Helion Energy to demonstrate net electricity production by 2024

[TallDave]

This does confirm that the final assembly of Polaris has shifted to the right by a few months and is now scheduled for summer.

too bad, sounds like it may be late fall before they're getting into the 10KeV+ range

[TallDave]

I still don't know how to put all this together to do what Dave is trying to do, but I sense a path.

thanks, I think I got where I was trying to go, more or less

but my previous estimate rests on the assumption losses must come from the pulse energy and not the fusion products (we might call this the "zero ignition model"), and as Kirtley mentions the gaping hole in that model may be the MeV protons whizzing around transferring energy to the KeV fuel ions

that isn't quite ignition, but it might be akin to striking a match-head

Kirtley mentions a couple papers on the modelling of such collisions, but there are so many interacting variables at play that I wouldn't hazard a guess at this point... definitely one of the more interesting experimental results we hope to see from Polaris, particularly given the value of extending the useful pulse

[Skipjack]

HERT:

So 1Hz, circa 50 MJ in, say 55 MJ out, is 5MW.

yes but unfortunately it's only 5MW for 1ms, which is not very useful, practically speaking, as it would only provide 5KW over the 1 second, or enough to power an average home (although again I have to emphasize this is still 50 years ahead of major programs like ITER and NIF)

since actual usable power is always in watts over time (e.g. kilowatt hours) the recovered fusion power required to maintain a given power plant output is the reciprocal of the reactor utilization factor

my guess would be Helion hopes the next-generation pulse rate will be as fast as 10Hz and the fusing plasma time as long as 10ms, which gives them a utilization of 10% meaning a 100MW power plant would require 1GW recovered power (seems plausible), although both of these obviously represent some challenges

Uhm no. 50 MJ is almost 14 kWh. That would be 14 kWh per second. Assuming that half of it is recirculated into the machine, we get 7 kWh per second.
That would be 25 MW, if released to the grid continuously. Though with losses and everything else, it would likely be significantly less. I would already be happy if they managed to power a light bulb.

[mvanwink5]

happy if they managed to power a light bulb.

Yes.
That was the context for Polaris power production, just to reach net electric, not commercial. I thought that was understood. Hence the capacitor sizing for polaris is just to form the plasma, accelerate, then compress it, then recover it minus losses. This energy is not totally lost, but recovered for the next cycle minus losses (fyi, recovery is through dynamic breaking of the plasmoid in the compression zone). Helion talks about the net losses. I'll watch while TD disputes Helion's claims.

Later, for commercial, the capacitors will need additional energy storage for reactor operation, plus, to store produced fusion energy to be converted continuously to 3 phase, sine wave shaped power out - dynamically - per 60 Hz cycle (not even a second).

[Skipjack]

happy if they managed to power a light bulb.

Yes.
That was the context for Polaris power production, just to reach net electric, not commercial. I thought that was understood. Hence the capacitor sizing for polaris is just to form the plasma, accelerate, then compress it, then recover it minus losses. This energy is not totally lost, but recovered for the next cycle minus losses (fyi, recovery is through dynamic breaking of the plasmoid in the compression zone). Helion talks about the net losses. I'll watch while TD disputes Helion's claims.

Later, for commercial, the capacitors will need additional energy storage for reactor operation, plus, to store produced fusion energy to be converted continuously to 3 phase, sine wave shaped power out - dynamically - per 60 Hz cycle (not even a second).

I am not sure whether future power plants will need much larger capacitor banks. I have only ever heard and seen the 50 MJ number in relation to the size of it. How it all plays together is a bit hard to understand and Helion is playing their cards close to their chests with their pulsed power systems, an area where they have significant expertise and decade(s) of experience.

They will need inverters to convert the direct current from the capacitors to alternating current for the grid. It is not an uncommon piece of equipment. Renewables and grid scale batteries need them too. That said, it adds at least some complication and cost to the system.

Generally, it seems that Helion is aiming for behind the meter applications first, as it avoids this, along with the lengthy bureaucracy involved with getting grid connection permits.

I believe that this is also one reason why Microsoft is the first customer. Theoretically, they can supply them with DC- current rather than AC current, but the exact details are unknown to me and probably heavily protected by NDAs. The same could be true for their contract with Nucor which is also a behind the meter contract. Just as with the Microsoft contract, this is all pure speculation on my side so take it with a grain of salt.

[RERT]

HERT:

So 1Hz, circa 50 MJ in, say 55 MJ out, is 5MW.

yes but unfortunately it's only 5MW for 1ms, which is not very useful…

No, I don’t think so. If its producing a net 5MJ in each pulse, and doing one pulse per second, thats 5MW: a Watt is a Joule per second.

