• Smokeydope@lemmy.worldEnglish
    13·
    6 hours ago

    "Dyson sphere? Boooring. Every type 1 baby species always comes up with the same idea, ‘hey lets just surround a star with mirrors and directly harvest the energy! What could possibly go wrong?’ Besides the fact your 80% of the way towards turning the star into a fucking bomb (don’t ask how we found that out), its basic ass vanilla shit.

    Look, you don’t progress to a type three civilization by being uncreative hacks. Screw efficiency, the universe is our canvas and this is our art. No, we translocate entire water world planets and ice comets bigger than most moons using manufactured wormholes, hurl them into a designated star and use the steam produced to turn billions of giant turbines locked in orbit around the star. We then convert the mechanical energy to electromagnetic radiation pulses more powerful than neutron star pulsars and reflect them to nearby populated systems with mirrors. Take notes, monkeys."

  • disguy_ovahea@lemmy.worldEnglish
    849·
    18 hours ago

    I don’t know why this is constantly criticized as a method of energy capture. Liquids allow for maximum surface area contact, creating more efficient heat transfer from the irradiated rods.

    Armchair nuclear physicists should release an improved model before being so critical of the most effective and reliable method of energy generation we currently have.

    • SkyeStarfall@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
      78·
      16 hours ago

      I don’t think it’s a criticism? It’s more about highlighting the slight absurdity of super-high tech power generation still using the same method that has been used since the very start of electricity generation. A turbine spun by evaporated water.

    • glimse@lemmy.worldEnglish
      129·
      18 hours ago

      I’d not that it’s criticized, it’s just kinda funny that everything comes back to steam engines

      • disguy_ovahea@lemmy.worldEnglish
        38·
        12 hours ago

        Oh for sure. It’s like a desire path or evolution’s crab in that way. I think I just misunderstood people’s criticisms as belittlement of the process without them understanding why it’s still the standard.

        • glimse@lemmy.worldEnglish
          13·
          17 hours ago

          Fair enough, I’m sure people DO criticize it but it’s mostly a joke.

          On a side note, are there any theoretical energy sources that DON’T involve steam? I’m not well-versed

          • BussyCat@lemmy.worldEnglish
            2·
            6 hours ago

            On the nuclear side there are also alpha voltaics, beta voltaics and gamma voltaics that take radiation and generate electricity. Alpha rely on alpha particles ionizing usually a gas, Beta voltaics rely on beta particles which are electron or positron emissions and gamma voltaics take photons in the gamma region and use them to excite electrons to generate electricity.

            Overall though heating water is significantly easier to do, more efficient, and more robust

          • macarthur_park@lemmy.worldEnglish
            22·
            16 hours ago

            Solar (photovoltaics), wind turbines, and hydroelectric are a few non-steam energy sources in use.

            As for theoretical sources, some of the pulsed-power fusion concepts use the electromagnetic pulse from fusion to directly induce electrical power. But none of these have been demonstrated yet.

          • grue@lemmy.worldEnglish
            7·
            16 hours ago

            Excluding things that still involve moving fluid through a turbine or piston engine mechanically driving a dynamo or alternator while simply swapping out the steam for another fluid (too obvious), here’s all the ones I could find:

          • toynbee@lemmy.worldEnglish
            7·
            17 hours ago

            Also not well versed, but last time I saw this topic come up, someone mentioned towers that wiggle in the wind and generate energy via the wiggles, apparently interacting with liquid at no point.

            edit: Also maybe this YouTuber’s creation? https://youtu.be/BSxK5VagSb8

          • skibidi@lemmy.worldEnglish
            1·
            12 hours ago

            Thermo-electrochemical cycles.

            The idea is simple: the favorability of a chemical reaction is a function of temperature, some reactions are more favorable at high temperatures, some at lower. For electrochemical reactions (e.g. batteries) this means a change in voltage at different temperatures. Some reactions have higher voltages, some lower. By choosing a pair of redox reactions such that the direction of charge transfer can be reversed within a specified temperature envelope, one can create a thermal engine that directly converts heat to electrical energy without requiring a turbine.

            There’s lots of research on this, sometimes called the ‘omnivorous’ flow battery.

