• Flying Squid@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    47
    arrow-down
    17
    ·
    6 days ago

    What we need to do is find some way to make a giant fusion reactor and put it in the sky and get energy from it that way.

    But that’s just a pipe dream…

    • FatCrab@lemmy.one
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      24
      ·
      5 days ago

      What we need is robust decentralized multimodal energy production fit for the local area where it is installed and contributing to a well maintained distributed grid with multiple redundancies and sufficient storage so that incidental costs are minimized and uptime is effectively 100%. Energy is a tool and its generation is a category of tools, whining about people developing a better screwdriver rather than only using hammers is counterproductive when we’re trying to build a house for as many people as possible that doesn’t fucking kill everyone.

      • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        6
        arrow-down
        17
        ·
        edit-2
        5 days ago

        I’m whining about China spending very little on current green energy technology while building more and more coal plants and taking advantage of these sort of PR stories.

        I can’t help it, I’m one of those people who whines about climate change.

        • yunxiaoli@sh.itjust.works
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          14
          ·
          5 days ago

          ‘spending very little’???

          They produced more new green energy than the total capacity of green energy for the rest of the world combined in 2024.

            • dnick@sh.itjust.works
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              5
              ·
              5 days ago

              Probably because they have a billion months to feed and a ridiculously inefficient incentive mechanism for progress in general. Kind of amazing that they put emphasis on green tech at all, except for the fact that they have the bodies to through at it and it’s something the rest of the world values as well.

            • yunxiaoli@sh.itjust.works
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              5
              arrow-down
              1
              ·
              5 days ago

              In a generation they went from a famine every decade to the end of famines, in a second generation they went from a industrial age economy with most of its people living in extreme poverty to eliminating extreme poverty and some of its people living on par with those in the wealthiest nations. In this generation they have raised the standard of living of their poorest from a poverty the US hasn’t seen in a century to that of middle class Americans in the 1980s. In order to accomplish this, massive amounts of electricity is needed. That lifestyle is naturally wasteful as it takes electricity for granted, but it’s better by most accounts. This is on top of being the world’s factory and the electricity use that entails.

              In short, yes, they need both, and nuclear which they’re also the leader in. Unlike the West they do have plans to get off coal as a power source, and the amount of work they’ve done eliminating coal usage near cities by itself is commendable, compared to its contemporaries like the US.

              • socsa@piefed.social
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                2
                ·
                5 days ago

                The poorest parts of China are still much poorer than any middle class. Most rural Chinese still do not complete high school.

                • yunxiaoli@sh.itjust.works
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  arrow-up
                  1
                  ·
                  4 days ago

                  And yet they own large farms that are tax free that they can earn money off of. The few low industrialized parts (currently representing less than 200 million) don’t have schools or massive infrastructure, but also have guarantees their way of life and making money is secure until they do have access to those things. And Xinjiang alone shows it’s not an empty promise; going from one of those regions you’re referring to, to a region that rivals Vietnam or Malaysia by itself.

                • yunxiaoli@sh.itjust.works
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  arrow-up
                  2
                  ·
                  4 days ago

                  Yeah, mao fucked up, like the US fucked up during its great famine, sorry dust bowl. And then no famine ever again.

                  To your second point, of course you can’t leave if you’re a criminal (every nation on earth has this policy) or in severe debt to the government (most nations have this policy), but you can leave under pretty much any other circumstances. I didn’t click your link but even you wouldn’t be spreading the conspiracy theory of secret global police that kidnap random yellow people for the cpc, right?

                  To your third point, coal plants and any other steam generators are easy to convert over to each other once built. A nuclear plant and a coal plant share 70% of their equipment. Building one lays the foundation for the other. If you need quick base load expansion, you can’t really beat coal or diesel, and continually expanding the quality of life for 1.4 billion people requires constant base load expansion… Even better if it can later be converted into near infinite power sources like nuclear.

            • Carl@lemm.ee
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              1
              ·
              edit-2
              4 days ago

              Last year, China commissioned 96 GW of new coal production and commissioned 356 GW of wind and solar. This was the most coal production China has built in a single year since 2015, and it was still less than the amount of renewables that they put on it.

              I wish China could wave a magic wand and have their entire energy grid go green, but the truth is that their middle class is still growing, and with it the demand for electricity, and even with the massive amount of spending they’ve put into wind and solar those forms of power simply can’t keep up with the rising demand on their own, so coal remains a necessary part of their multimodal grid with multiple redundancies and sufficient storage.

