Chapter 408 Using Controlled Nuclear Fusion to Boil Water Is a Bit Too Low

China announced the construction of a controllable nuclear fusion demonstration reactor, and it is not just the United States that is troubled.

Almost all countries that have the ability to independently build controllable nuclear fusion experimental reactors, or have participated in the ITER project, are busy working overtime and worrying about this sudden news.

Europe, Germania.

In the Planck Institute of Plasma Research, after hearing the news, they were busy planning to restart Helix 7X for a deuterium-tritium raw material fusion ignition operation. Professor Tillman Lunt, who was collecting neutron irradiation data, had a look on his face. Confused.

"Demonstration pile? Are you sure?"

After being shocked and stunned for a long time, Tillman swallowed and asked in surprise after digesting the news.

Opposite, Robert Mack, director of the Planck Institute of Plasma Research, nodded and said: "The news conveyed by the media over there cannot be false."

"Incredible, really unbelievable. Have they solved the problem of the first wall material? How? There are also problems such as tritium self-sustainment, magnetic surface tearing of the tokamak device, etc., these have been solved? You need to know the demonstration reactor and are two completely different things.”

Tillman Lunt couldn't help but ask a series of questions. He had too many doubts in his heart.

Robert Mack sighed and said: "No one has heard that these problems have been solved. Except for the two-hour high-density plasma operation experiment, Professor Xu has never disclosed the progress to the public. "

"Don't talk about us, even the United States doesn't know how far they have progressed. The United States is also very worried about this. It is increasing penetration, hoping to obtain more intelligence."

After a pause, he continued with emotion: "I have to say that Professor Xu really did something big this time."

"The demonstration reactor, ITER, was originally expected to start construction in 2025 or even 2035, but this time it has been moved forward by several years."

On the side, Tillman Lunt couldn't help but ask: "I just want to know how he solved the problem of neutron irradiation of the first wall material and what material he used."

Robert smiled bitterly and said: "How can this kind of technology involving the core of controllable nuclear fusion be spread?"

"However, there is news that the first wall material may be related to the radiation technology that Professor Xu previously developed to deal with nuclear waste."

"'Nuclear energy beta radiation energy concentration and conversion technology'?"

"Well, this is it."

Hearing this, Tillman Lent began to think about it. He had naturally heard of this technology applied to nuclear waste.

Germany has also had transactions with China. In the past two years, the government used technology in exchange for China to build a nuclear waste power station in Bavaria, and then prepared to collect the nuclear waste from 17 nuclear power plants across the country. It was transferred and disposed of in one go.

This is a good thing for Germany, which relies on Tsarist Russia for energy.

After all, due to the extremely difficult disposal of nuclear waste, they were planning to gradually shut down all nuclear power plants.

But now, after the nuclear waste problem has been dealt with, nuclear power plants have been promoted on a large scale.

Of course, energy issues are still a big trouble for them.

Otherwise, the EU would not increase investment in controlled nuclear fusion.

But what's sad now is that they seem to be far behind China.

No matter how anxious countries are about this news, the financial market has already reacted from the moment the Qixia Controlled Nuclear Fusion Project announced the construction of a demonstration reactor through the news media.

On Wall Street, just like those in the field of nuclear fusion, these financial elites who usually sit in their offices with air conditioners blowing on are now sweating coldly, panicking and anxious.

In particular, financial institutions in areas that speculate in coal, oil, natural gas and other fossil energy areas are on the verge of selling off the stocks and futures in their hands.

Does the construction of the demonstration reactor mean that the commercialization of controllable nuclear fusion is approaching?

If the ultimate energy in the dream of human civilization comes true, fossil energy and other things will all be swept into the dust of history, right?

Oil and natural gas are not bad. Even if they are separated from the fuel and energy attributes, they still have the attributes of chemical raw materials.

However, although coal can indeed obtain some chemical raw materials through gasification, distillation and other methods, the importance of energy attributes accounts for almost more than 90% of its various attributes.

What's more, China is still the world's largest coal consumer, and its coal imports from other countries every year are astronomical.

There are even some countries, such as Indonesia, the Philippines and other South Asian countries, the economic gain from exporting coal to China even accounts for a high proportion of their own economic GDP.

