This is the
talk page for discussing improvements to the
DEMOnstration Power Plant article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject. |
Article policies
|
Find sources: Google ( books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL |
This article is rated Start-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
DEMO is the name of a proposed fusion reactor, so i chose to create a page here. This unfortunalty ment removing a redirevt page to Demo (comics). I hope no one is bovvered. mastodon 23:50, 1 February 2006 (UTC)
Is the project famous enough to deserve its own article? There are no references of any kind. -- Elonka 16:19, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
The ITER article says that ITER is designed to run for 500 seconds (and in another place: 'for 8 minutes' - or 480 seconds). This article says 400 seconds. I'm going to assume the ITER article is correct and change it to 500 here. If anyone has knowledge that 400 is indeed the right number then they need to fix the ITER article as well as this one. SteveBaker 18:45, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
From iter.org: ITER will produce about 500 MW of fusion power in nominal operation, for pulses of 400 seconds and longer.-- 83.38.193.187 17:03, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
Article currently reads As a prototype commercial fusion reactor DEMO could make fusion energy (which does not produce the global warming or pollution of fossil fuel, nor the long-lived radioactive waste of fission energy) available within 20 years. The ITER article quotes a Greenpeace activist as saying Nuclear fusion has all the problems of nuclear power, including producing nuclear waste and the risks of a nuclear accident.
They can't both be right, and I actually think Greenpeace has it right here on the waste issue. According to the current article (and AFAIK), DEMO will use the D + T reaction. But the current article also states It is hoped that careful material choice will mean that the wastes produced in this way will have much shorter half lives than the waste from fission reactors, with wastes remaining harmful for less than one century. These are weasel words. Yes, many would like to think this will happen, because unless it does happen, fusion won't be able to compete with fission on environmental grounds, as many would like to think it will. But there is no evidence as yet to support this hope, and there are many reasons to doubt it.
But whoever is right, the claim that DEMO could make fusion energy (which does not produce... the long-lived radioactive waste of fission energy) available within 20 years is clearly POV. And even the most optimistic material from the ITER participants themselves doesn't support it. Rather, testing of these materials won't even start until IFMIF comes online about 2017, having taken ten years to build. If DEMO then takes another ten years to build, the testing program for its lining materials would need to be completed in zero years in order to meet the twenty year deadline.
This is obviously not going to happen, but it's only half the story. It's also interesting to note that IFMIF will only subject the materials to real-time testing. The possibility of accelerating the testing program, as was done for fission reactor cladding materials in particular, by using an even higher neutron flux does not exist, because higher fluxes are just not available. They are pulling out all stops to even achieve that predicted neutron flux of DEMO, without trying to exceed it. So, even if you only want to keep the lining material for two years between changes, which is probably too short an interval for any commercial reactor, each test of each new formulation will take two years... and that's also assuming 100% availability of IFMIF for those two years. Andrewa 02:00, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
I have removed the "unverified claims" tag. Whether anybody here thinks this is possible or not, it is the focus of much fusion research and up to scientists to label as speculation. Most of the peer reviewed work on ITER makes similar claims. Rpf ( talk) 17:17, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
"Re-adding Speculation tag. I have never read such a speculative article. Even ref 2 begins by saying: 'The steps beyond ITER are open at this stage.'" The "future power plant" covers the article's form of speculation; the speculation template applies to notable refutation from the scientific community, which does not include Johnfos's views. I have removed the template. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dmyersturnbull ( talk • contribs) 07:47, 25 January 2009 (UTC)
This document may be of interest http://www.iop.org/Jet/fulltext/JETR99013.pdf SkippyUK ( talk) 09:43, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
Presumably somewhere in Europe (France?), but where and by who is it to be built? And c14 years design then c9 years construction so it is a long-term project! Hugo999 ( talk) 01:50, 23 November 2010 (UTC)
India they have a few plans for a test reactor that could conveniently be converted to a DIY 'demo' if iter is successful — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.137.43.29 ( talk) 22:12, 19 December 2012 (UTC)
DEMO doesn't refer to any specific project, but rather the step beyond ITER - the demonstration of fusion as a source of electrical energy. Many countries have proposed DEMO designs, and it is likely that there will be more than one variant built once break-even thermal energy production has been demonstrated in ITER. 150.203.179.56 ( talk) 05:35, 21 October 2013 (UTC)
The broader approach agreement ~2005 between the ITER consortium and Japan implies that France (as host for ITER) must support Japan as host for DEMO. - Rod57 ( talk) 02:44, 16 February 2016 (UTC)
It's rather speculative. The article currently reads DEMO is intended to be the first fusion reactor to generate electrical power. Nobody is saying how much electrical power this might be. The first fission reactor to generate electrical power was Experimental Breeder Reactor I in 1951. Four light globes' worth in fact, see the photo. It's not recorded exactly how much electrical power was being consumed by the reactor's pumps etc. at the time AFAIK, but it was a lot more than the electrical power required to light those four light globes.
