• DarkCloud@lemmy.world
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    23 days ago

    Predicted fusion energy and energy actually harvested and converted to usable electricity are not the same thing. Your article is about “fusion energy” not experimentally verified electrical output.

    It’s a physicist doing conversion calculations (from heat to potential electricity), not a volt meter measuring actual output produced.

    • tburkhol@lemmy.world
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      23 days ago

      If you’re not sure how the fire works, it seems kind of stupid to build a turbine for it.

      • Llewellyn@lemm.ee
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        23 days ago

        We were absolutely not sure how fire really works (low temperature plasma dynamics and so on) when we used it in caves eons ago.

        • scarabic@lemmy.world
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          23 days ago

          We also did not build turbines then.

          Also, a campfire is not plasma, so you probably shouldn’t be building any turbines either.

            • scarabic@lemmy.world
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              22 days ago

              Very hot flames can contain enough ions / free electrons to be considered a plasma but a wood campfire the likes of which cavemen built, which is what we are discussing here, do not achieve such temperatures. If cavemen wielded acetylene torches then they might have more experience with plasma.

              If you were thinking something simple like “fire is plasma” that is reductive, and the cases where flame is plasma are not the everyday kind. Hence, when I said “a campfire is not plasma” I was being pretty specific. Your reply that ”fire is a low temperature plasma,” as an unqualified blanket statement, is wrong. Go read on it. It’s interesting.

              • Llewellyn@lemm.ee
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                22 days ago

                We used very hot flame later. Still without full understanding of plasma.