What is strange is that the core seems to be idle something over 99.7% of the time. Seems like an opportunity…though I dimly recall 10Hz as the target for the commercial machine, so only idle 97% of the time…

So again: we seem to have concluded that polaris will pulse at 1Hz. Is the input pulse energy 50MJ, or some other number? Is it right to picture that as lasting about 1ms? That’s a 50GW pulse…

[mvanwink5]

Remaining gasses have to be evacuated after the pulse, and their patented high volume vacuum pump is key to doing this fast.

[mvanwink5]

I am not sure whether future power plants will need much larger capacitor banks.

I would not be surprised if you are largely correct that there would not be a significant increase in capacitor energy storage to handle net power.

3 phase power summed is non time varying, constant, and transformers are standard enabling voltage to be stepped up for transmission then stepped down for users needs. It is hard to guess what Helion would do for their first customer but a standardized customer interface would make sense in the long run.

[RERT]

Remaining gasses have to be evacuated after the pulse, and their patented high volume vacuum pump is key to doing this fast.

Thanks, I should have realised!

[Skipjack]

No, I don’t think so. If its producing a net 5MJ in each pulse, and doing one pulse per second, thats 5MW: a Watt is a Joule per second.

What is strange is that the core seems to be idle something over 99.7% of the time. Seems like an opportunity…though I dimly recall 10Hz as the target for the commercial machine, so only idle 97% of the time…

So again: we seem to have concluded that polaris will pulse at 1Hz. Is the input pulse energy 50MJ, or some other number? Is it right to picture that as lasting about 1ms? That’s a 50GW pulse…

Older presentations by Helion said that Polaris would do 1 Hz, their website says that Polaris will do "0.1 Hz+". My current assumption is that Polaris will do at least 0.1 Hz initially, but will later be updated to do more.

Future power plants are supposed to do 1 to 10 Hz. To the best of my understanding, one limiting factor is the pumps as the vacuum chamber has to be evacuated between pulses. There are also wall load restrictions (neutrons, X-rays) and the cooling that is required to deal with that. Could also be that some of the other components (switches, e.g.) need some time between pulses, though I am somewhat doubtful of that because Helion has done much higher pulse rates in the past (albeit with a much smaller system).

The capacitor bank can hold 50 MJ, how much of that is input power and how much of it is fusion power is a bit of a mystery. I hear that the target Q is around 2. But all of that has been in a bit of a flux lately.

[mvanwink5]

SJ, any idea what the new earthwork is all about at Helion's new plant? Accelerating production plans??

[Skipjack]

SJ, any idea what the new earthwork is all about at Helion's new plant? Accelerating production plans??

Been trying to get information on that.

[mvanwink5]

AI compute clusters are power hogs & huge pressure to supply it is escalating exponentially. If Helion can scale there will be a market that dwarfs steel foundries.

[RERT]

The capacitor bank can hold 50 MJ, how much of that is input power and how much of it is fusion power is a bit of a mystery. I hear that the target Q is around 2. But all of that has been in a bit of a flux lately.

Not entirely clear if that's Polaris or the power plant. If it's the plant at 50MW it doesn't work at 1 Hz: the capacitor bank will be empty after supplying the grid when the next shot cues up.

At 2 Hz, I don't think it can work at a Q of 2, because of losses.

A consistent picture at 3 Hz would be 33MJ to power the pulse, and 17MJ to the grid. So at Q=2, 33MJ in, 66MJ out, and up to 16MJ available to cover various losses. The higher the pulse rate the lower the needed Q.

Meh. Speculation: might as well wait and see.

In more exotic speculation, could they form FRCs in the compression zone and accelerate them out of the device after the pulse? Wouldn't have to go at anything like 300km/s to beat a pump...maybe...

[Skipjack]

Not entirely clear if that's Polaris or the power plant. If it's the plant at 50MW it doesn't work at 1 Hz: the capacitor bank will be empty after supplying the grid when the next shot cues up.

At 2 Hz, I don't think it can work at a Q of 2, because of losses.

A consistent picture at 3 Hz would be 33MJ to power the pulse, and 17MJ to the grid. So at Q=2, 33MJ in, 66MJ out, and up to 16MJ available to cover various losses. The higher the pulse rate the lower the needed Q.

Meh. Speculation: might as well wait and see.

In more exotic speculation, could they form FRCs in the compression zone and accelerate them out of the device after the pulse? Wouldn't have to go at anything like 300km/s to beat a pump...maybe...

Power plants will do between 1 Hz and 10 Hz for load following. So the full 50 MW will be at 10 Hz, I assume, IF they can get 10 Hz to work. Otherwise, they will have to make their machines bigger and/or stronger.