And that's the result DEMO is promising. ITER in operation will consume considerable quantities of liquid nitrogen and liquid helium, providing 1,300 kW and 75 kW of cooling respectively (in addition to the 450 MW water cooling system). DEMO will consume far more of these liquid gases, the 15% bigger is linear dimension and is a minimum, so it will be at least 1.5 times the size in volume with 1.3 times the surface area, and it will run hotter, and most important it will operate continuously, rather than in bursts of up to 8 minutes maximum which is the goal for ITER. Providing these liquid gases will consume a considerable amount of energy, which along with the energy needed to maintain the enormous magnetic fields will all come from the electricity supply.
So DEMO, like ITER, will consume a great deal of electrical power. Unlike ITER it will produce some too, but only a token amount compared to its electric input. Or at least that is the plan when you cut out the weasel words such as prototype commercial. That phrase to me implies that a series of plants similar to DEMO might be commercially viable. Not a chance. DEMO won't even produce a net amount of electricity.
Electrical break-even will be achieved by the plant after DEMO, at best. Andrewa ( talk) 06:00, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
The result of the proposal was no consensus. -- BDD ( talk) 14:17, 9 May 2015 (UTC)
DEMO → ? – DEMO should redirect to Demo; topic is not wp:notable. <<< SOME GADGET GEEK >>> ( talk) 15:25, 6 April 2015 (UTC) <<< SOME GADGET GEEK >>> ( talk) 15:25, 6 April 2015 (UTC)
DEMO, a form of demonstration power plant..."? Our text currently reads: "
DEMO (DEMOnstration Power Plant) ..." and yet from scanning results of my scholar search on: "Demonstration Power Plant" AND demo I do not see support for a stylisation as "DEMOnstration Power Plant". What proportion of the ~ 1,470 results for "Demonstration Power Plant" do you think apply to other topics, what are those topics and which Wikipedia articles apply to them?
Wikipedia prefers the name that is most commonly used (as determined by its prevalence in reliable English-language sources) as such names will be the most recognizable and the most natural." Greg Kaye 09:03, 7 April 2015 (UTC)
While I agree with the IP above that we shouldn't allow trivial disambiguation using only capitalisation (nor any other trivial difference), at present consensus is to do so, and unless we can overturn that (IMO very silly) consensus we should abide by it. Consensus can change and if we have consensus here to ignore that rule, that might be a valid first step to changing the rule in due course. My opinion unfortunately is that there's not a snowball's chance of that and that we should just accept the rule and move on.
