It's actually not reasonable; since the 70s there have been significant pushes
toward efficiency on a variety of fronts which make pre-1970s energy
consumption statistics inapplicable.

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wcoenen
I know; my point was that this drive for energy efficiency would disappear
again in a world with limitless energy supply from fusion.

~~~
jeffreymcmanus
But nothing's ever "limitless," though -- energy would still cost something
(even though it could be 1/100th of what it is today). Transmission and
storage of energy would still have costs and that's where the drive for
efficiency would come from.

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troymc
General Fusion is taking a different approach to fusion than anything
previous. Their website has a great summary:

<http://www.generalfusion.com/>

If they (General Fusion) can make their idea work... wow. Kudos to Bezos and
the other investors for backing them.

Also did you notice the author chose to use a Bezos photo taken by Steve
Jurveston (Managing Director of Draper Fisher Jurvetson)? It's a small world
indeed!

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jacques_chester
Here's the triad which must seem attractive to billionaires:

High Risk -- High Capital Cost -- High Impact.

By risk I refer to financial risk. By impact I refer to the changes the new
thing would wreak and the concomitant profits that would follow.

Fusion fits the bill nicely. With a few billion bucks I reckon I would happily
sling a million here and there for a low probability of obtaining still
further billions.

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Element_
I submitted an old article about these guys last year:
[http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2008-12/machine-
might-...](http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2008-12/machine-might-save-
world) the article includes a video of their proposed design and an interview.

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known
<http://www.hyperionpowergeneration.com/product.html> also sounds interesting

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kristianp
Pity he isn't investing in Emc2, the maker of the Polywell.
<http://www.emc2fusion.org/>

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MatthewB
General Electric...General Fusion...oh, I get it:)

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smhinsey
It's a pretty common prefix. There was General Atomics, General Dynamics, and
of course, General Motors. Probably more too.

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andrerobot
Is the name Elastic Fusion Power appropriate?

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heyrhett
I hope he wasn't inspired by "Wall Street II"

