• Björn Tantau
    link
    fedilink
    65 hours ago

    I really wonder what power plants will do with the helium once they get fusion working. Maybe a balloon business on the side isn’t such a bad idea.

    • @subtext
      link
      254 minutes ago

      I mean too much Helium isn’t a problem. It’s one of the few (only?) elements that will just disappear if you don’t do anything with it.

      It’s light enough that it rises to the very tip top of the earth’s atmosphere and is then stripped away by solar radiation. That’s why is a depleting natural resource, not because it’s burned or used or anything, but because it just escapes.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      72 hours ago

      In a perfect world stick it in a secondary reactor and make lithium. But that’s obviously even further off than hydrogen fusion.

    • @Warl0k3
      link
      22 hours ago

      The amount of helium produced is truly miniscule, in the order of a few cubic centimeters. They’ll just pump it into the ground somewhere, assuming we ever get fusion working