Disclosure: I believe this is an extremely important article because of my belief that there is an enormous amount of misinformation surrounding fusion power, some of it deliberate to the point that some might even see the suggestion above that DEMO is non-notable as part of this campaign. I assume good faith but think we need to be aware. Opponents of fission power put forward among their arguments that fusion will soon make it obsolete, and that fusion will create no significant amounts of nuclear waste. My personal opinion is that maintaining the plasma facing material will create such enormous amounts of high-level nuclear waste when compared to fission power that fusion will be neither economic nor politically acceptable. We will not know for sure in my lifetime, but meantime, good Wikipedia articles are an important safeguard against wild and baseless speculation. Andrewa ( talk) 18:07, 7 April 2015 (UTC)
The Timeline section gives the dates presented in 2004. To what extent were the dates dependent on the progress of ITER and IFMIF (eg does the engineering design (due 2024) needs results from extended operation of ITER and IFMIF?) and has there been any later revision to the DEMO timeline eg due to delays in ITER ? - Rod57 ( talk) 18:03, 5 December 2015 (UTC)
Have any funds been allocated for any part of the DEMO idea ? How many groups are working on a conceptual design ? What progress has been made on a conceptual design since 2004 ? (no hints at Preparing for ITER and developing DEMO) - Rod57 ( talk) 18:20, 5 December 2015 (UTC)
It says nothing specific to DEMO and isn't worth reading - Delete the lot ? - Rod57 ( talk) 02:54, 16 February 2016 (UTC)
Article currently reads in part both ITER and DEMO will produce their own tritium, dispensing with the fission reactor currently used for this purpose. The source given is archived here and reads in part Global inventory for tritium is presently around twenty kilos, which ITER will draw upon during its operational phase and later Certain modules in ITER will be used during later-stage operation to test tritium breeding concepts.
That's a long way from what the article seems to say. ITER will produce some Tritium, but not nearly enough to fuel itself. Perhaps not very much at all. Andrewa ( talk) 01:04, 28 September 2020 (UTC)
The editor at 150.203.179.56, on 21 October 2013, was right: "DEMO doesn't refer to any specific project, but rather the step beyond ITER - the demonstration of fusion as a source of electrical energy. Many countries have proposed DEMO designs, and it is likely that there will be more than one variant built once break-even thermal energy production has been demonstrated in ITER."
The assumption by Andrewa, 24 October 2013 (UTC) was entirely reasonable: "Have you a source for this? It's a very interesting claim. The unprecedented degree of international cooperation that was necessary to build ITER was motivated entirely by the enormous cost. Several countries have built fusion reactors on the general scale of JET, but there's only ever expected to be one ITER. I'd have thought that similar considerations would have meant that there will only be one DEMO."
Reasonable it was, current it was not. It less-current now, seven years later. As a result, a lot of information in this page is outdated, including the page name which should be plural. Here is a proposal for revision of the lead.
Please discuss (and please help Wikify the urls I've provided)
Much of the discussions on this page are about the EU DEMO design, and editors should carefully review this article to ensure that the EU DEMO design references are identified as such. Clearly, lots more on this page will need updating, but I'm offering the above as a starting point.
I believe the TIMELINE section "The following timetable was presented at the IAEA Fusion Energy Conference in 2004 by Christopher Llewellyn Smith" is weakly supported and overstates the significance of Smith's presentation. First, the source provided is secondary, not primary. More important, Smith's ideas do not represent any form of official position or consensus. It is one person's conference paper. Moreover, it is easy to find earlier precedents for the DEMO reactor concepts, such as this one,
https://inis.iaea.org/search/search.aspx?orig_q=RN:27039500 "The activities on conceptual study of fusion DEMO-reactor were started in Russia in 1992."
StevenBKrivit ( talk) 01:27, 1 January 2021 (UTC)
References
The article and the conversations here all sound like they are describing something that might be built, and according to a timeline. Like, say, a freeway system, or a hospital, or a railway network.
