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Scientists replicate fusion ignition
(www.afr.com)
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this post was submitted on 07 Aug 2023
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I know a little about stuff.
Similar to the 2022 firing, The fusion charge itself was net energy positive. That is, the fusion production was greater than the input of laser shot used, which means they're closing in on optimal ignition.
However: the total cycle energy was terrible. The lasers NIF uses are quite old due to the speed of government and the sheer size of the project, plus thermodynamics hates an engineer's guts. so their total real input electrical energy to generate such a laser pulse of a few joules was hundreds of thousands of times greater than the actual fusion output.
This is great for understanding the physics of conditions that fusion requires, but terrible for generating power.