                • Carl@lemm.ee
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  arrow-up
                  1
                  ·
                  4 days ago

                  If that’s what you think I was saying then you need to work on your reading comprehension.

        • explodicle@sh.itjust.works
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          4 days ago

          The USA and Lockheed Martin have been making PR stories about fusion for over a decade, while increasing emissions.

          I really hope at least one of these is not bullshit.

      • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        20
        arrow-down
        15
        ·
        6 days ago

        It’s too bad there isn’t some sort of way we could store electricity in some sort of containment.

        Then we could do stuff like take electrically-powered devices with us wherever we went! Think of how handy that would be!

        • Lumiluz@slrpnk.net
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          9
          ·
          edit-2
          5 days ago

          Yeah! We could use such technology to trap this “artificial sun” instead, and then have a steady stable output throughout the night for things that use a bunch of electricity but run constantly, like water filtration plants and material processing facilities.

          Great idea! But I guess more research is needed to make this work for the things that use the MOST electricity, instead of small portable devices that use a fraction of the electricity

        • Dr. Moose@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          4
          ·
          5 days ago

          Batteries will never be enough for full down time store. Anyone who’s saying otherwise is selling you batteries.

          Just try to do some paper napkin math how much lithium batteries can store and how much we’d need to just satisfy current demand, not even talking about the near future.

          The only battery technology that has promise is good ol’ hydro but it’s only accessible to a few places around the world and in no way sustainable.

          • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            2
            arrow-down
            2
            ·
            edit-2
            5 days ago

            Good thing there are options other than batteries. Which I have already linked to.

            Also, I am amused that you are suggesting batteries will never have enough storage in a glowing article about non-practical fusion power.

  • Null User Object@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    65
    arrow-down
    18
    ·
    6 days ago

    Any announcements like this coming from China should be taken with a huge grain of salt the size of… China.

    • CosmoNova@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      24
      arrow-down
      4
      ·
      6 days ago

      Yep. They‘re putting out what they call huge breakthroughs on a weekly basis for months and make headlines. By the time they have been put into perspective or straight out debunked and torn to shreds by the global scientific community, they already squeezed out another wild claim to overshadow criticism. Rinse and repeat. There is a reason the overwhelming majority of AI generated slob studies come from China. They want fast results and know the press won‘t really read them and instead just quote whatever they claim.

    • umbrella@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      6
      arrow-down
      4
      ·
      5 days ago

      eh. they have been verifiably meeting their goals for a long time.

    • surph_ninja@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      12
      arrow-down
      25
      ·
      edit-2
      5 days ago

      It’s wild that y’all feel so comfortable being so openly Sinophobic.

      They put a lot of funding into scientific research, and surprise surprise they get results. Maybe we should emulate their success, instead of continuing to waste our budget on war.

      • Null User Object@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        29
        arrow-down
        6
        ·
        5 days ago

        Skepticism of positive press (aka propaganda) from a country notorious for cracking down on negative press (i.e. any mention of Tiananmen Square) is not a phobia. It’s completely justified.

              • Null User Object@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                14
                arrow-down
                4
                ·
                5 days ago

                The discussion was about the unreliability of Chinese propaganda. You moved to funding scientific research. You didn’t just move the goalpost a bit. You relocated it to a different city.

                • surph_ninja@lemmy.world
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  arrow-up
                  4
                  arrow-down
                  9
                  ·
                  5 days ago

                  Incorrect. Someone posited that China’s scientific achievements were merely propaganda, and I pointed out that they have invested heavily in research, which tends to produce outcomes.

                  In fact, you attempted to move the goalposts to non-scientific anti-China propaganda, and it fell flat. Then you attempted to DARVO by accusing others of what you are doing.

                  If you’ve actually forgotten what we’re discussing, look at the original post. We are discussing China’s scientific breakthroughs.

  • meowmeowbeanz@sh.itjust.works
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    59
    arrow-down
    21
    ·
    6 days ago

    Breaking records in fusion is the scientific equivalent of flexing in a mirror—EAST’s 17-minute plasma sprint is impressive, but let’s not confuse lab theatrics with grid-ready energy. Fusion’s PR circus loves dangling “unlimited clean energy” while glossing over the actual timeline: we’re still decades from net-positive output, assuming we don’t incinerate the budget first.

    China’s state-backed “artificial sun” reeks of geopolitical posturing—ITER’s bloated corpse twitches in France, and suddenly EAST is the poster child? Upgrading microwave-like heating systems to “70,000 household ovens” sounds less like innovation and more like a kitchen appliance dystopia.