This is not only none of those, it is nothing like any of those. This whole article describes a complete fantasy. This is not worthy of serious consideration. The article should make that quite clear. 2001:8003:E40F:9601:30DF:977D:1C66:DDE7 ( talk) 13:08, 27 June 2024 (UTC)
This is the
talk page for discussing improvements to the
DEMOnstration Power Plant article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject. |
Article policies
|
Find sources: Google ( books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL |
This article is rated Start-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
DEMO is the name of a proposed fusion reactor, so i chose to create a page here. This unfortunalty ment removing a redirevt page to Demo (comics). I hope no one is bovvered. mastodon 23:50, 1 February 2006 (UTC)
Is the project famous enough to deserve its own article? There are no references of any kind. -- Elonka 16:19, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
The ITER article says that ITER is designed to run for 500 seconds (and in another place: 'for 8 minutes' - or 480 seconds). This article says 400 seconds. I'm going to assume the ITER article is correct and change it to 500 here. If anyone has knowledge that 400 is indeed the right number then they need to fix the ITER article as well as this one. SteveBaker 18:45, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
From iter.org: ITER will produce about 500 MW of fusion power in nominal operation, for pulses of 400 seconds and longer.-- 83.38.193.187 17:03, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
Article currently reads As a prototype commercial fusion reactor DEMO could make fusion energy (which does not produce the global warming or pollution of fossil fuel, nor the long-lived radioactive waste of fission energy) available within 20 years. The ITER article quotes a Greenpeace activist as saying Nuclear fusion has all the problems of nuclear power, including producing nuclear waste and the risks of a nuclear accident.
They can't both be right, and I actually think Greenpeace has it right here on the waste issue. According to the current article (and AFAIK), DEMO will use the D + T reaction. But the current article also states It is hoped that careful material choice will mean that the wastes produced in this way will have much shorter half lives than the waste from fission reactors, with wastes remaining harmful for less than one century. These are weasel words. Yes, many would like to think this will happen, because unless it does happen, fusion won't be able to compete with fission on environmental grounds, as many would like to think it will. But there is no evidence as yet to support this hope, and there are many reasons to doubt it.
But whoever is right, the claim that DEMO could make fusion energy (which does not produce... the long-lived radioactive waste of fission energy) available within 20 years is clearly POV. And even the most optimistic material from the ITER participants themselves doesn't support it. Rather, testing of these materials won't even start until IFMIF comes online about 2017, having taken ten years to build. If DEMO then takes another ten years to build, the testing program for its lining materials would need to be completed in zero years in order to meet the twenty year deadline.
This is obviously not going to happen, but it's only half the story. It's also interesting to note that IFMIF will only subject the materials to real-time testing. The possibility of accelerating the testing program, as was done for fission reactor cladding materials in particular, by using an even higher neutron flux does not exist, because higher fluxes are just not available. They are pulling out all stops to even achieve that predicted neutron flux of DEMO, without trying to exceed it. So, even if you only want to keep the lining material for two years between changes, which is probably too short an interval for any commercial reactor, each test of each new formulation will take two years... and that's also assuming 100% availability of IFMIF for those two years. Andrewa 02:00, 24 June 2007 (UTC)
I have removed the "unverified claims" tag. Whether anybody here thinks this is possible or not, it is the focus of much fusion research and up to scientists to label as speculation. Most of the peer reviewed work on ITER makes similar claims. Rpf ( talk) 17:17, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
"Re-adding Speculation tag. I have never read such a speculative article. Even ref 2 begins by saying: 'The steps beyond ITER are open at this stage.'" The "future power plant" covers the article's form of speculation; the speculation template applies to notable refutation from the scientific community, which does not include Johnfos's views. I have removed the template. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dmyersturnbull ( talk • contribs) 07:47, 25 January 2009 (UTC)
This document may be of interest http://www.iop.org/Jet/fulltext/JETR99013.pdf SkippyUK ( talk) 09:43, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
Presumably somewhere in Europe (France?), but where and by who is it to be built? And c14 years design then c9 years construction so it is a long-term project! Hugo999 ( talk) 01:50, 23 November 2010 (UTC)
India they have a few plans for a test reactor that could conveniently be converted to a DIY 'demo' if iter is successful — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.137.43.29 ( talk) 22:12, 19 December 2012 (UTC)
DEMO doesn't refer to any specific project, but rather the step beyond ITER - the demonstration of fusion as a source of electrical energy. Many countries have proposed DEMO designs, and it is likely that there will be more than one variant built once break-even thermal energy production has been demonstrated in ITER. 150.203.179.56 ( talk) 05:35, 21 October 2013 (UTC)
The broader approach agreement ~2005 between the ITER consortium and Japan implies that France (as host for ITER) must support Japan as host for DEMO. - Rod57 ( talk) 02:44, 16 February 2016 (UTC)
It's rather speculative. The article currently reads DEMO is intended to be the first fusion reactor to generate electrical power. Nobody is saying how much electrical power this might be. The first fission reactor to generate electrical power was Experimental Breeder Reactor I in 1951. Four light globes' worth in fact, see the photo. It's not recorded exactly how much electrical power was being consumed by the reactor's pumps etc. at the time AFAIK, but it was a lot more than the electrical power required to light those four light globes.
