Company Microsoft wants to completely switch to electricity without carbon emissions and be carbon neutral by 2030 (here it must be said that every power plant has carbon emissions, at least in its construction). The company’s project should become one of the sources of energy Helion Energy. It should start supplying Microsoft with 50 MW of electricity from 2028. But it has one catch, and it’s a really huge one. This electricity should come from a fusion reactor. Let’s remember here that nuclear fusion has been developing for many decades and we are basically still in a state where “it will be in 20-30 years”. However, Helion Energy does not think so and sees the launch of the merger in just 5 years, which is unbelievable.
Helion Energy’s reactor does not use a laser method like the reactor mentioned above, rather it is closer to tokamaks that work with a magnetic field and plasma. Its plasma accelerator uses two uncommon isotopes, deuterium (heavy hydrogen) and helium-3 (tralphium). In the case of deuterium it is about 0.016% of hydrogen, in the case of helium-3 it is even worse, there it is only 0.00014%. The company thus faces several problems and goals with a rather low probability of success. Not only is it necessary to ensure that the fusion succeeds at all and that energy can be obtained (although there are already 6 prototypes that have reached that temperature, only the 7th prototype should obtain energy from the reaction), it is also necessary that this reaction really produces more energy than how much it consumes, including covering all other inputs, it is also necessary to solve where to take the heavy hydrogen and helium-3, which are very scarce, and if all this miraculously works out, to build the whole thing in the promised mere 5 years.
The principle of the reactor is that plasma is heated on both sides of the reactor, using magnets to move it towards the center of the reactor at a speed of over a million miles per hour (1.6 million km/h). They collide in the fusion chamber, the magnetic field increases and the compressed plasma reaches a temperature of 100 million °C. Nuclear fusion will occur and energy will be released into the capacitors, where the energy can be used for another cycle of heating the plasma, moving it magnetically, and so on. The entire cycle should take place in milliseconds.
Do you believe that this really very optimistic plan will be fulfilled, or will Helion pay a contractual penalty to Microsoft for non-compliance?
2023-05-17 13:08:11
#Microsoft #signed #contract #Helion #supply #nuclear #fusion #power
