Re:Nuclear-fusion reactor doubles record for energy made fro...
by idiotsecant on Thursday February 24, 2022 @11:20AM
(#30456489)
>We can likely build out storage faster than NPPs
First, this is yet to be determined. Even assuming it is true, which I'm not sure it is, The problem is not limited to storage - you also need massive transmission system upgrades that will cost on the same order of magnitude as an Apollo program. I think in the long term it should certainly be done, but pretending that the cost of solar and wind power is the cost of solar panels, or even the cost of solar panels + storage is not comparing apples to apples.
Re:Nuclear-fusion reactor doubles record for energy made fro...
by pfdietz on Friday February 25, 2022 @07:58AM
(#30466760)
Energy is huge. The world will likely spend the equivalent of approaching a quadrillion dollars over the next century on energy. The Apollo program, in comparison, was less than a rounding error.
Re:Nuclear-fusion reactor doubles record for energy made fro...
by ncmncm on Thursday February 24, 2022 @03:20PM
(#30459750)
We are down for many, many times the cost of Apollo, regardless. The only question is how much available power we will get for that. The very best one running is solar+wind+storage, far ahead of the others.
Re:Nuclear-fusion reactor doubles record for energy made fro...
by dahfizz on Thursday February 24, 2022 @11:10AM
(#30456368)
I put numbers in another comment, but this isn't a "just build some more batteries" type of problem. The scale of storage needed completely dwarfs our current production capacity. This problem cannot be solved in the near future, with current production/technology.
How is this an interesting argument? Of course we don't have things before we build them. That's true of nuclear power plants, too. We can likely build out storage faster than NPPs, with more aggressive cost decline with cumulative production.