And that's the result DEMO is promising. ITER in operation will consume considerable quantities of liquid nitrogen and liquid helium, providing 1,300 kW and 75 kW of cooling respectively (in addition to the 450 MW water cooling system). DEMO will consume far more of these liquid gases, the 15% bigger is linear dimension and is a minimum, so it will be at least 1.5 times the size in volume with 1.3 times the surface area, and it will run hotter, and most important it will operate continuously, rather than in bursts of up to 8 minutes maximum which is the goal for ITER. Providing these liquid gases will consume a considerable amount of energy, which along with the energy needed to maintain the enormous magnetic fields will all come from the electricity supply.
So DEMO, like ITER, will consume a great deal of electrical power. Unlike ITER it will produce some too, but only a token amount compared to its electric input. Or at least that is the plan when you cut out the weasel words such as prototype commercial. That phrase to me implies that a series of plants similar to DEMO might be commercially viable. Not a chance. DEMO won't even produce a net amount of electricity.
Electrical break-even will be achieved by the plant after DEMO, at best. Andrewa ( talk) 06:00, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
The result of the proposal was no consensus. -- BDD ( talk) 14:17, 9 May 2015 (UTC)
DEMO → ? – DEMO should redirect to Demo; topic is not wp:notable. <<< SOME GADGET GEEK >>> ( talk) 15:25, 6 April 2015 (UTC) <<< SOME GADGET GEEK >>> ( talk) 15:25, 6 April 2015 (UTC)
DEMO, a form of demonstration power plant..."? Our text currently reads: "
DEMO (DEMOnstration Power Plant) ..." and yet from scanning results of my scholar search on: "Demonstration Power Plant" AND demo I do not see support for a stylisation as "DEMOnstration Power Plant". What proportion of the ~ 1,470 results for "Demonstration Power Plant" do you think apply to other topics, what are those topics and which Wikipedia articles apply to them?
Wikipedia prefers the name that is most commonly used (as determined by its prevalence in reliable English-language sources) as such names will be the most recognizable and the most natural." Greg Kaye 09:03, 7 April 2015 (UTC)
While I agree with the IP above that we shouldn't allow trivial disambiguation using only capitalisation (nor any other trivial difference), at present consensus is to do so, and unless we can overturn that (IMO very silly) consensus we should abide by it. Consensus can change and if we have consensus here to ignore that rule, that might be a valid first step to changing the rule in due course. My opinion unfortunately is that there's not a snowball's chance of that and that we should just accept the rule and move on.