    The real tragedy? Fusion research remains a closed-loop cult. Open-source this tech, or watch it rot in nationalist silos. Imagine crowdfunding a reactor on GitHub—now that’s a fusion milestone worth celebrating.

    • GaMEChld@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      17
      ·
      5 days ago

      This is why it’s always decades away. However, I doubt China is being as cavalier about it.

      • meowmeowbeanz@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        6
        arrow-down
        5
        ·
        5 days ago

        China’s approach is less cavalier and more calculated opportunism. They’re playing the long game, but let’s not pretend it’s altruistic. Fusion isn’t about saving the planet—it’s about energy dominance. If they crack it first, it won’t be a global breakthrough; it’ll be a geopolitical flex.

        The graph you shared screams one thing: chronic underfunding. The “1978 level of effort” line is a funeral procession for innovation. Actual funding is a joke compared to the projections, and every year we delay, the gap widens.

        Fusion will stay “decades away” as long as it’s locked behind bureaucratic walls and nationalist agendas. Open up the research, decentralize the effort, and maybe—just maybe—we’ll see progress before the sun burns out.

        • Floey@lemm.ee
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          6
          ·
          5 days ago

          This reminds me of an article in a mainstream newspaper I read about BYD, that claimed beating China might be more important than winning the war on climate change. Can’t we be happy about technological progress, no matter where it comes from? Nationalism is regressive.

          • meowmeowbeanz@sh.itjust.works
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            2
            arrow-down
            4
            ·
            5 days ago

            Technological progress isn’t some neutral, utopian march forward—it’s a weapon in the hands of whoever controls it. Pretending the source doesn’t matter is naive at best, dangerous at worst. Nationalism may be regressive, but unchecked global power dynamics are worse. If China dominates fusion, it’s not just about clean energy; it’s about leverage over every nation still burning coal.

            We can celebrate progress and question its implications. Decentralization isn’t just a buzzword; it’s a survival strategy. Letting one state monopolize the future of energy is like handing them the keys to the planet. Fusion needs to be a global effort, not a geopolitical trophy. Progress without accountability is just another form of control.

            • Floey@lemm.ee
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              2
              ·
              4 days ago

              Don’t you think it’s much easier to leverage an ephemeral resource like coal or oil? What you frame as China acquiring leverage is better framed as a loss of leverage by the titans of oil. Time is going to cause that leverage to be lost eventually anyway, so maybe we should be planning for that? Or maybe we should let the people interested in short term gain draft the policy and complain that China is eating our cake.

        • GaMEChld@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          5
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          5 days ago

          Oh, I’m under no delusions that any player in the energy market is altruistic. I just bet they are devoting more resources to it. They are already making big moves on lots of stages concurrently.

          But just like China rips off tech all the time, I imagine if China cracks it, it won’t be long till it’s copied.

          • meowmeowbeanz@sh.itjust.works
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            3
            arrow-down
            3
            ·
            5 days ago

            The irony is that the same system that lets China “rip off tech all the time” is also why they’re outpacing everyone. They don’t wait for bureaucratic permission slips or endless committee debates—they just do. Meanwhile, the West pats itself on the back for “innovation” while starving critical projects of funding and drowning them in red tape.

            If China cracks fusion, it won’t just be copied—it’ll be leveraged to tighten their grip on global energy markets. That’s not a tech race; it’s a strategic chokehold. The real tragedy is that instead of collaboration, we’re stuck in this zero-sum paranoia where progress is secondary to power plays. Decentralization isn’t just idealistic—it’s the only way to stop this from becoming another cold war with a hotter ending.

    • Rowan Thorpe@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      21
      ·
      6 days ago

      Valid point, but worth also mentioning an anecdote I read years ago (can’t remember from whom, perhaps Kurzweil?): when they were told the Human Genome Project had mapped 1% they were excited, saying it “had nearly finished”, and then had to keep justifying the statement by explaining the exponential nature of such work to the majority of people who couldn’t view it in any way other than as measured linearly per-result. Supposedly the project was completed only a few years later.

      • meowmeowbeanz@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        13
        arrow-down
        7
        ·
        6 days ago

        The Human Genome Project anecdote is a great parallel, but here’s the catch: fusion isn’t just an exponential problem; it’s a political one. While the genome folks could pivot and iterate, fusion is shackled by nationalist chest-thumping and bloated bureaucracy.

