
New tungsten alloy has potential for nuclear fusion – The Engineer The Engineer - mrfusion
https://www.theengineer.co.uk/tungsten-alloy-nuclear-fusion/
======
offbytwo
Before anyone comments "fusion is always 10 years away" I'll just say that
we've made significant progress in the last 40 years (energy generated by
fusion is on par with moore's law) and it is simultaneously the single hardest
and the most rewarding engineering problem ever attempted by humans. Any news
on this front is good news.

~~~
eesmith
Here are the two issues I have with your comment.

The phrase "we've made significant progress in the last X years" has been used
for a long time nuclear fusion research. Quote mining from Google Scholar:

2007 - "Significant progress has been made in the area of advanced modes of
operation that are candidates for achieving steady state conditions in a
fusion reactor."
[https://inis.iaea.org/search/search.aspx?orig_q=RN:38071367](https://inis.iaea.org/search/search.aspx?orig_q=RN:38071367)

1999 - "Over the past several decades, significant and steady progress has
been made in the development of fusion energy and its associated technology
and in the understanding of the physics of high-temperature plasmas." \-
[https://e-reports-ext.llnl.gov/pdf/237013.pdf](https://e-reports-
ext.llnl.gov/pdf/237013.pdf)

1981 - "SUBSTANTIAL PROGRESS HAS BEEN MADE IN ACHIEVING THE CONDITIONS
NECESSARY FOR FUSION" \-
[https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/6040602](https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/6040602)

As such, the phrase, while true, cannot be used to infer any sort of near-time
(within the next few decades) prediction for an effective fusion power system.

Second, I do not like the appeal to Moore's Law because even if true (I don't
know the baseline numbers), all you are saying is that there has been an
exponential growth over the decades. However, there are many S-curve growth
patterns which appear exponential near the start. What is the basis for
assuming that nuclear fusion will be like Moore's law, with exponential growth
over many decades, and not an S-curve?

For example, from the 1800s to the 1970s we saw huge increases in transport
speed; from trains and wooden ships to moon travel and supersonic passenger
airlines. Someone in 1965 (ahem, Heinlein) might point to the exponential
growth in rocket ships over a single lifetime and easily assume it would
result in Moon bases and tourism within another two generations.

Instead, it flattened out.

~~~
offbytwo
> cannot be used to infer any sort of near-time

It's not meant to, it's meant to dispel the common notion that _no_ progress
is being made in this area of research.

And the total power output doesn't need to remain exponential for fusion to be
viable, we just need a way to sustain fusion reactions for a long enough
period of time (china recently set a record with 101 seconds).

Seriously look into all the work being done on this currently by Government
projects and private companies. I'm not saying it'll happen soon but
significant progress has indeed been happening for a long time, and is only
picking up pace as time goes on. As I said, this is likely the most difficult
thing humans have ever attempted.

[https://www.iter.org/sci/BeyondITER](https://www.iter.org/sci/BeyondITER)

~~~
eesmith
But the quip that "fusion is always 10 years away" is not an expression that
_no_ progress is being made. Rather, it's an expression that the most
optimistic views for fusion are always for at least 10 years in future, and as
we get more understanding of the difficulty, that horizon always stays 10
years away.

I've been following fusion from the sidelines since I first read about it in
SciAm in the 1980s.

I think that understanding how the human body (or any complex biological
system) works is a more complex project.

