this post was submitted on 07 Aug 2023
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US scientists achieve net energy gain for second time in a fusion reaction (www.theguardian.com)
submitted 1 year ago by L4s@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world
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US scientists achieve net energy gain for second time in a fusion reaction::The Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s National Ignition Facility achieved the feat using lasers to fuse two atoms

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[–] drspod@lemmy.ml 28 points 1 year ago (3 children)

It might be net energy gain when considering just the energy needed to sustain the reaction, but I doubt it accounts for the energy needed to power and cool all of the infrastructure that makes that reaction possible. They never mention that part.

In December, Lawrence Livermore first achieved a net energy gain in a fusion experiment using lasers. That experiment briefly achieved what’s known as fusion ignition by generating 3.15 megajoules of energy output after the laser delivered 2.05 megajoules to the target

The laser energy is not the only energy input (or even the largest part) required to run these experiments.

Here is a good (2 year old) video on this topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJ4W1g-6JiY

[–] Telcontar@lemmy.world 11 points 1 year ago

Here is another article that does actually mention the other energy requirements

Energy gain in this context only compares the energy generated to the energy in the lasers, not to the total amount of energy pulled off the grid to power the system, which is much higher. Scientists estimate that commercial fusion will require reactions that generate between 30 and 100 times the energy in the lasers.

[–] JoeClu@lemmy.world 9 points 1 year ago

Last time I heard about it, it was exactly like you mention. I find the articles very misleading.