        The exponential curve you’re referencing? It’s flattened every time funding gets siphoned into PR stunts or geopolitical flexing. Crowdfunding might sound naive, but at least it would decentralize the process and cut through the red tape.

        Fusion isn’t stuck because of science—it’s stuck because of people. Until we stop treating it like a Cold War relic and start treating it like open-source software, we’ll be stuck in this endless cycle of “almost there” milestones. Let’s break that loop.

        • tetris11@lemmy.ml
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          13
          ·
          edit-2
          5 days ago

          (Craig Ventor tried to copyright the human genome, prompting the rest of the genomics scientific community to race to beat him, so I’d claim that the HGP definitely had politics involved.)

          • meowmeowbeanz@sh.itjust.works
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            3
            arrow-down
            2
            ·
            5 days ago

            Venter’s antics were the epitome of commodifying discovery. Patenting genes wasn’t just about competition—it was a power grab over the building blocks of life itself. The public effort had to scramble not just to finish but to ensure humanity’s genome didn’t become a corporate asset.

            This wasn’t innovation; it was exploitation dressed up as progress. The fact that the race even happened shows how broken the system is when profit motives dictate the pace of science. Imagine if all that energy had gone into collaboration instead of brinkmanship.

            Fusion’s stuck in the same trap: egos, politics, and profiteering. Until we dismantle these barriers, we’ll keep running in circles, chasing breakthroughs that serve shareholders instead of society.

            • tetris11@lemmy.ml
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              4
              ·
              edit-2
              5 days ago

              Genuinely. I do wonder about the safeguards against such profiteering that clearly were not in place. I can understand the perspective of a company or entity that bootstraps discovery and innovation all on its own without any reference to prior art. But it’s never the case.

              Behind the thin veneer of professionalism of every tech company is a bunch of grown headless children cobbling together accessible open source tools or pouring through papers published in reputable scientific journals coming out of schools and universities. To re-invent the wheel would be madness, and yet every tech company implicitly makes the claim that they did it alone, instead of standing on the shoulders of the free and accessible tax-funded work that comes out of scientific institutions. It does make me sick to think about it.

              • meowmeowbeanz@sh.itjust.works
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                3
                arrow-down
                2
                ·
                5 days ago

                The safeguards weren’t missing—they were deliberately bypassed, or worse, designed to fail. The system isn’t broken; it’s functioning exactly as intended, funneling public knowledge into private coffers while selling us the illusion of progress.

                These tech vultures don’t innovate; they appropriate. They slap a logo on what’s been painstakingly built by the collective effort of underpaid researchers and public institutions, then act like they’ve cracked the code of the universe. It’s theft, dressed up in a hoodie and a TED Talk.

                The real tragedy is how we’ve normalized this parasitism. The public funds the foundation, corporations patent the result, and society foots the bill twice—once in taxes, and again when we’re sold back what was ours to begin with.

                • tetris11@lemmy.ml
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  arrow-up
                  1
                  ·
                  4 days ago

                  These tech vultures don’t innovate; they appropriate. They slap a logo on what’s been painstakingly built by the collective effort of underpaid researchers and public institutions, then act like they’ve cracked the code of the universe. It’s theft, dressed up in a hoodie and a TED Talk.

                  Well said, starred this comment

    • NostraDavid@programming.dev
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      11
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      5 days ago

      watch it rot in nationalist silos

      “ITER includes China, the European Union, India, Japan, Korea, Russia and the United States. Members share costs and experimental results.”

      That’s quite the wide “nationalist silos”, no?

      Look, I agree that more open = more better, but I think you made it sound a bit as if it’s just France (implied) that’s gaining from this, where it’s really an international effort.

      • meowmeowbeanz@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        arrow-down
        5
        ·
        5 days ago

        ITER isn’t “international” in any meaningful sense. It’s a bloated Frankenstein of geopolitical vanity projects, where nations bicker over scraps of influence while pretending to collaborate. Sharing costs? Sure, but they’re also sharing inefficiencies, delays, and mountains of red tape. France hosting isn’t just a coincidence—it’s a calculated power play.

        Your defense of ITER as a global effort is laughable. Experimental results are locked behind bureaucratic walls, inaccessible to the very people who could accelerate progress. Fusion isn’t advancing; it’s stagnating under nationalist egos.

    • girsaysdoom@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      18
      ·
      6 days ago

      I wouldn’t be surprised if it were capitalist motivation that is holding back the actual research. Those that fund it want to have exclusive rights to research akin to the nuclear rat race all over again. It would likely be a benefit to humanity if it were open-sourced but I’m sure that those countries/orgs that own these projects think otherwise.