If one day China no longer needs their coal, everyone can imagine the consequences.

Although there is still a long way to go between the demonstration reactor and the real commercial fusion reactor, no one knows how many years, ten years or even decades it will take to truly complete the process.

But for the market, when such news is released, it will create panic in itself.

Of course, it is certain that some capital giants are taking advantage of the troubled waters and adding fuel to the flames.

But no matter what, the decline of fossil fuels is doomed.

If good news about controllable nuclear fusion comes out from Professor Xu again in the future, it is not impossible that the fossil energy-related sector will be directly penetrated.

Xu Chuan could think of the troubled Western countries and the slump in the stock and futures markets, but he was not very concerned about them.

Compared with these things, he was more concerned about the construction of the demonstration reactor.

This is a super project. Although the Qixia Controlled Nuclear Fusion Engineering Base was divided according to the standards of the demonstration reactor from the beginning, some experimental configurations were also made according to the standards.

But the experimental reactor and the demonstration reactor are two completely different things after all.

In contrast, the demonstration reactor has many more supporting equipment.

For example, ultra-vacuum pumps, plasma exchange systems, generator sets, power grid control. A series of related supporting equipment are not available in the experimental reactor.

In fact, Xu Chuan is also in the institute, discussing these things with two academicians arranged by the Nuclear Industry Group.

"We will temporarily set six generators here, and reserve space for four. There is no problem with this. Just follow your request, Academician Xu."

"But as for the way of generating electricity, shall we still use heat engines?"

"If we use heat engines, we have complete design drawings and structural drawings here. We can use them with a little modification. It is very convenient."

In the office, Academicians Wang Yongnian and Hou Chengping of the Nuclear Industry Group discussed with Xu Chuan and Peng Hongxi the details of the supporting equipment for the demonstration reactor construction.

Hearing this question, Xu Chuan smiled and said, "To be honest, using nuclear fusion to boil water is a bit of a waste of talent."

Academician Hou Chengping shook his head and said, "But it is undeniable that boiling water is still the most efficient way of generating electricity that we can currently create."

Since Watt and Faraday opened the steam age and the electromagnetic age, no matter how energy and social technology change, there has never been much change in how to generate electricity in terms of electricity.

Boiling water is still the most common and most efficient way of generating electricity.

Although countries are constantly optimizing this set of technologies, they have never been separated from it.

There is a joke that goes:

"Hey, look! We have discovered another new energy source."

"What can we do with it?"

"We can use it to boil water!"

It is a black humor joke, but it truly reflects the current level of human technology in power generation.

How to say it, anyway, with the current human technology, it is difficult to directly convert chemical energy and nuclear energy such as coal and oil into electrical energy on a large scale.

It is still the same as Watt and Faraday two hundred years ago.

First find a way to convert it into the internal energy of water, then the water vapor drives the steam turbine to convert it into kinetic energy, and then cut the magnetic flux lines to convert it into electrical energy.

Modern thermal power is essentially to use fuel (coal, natural gas, nuclear energy, garbage, etc.) to boil water, generate water vapor, convert its kinetic energy into the kinetic energy of turbine rotation, and then drive the generator set.

If we expand it further, hydropower and wind power can actually be planned into this category, and the core mechanism is the same.

The only difference is solar power generation, the core of which is the photovoltaic effect.

In addition, there is a rarely heard of bio-power generation, which uses a special chemical reaction of the organisms themselves to generate electricity, but it has basically not been used commercially and is still being studied in the laboratory.

Xu Chuan smiled and said: "It is undeniable that the efficiency of boiling water is indeed a very high one in the past power generation technology."

"For mainstream heat sources such as coal combustion, solar energy, nuclear fission, geothermal energy, before the supercritical carbon dioxide circulation technology matures, no other material can replace water, which seems to be nothing special."

"It can be said that as the source of life, water is magical, and humans are lucky that such a good material can be used for power generation in addition to drinking."

After a pause, he smiled and continued: "But when it comes to efficiency, the efficiency of boiling water is not necessarily the highest."

"Especially in the technology of controlled nuclear fusion."

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