          • disguy_ovahea@lemmy.worldEnglish
            1·
            12 hours ago

            Oh, there are many. I was referring specifically to finding a more efficient way to convert the heat from irradiated rods to electrical energy.

    • azi@mander.xyzEnglish
      32·
      8 hours ago

      I mean it does seem kinda weird that running a heat engine to run a generator is more efficient than using a thermoelectric generator with no mechanical inbetween step.

    • Deconceptualist@lemm.eeEnglish
      14·
      17 hours ago

      Also, water is an amazing coolant. At the molecular level its hydrogen bonding contributes to a bulk property called heat capacity that ends up much higher than most other substances, meaning it can soak up a ton of energy per unit volume (and later release that energy, e.g. into a turbine). And there’s even more of that heat capacity in the phase transition from liquid to steam and back. It’s crazy good.

      It’s also super cheap and abundant. The main reason water isn’t the coolant for nearly everything is that it can be corrosive. Also steam can be quite dangerous due to all that energy it carries.

      • BussyCat@lemmy.worldEnglish
        4·
        6 hours ago

        The heat of vaporization is also a huge negative of using water as you need to condense the water and then reboil it which wastes a bunch of energy

        • SoleInvictus@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
          2·
          4 hours ago

          If we were a smarter species, we’d consistently use further heat exchange to use that waste heat for something else, like heating homes. The Blue Lagoon in Iceland uses it to heat a massive outdoor spa.

    • dejected_warp_core@lemmy.worldEnglish
      8·
      16 hours ago

      Not only that, but we’re harnessing the humble yet awesome power of phase-changing matter. The same phenomenon breaks mountains down to rubble, constantly chews apart our infrastructure, and keeps our homes and food cool. It makes a lot of sense to use that same phenomenon to do work.

      Armchair nuclear physicists should release an improved model before being so critical

      They would, but there are limited options for directly generating electricity. Outside of manipulating magnetic fields with kinetic motion, all we have are betavoltaics, photovoltaics, and thermocouples. And they’re all kind of awful in terms of efficiency. Even chlorophyll is awesome at converting air, light, and water, into… sugar, which then has to be oxidized (burned) to be useful.

      • disguy_ovahea@lemmy.worldEnglish
        3·
        16 hours ago

        There’s plenty of room for advancement in alternative energy for sure. My comment about critics was referring more to the method of capturing and converting irradiated rod heat to electricity. Water vapor is still the standard for a reason. It’s like being critical of a jet engine because it’s basically just a compressor.

  • DickFiasco@lemm.eeEnglish
    82·
    18 hours ago

    I feel like the next big technological achievement will just be replacing water with some other fluid.

    “Steam cycle? No, this is the much more advanced glycol cycle.”

    • nooneescapesthelaw@mander.xyzEnglish
      2·
      6 hours ago

      We already use different fluids for different power cycles, for example organic rankine cycles or just power cycles that use organic fluids are good for low temperature heat sources like low temp geothermals

    • Yondoza@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      16·
      11 hours ago

      It’s why photovoltaics are so cool. Direct electricity generation without having to spin magnets in circles like neanderthals.

      • Redjard@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
        91·
        6 hours ago

        Solar is no doubt the coolest.
        Hydro and wind are also very neat, going directly from mechanical to electric via generator, without a steam-turbine.

        There is also a very cool fusion-category based on dynamic magnetic fields, that basically form a magnetic piston which expands directly due to the release of charged particles via fusion and then captures the energy from that moving electric field by slowing it back down and initiating the next compression.
        A fully electric virtual piston engine in some sense, driven my fusion explosions and capturing straight into electricity.
        Feels so much more modern than going highly advanced superconducting billion K fusion-reactor to heat to steam to turbine.

    • nandeEbisu@lemmy.worldEnglish
      39·
      17 hours ago

      The nice things about steam is you can get as much water as could want on earth, but something like ammonia which we used as a refrigerant for years would probably work well too and there’s planets with ammonia rich atmospheres.

      The interesting thing is the cycles are fairly similar at a high level, you just run out in one direction for power and the opposite direction for cooling.

  • jmcs@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
    8·
    17 hours ago

    Sometimes it’s wind or water, and photovoltaic panels don’t even use a dynamo. But classics sometimes are classics for a reason.