      • meowmeowbeanz@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        14
        arrow-down
        4
        ·
        6 days ago

        The capitalist chokehold on fusion research is the elephant in the reactor room. These projects aren’t about humanity’s progress—they’re about patent monopolies and geopolitical leverage. The nuclear arms race never ended; it just swapped warheads for energy grids.

        Open-sourcing fusion tech isn’t just a moral imperative; it’s the only way to break this cycle of greed. If nations and corporations keep hoarding breakthroughs, we’ll end up with a dystopia where energy is another tool of oppression.

        Crowdfunding a reactor on GitHub might sound absurd, but it’s more realistic than trusting megacorporations or governments to prioritize global welfare over profit margins. Fusion belongs to everyone, or it belongs to no one.

        • baldingpudenda@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          6 days ago

          I can’t remember the company name, but they were using an inertial fusion reactor and were hyped for producing positive energy from their test. Someone posted that it wasn’t going anywhere because it was actually just a cover for military tests on possible fusion bombs. I didn’t look too hard, but they did have funding from the military.

          • AppleTea@lemmy.zip
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            4
            ·
            6 days ago

            I don’t know about weaponizing anything, but I do know the only energy positive fusion reaction was done by making a little pellet of hydrogen, carefully aligning a room full of lasers, and then zapping it into helium. Each time they did it, someone had to walk into the chamber to put in the pellet, and they’d have to spend a few hours aligning the lasers again.

            You get more energy out than you put in, but it just doesn’t scale.

          • meowmeowbeanz@sh.itjust.works
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            2
            arrow-down
            5
            ·
            6 days ago

            Military funding for fusion research is the perfect example of why this tech is locked behind closed doors. It’s not about solving energy crises; it’s about weaponizing the future. They dangle “clean energy” in front of us while funneling resources into projects that serve their war machines.

            Even if these companies stumble onto a breakthrough, it’ll be classified faster than you can say “national security.” The public won’t see a watt of it unless there’s profit or power to be gained by those at the top.

            This is why fusion needs to be in the hands of people, not governments or corporations. Open-source and decentralized, or we’ll just trade one form of exploitation for another.

  • merthyr1831@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    7
    ·
    4 days ago

    So what are the limitations of running the reactor for longer? Is it containing the plasma becoming infeasible due to heat or other constraints or does the reaction inside the plasma fizzle out?

    • girsaysdoom@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      2
      ·
      3 days ago

      I believe that the issue is that the plasma loses stability and the self-sustaining state is lost.

      Think of it like a top that runs on fuel but needs outside intervention to get moving. As long as the top’s rotation is stable and has fuel supplied, it can theoretically run forever, but if it loses stability and starts to wobble then it needs an immense outside intervention to retain stability or just tumble until it settles.

  • perestroika@lemm.ee
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    20
    arrow-down
    2
    ·
    edit-2
    5 days ago

    Impressive. :)

    I’m tempted, but won’t try to guess how operation endurances will progress - it would be an poorly informed guess by a rando. Better to wait what they write about it in journals.

  • bleistift2@sopuli.xyz
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    46
    arrow-down
    33
    ·
    6 days ago

    Not a word about how much energy went into the process and how much was harvested…

    I can create plasma using a candle and a microwave.

    • partial_accumen@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      69
      arrow-down
      3
      ·
      6 days ago

      Not a word about how much energy went into the process and how much was harvested…

      A 17 minute runtime in a Tokamak an incremental step on the path to success. You’re in the kitchen looking over the shoulder of the chef saying the steak he’s just put in the pan isn’t cooked enough yet. He knows, but you can’t have the steak on your plate cooked to perfection until he does this current step he’s on.

      I can create plasma using a candle and a microwave.

      In 1964 you could build an honest to goodness fusion reactor copying the Farnsworth Fusor, yet that would never be on a path to a sustained fusion reaction with a net energy gain. The work in the article is.

      • YamahaRevstar@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        12
        arrow-down
        3
        ·
        6 days ago

        I love when online commenters who didn’t even read the article are smarter than the scientists it’s about

    • Fermion@feddit.nl
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      42
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      edit-2
      6 days ago

      Producing energy is not the goal of this facility which is why they don’t report on it. The useful output is in refining control and heating methods so that when power producing facilities are built, they can operate continuously. On that front, 17 minutes is very impressive. At the speeds at which the particles in a fusion plasma move, that time frame is essentially an eternity.