Fusion Reactor Neutrons
Discussions revolve around neutron production in deuterium-tritium fusion reactions, their challenges for energy capture, material damage, shielding, and comparisons to fission or aneutronic fusion.
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Could this maybe be used as part of a fusion reactor?
Sorry, I meant to type 'from a fusion reactor', since that's what we're talking about here.
What happens if fusion reactor meets a bomb?
Almost all of the energy comes out as kinetic energy of the fusion byproducts, which are mainly atomic nuclei and neutrons. Sadly, a great deal of the energy of the easiest to achieve fusion reactions (D-D and D-T) tends to exist in the neutrons released by the reactions. And those neutrons tend to fly right out of the charged plasma quite readily. This makes creating a self-sustaining magnetically confined fusion reaction more difficult but it also makes building a fusion reactor slightly chall
People often make the mistake of looking at the reaction energy of fusion, and comparing that with fission or burning fossil fuels.But the majority of the reaction energy is carried away by high-speed neutrons, which are pure waste - they can't be captured by magnetic fields, they are heavy and penetrate almost any material, leaving holes behind that make the structure brittle, and when they do get absorbed, they make the atom that absorbed them unstable, turning the material radioactive
Deuterium/Tritium fusion produces neutrons that will escape the magnetic fields and hit the surrounding machine producing heat but also damage. This shield around the machine absorbing the neutrons will have a circulating fluid that will remove the heat to run a steam or other type of generator.We don't really know how to build this part of the reactor right now, but some metals have the ability to self heal and people think this shield should be possible to build that has a decent
Why not just fuse hydrogen nuclei together? The energy produced as a byproduct could be very useful as well
My understanding is that neutrons are the primary component for heat generation and therefore steam and therefore energy. At low energy fusion reactions, is this not the desired outcome?
Why is fusion better than traditional nuclear reactors?
Doesn't the same apply to nuclear fusion power generation?