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0 pointstim3337y ago0 comments

And YC is invested in Helion Energy using pulsed inertial fusion. Though the tokamak seems closest to being functional. The MIT ARC design is theoretically supposed to be able to work, at least on paper:

>The ARC design aims to achieve an engineering gain of three (to produce three times the electricity required to operate the machine) while being about half the diameter of the ITER reactor and cheaper to construct. (Wikipedia)

It's not been built because of the $5bn or so cost, though given global warming / saving the planet type issues I'd be happy enough as a tax payer to have governments fund one and maybe knock 1% off the defence budget to counter that. It'd probably do more for world peace than churning out some more f35s.

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DennisP7y ago

ARC has some funding now. They spun off a startup called Commonwealth Fusion Systems, which has $50M so far, from an Italian oil/gas company.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth_Fusion_Systems

pfdietz7y ago

The ARC reactor would have a net power output of something like 190 MW(e). At $5B, that's $26/W(e), which is an order of magnitude too high, especially given how high the operating costs are likely to be.

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