Disclosure: I believe this is an extremely important article because of my belief that there is an enormous amount of misinformation surrounding fusion power, some of it deliberate to the point that some might even see the suggestion above that DEMO is non-notable as part of this campaign. I assume good faith but think we need to be aware. Opponents of fission power put forward among their arguments that fusion will soon make it obsolete, and that fusion will create no significant amounts of nuclear waste. My personal opinion is that maintaining the plasma facing material will create such enormous amounts of high-level nuclear waste when compared to fission power that fusion will be neither economic nor politically acceptable. We will not know for sure in my lifetime, but meantime, good Wikipedia articles are an important safeguard against wild and baseless speculation. Andrewa ( talk) 18:07, 7 April 2015 (UTC)
The Timeline section gives the dates presented in 2004. To what extent were the dates dependent on the progress of ITER and IFMIF (eg does the engineering design (due 2024) needs results from extended operation of ITER and IFMIF?) and has there been any later revision to the DEMO timeline eg due to delays in ITER ? - Rod57 ( talk) 18:03, 5 December 2015 (UTC)
Have any funds been allocated for any part of the DEMO idea ? How many groups are working on a conceptual design ? What progress has been made on a conceptual design since 2004 ? (no hints at Preparing for ITER and developing DEMO) - Rod57 ( talk) 18:20, 5 December 2015 (UTC)
It says nothing specific to DEMO and isn't worth reading - Delete the lot ? - Rod57 ( talk) 02:54, 16 February 2016 (UTC)
Article currently reads in part both ITER and DEMO will produce their own tritium, dispensing with the fission reactor currently used for this purpose. The source given is archived here and reads in part Global inventory for tritium is presently around twenty kilos, which ITER will draw upon during its operational phase and later Certain modules in ITER will be used during later-stage operation to test tritium breeding concepts.
That's a long way from what the article seems to say. ITER will produce some Tritium, but not nearly enough to fuel itself. Perhaps not very much at all. Andrewa ( talk) 01:04, 28 September 2020 (UTC)
The editor at 150.203.179.56, on 21 October 2013, was right: "DEMO doesn't refer to any specific project, but rather the step beyond ITER - the demonstration of fusion as a source of electrical energy. Many countries have proposed DEMO designs, and it is likely that there will be more than one variant built once break-even thermal energy production has been demonstrated in ITER."
The assumption by Andrewa, 24 October 2013 (UTC) was entirely reasonable: "Have you a source for this? It's a very interesting claim. The unprecedented degree of international cooperation that was necessary to build ITER was motivated entirely by the enormous cost. Several countries have built fusion reactors on the general scale of JET, but there's only ever expected to be one ITER. I'd have thought that similar considerations would have meant that there will only be one DEMO."
Reasonable it was, current it was not. It less-current now, seven years later. As a result, a lot of information in this page is outdated, including the page name which should be plural. Here is a proposal for revision of the lead.
Please discuss (and please help Wikify the urls I've provided)
Much of the discussions on this page are about the EU DEMO design, and editors should carefully review this article to ensure that the EU DEMO design references are identified as such. Clearly, lots more on this page will need updating, but I'm offering the above as a starting point.
I believe the TIMELINE section "The following timetable was presented at the IAEA Fusion Energy Conference in 2004 by Christopher Llewellyn Smith" is weakly supported and overstates the significance of Smith's presentation. First, the source provided is secondary, not primary. More important, Smith's ideas do not represent any form of official position or consensus. It is one person's conference paper. Moreover, it is easy to find earlier precedents for the DEMO reactor concepts, such as this one,
https://inis.iaea.org/search/search.aspx?orig_q=RN:27039500 "The activities on conceptual study of fusion DEMO-reactor were started in Russia in 1992."
StevenBKrivit ( talk) 01:27, 1 January 2021 (UTC)
References
The article and the conversations here all sound like they are describing something that might be built, and according to a timeline. Like, say, a freeway system, or a hospital, or a railway network.
This is not only none of those, it is nothing like any of those. This whole article describes a complete fantasy. This is not worthy of serious consideration. The article should make that quite clear. 2001:8003:E40F:9601:30DF:977D:1C66:DDE7 ( talk) 13:08, 27 June 2024 (UTC)