I think a big part of the reason there's so much hype around this is that room temperatures superconductors have long been a famous, almost legendary undiscovered material in popsci. Theoretically possible, but with no proof that any such material actually exists. But now not only is this paper claiming that such a material exists, but also that they made some, and it's easy to manufacture and works at temperatures well beyond ambient. Seems almost too good to be true!

So in addition to any immediate practical applications there's also this element of cracking a famous long unsolved problem. It'd be like if we discovered definitive proof that P != NP, or a theoretical basis for FTL communications. Even with no immediate practical applications it'd still be huge news.

> Theoretically possible, but with no proof that any such material actually exists.

I wouldn't say that it was necessarily "theoretically possible," for there has never been, and there still isn't, a grand theory of how any given material's atomic/crystalline structure relates to superconductivity. In other words, with no theory of material superconductivity, it was never quite clear what's possible and what isn't. With this new material, though, we might get a lot closer to a working model, if nothing else.

If we can find one with the right material properties it makes long distance movement of power generation much more plausible and economical.

Which would enable us to put a lot of solar power in the desert and move it around effectively to other places on Earth.

Again, with the right material properties it could also produce efficient storage, and that also has huge implications for electrical generation.

I got into superconductors shortly after the Fukushima disaster, and it was the poster child for superconductors in transmission lines. One of the perks back then was that you could put these reactors that are sensitive to earthquakes and the like out where they are relatively safe from such things. You can also have fewer, higher output power stations, so fewer municipalities have to operate smaller power plants (which tend to be coal or natural gas).

> put a lot of solar power in the desert

If you lose 20% to the grid, then build a 20% bigger solar farm.

Solar farms actually help with reversing desertification by reducing water losses from direct exposure to sunlight.

If its economical it will help with losses in the grid over distance. colliders like the LHC and fermi lab could be a lot cheaper to upgrade with room temp superconductors. More reliable too. Would also be a big help fusion reactors. Anything that uses electric motors will also benefit.

Brute forcing fusion by using insanely strong magnetic fields I suppose. What CFS is trying to do, smaller tokamak but much stronger magnets