[tsimionescu]

My contention is, DEMO might plausibly supply power to the grid 20 years from now, but will struggle to justify its economic cost (though would likely be kept around for some time with public spending).

Helion and Zap energy will more likely never be able to supply power to the grid at all for physics reasons, regardless of economics (assuming of course they don't entirely change course and move to a tokamak-like design).

[pfdietz]

Economics is an inherent part of practicality. Being able to provide power to the grid, but not economically, is not any better than not being able to provide power to the grid at all.

Helion and Zap have larger physics barriers, that's true. But the goal isn't to produce a pyrrhic victory and a power plant that "works" but can't compete. The goal is competitive energy out. I contend Helion and Zap are both more likely to reach that actual practical goal than DEMO.

[tsimionescu]

Agreed in principle. We clearly have different priors, but I think we agree on the general idea.

Basically, ITER/DEMO has a low chance of being economical even if it works physically. Helion and Zap have a higher chance of being economical if their approach works. I think we both agree on these points.

Where we differ is that I don't believe it's plausible that Helion or Zap's approach will work at all. But this is just a belief ultimately, I'm not basing it on any objective facts or anything like that.

[pfdietz]

On what do you base your feeling about Helion and Zap? Having examined the concepts in some detail, I have come to the opposite conclusion. Helion in particular has a combination of very clever ideas.

[devaiops9001]

Where I think Helion approach is missing something big is Helion attempts to "force" the plasma with magnets, contrast to Safire where the plasma forms self-containing magnetic fields. Plasma, like fire, which is a "cold plasma" in a way, is something found in nature. Leveraging plasma that has self-containing magnetic fields is "going with nature" rather than trying to run against it.

Suppose one were trying to take advantage of heat provided by fire, they would want to exploit how fire naturally behaves to get the benefit, rather than attempt to force fire to behave a certain way to get the benefit.

[tsimionescu]

Safire is pure pseudoscience. Helion is not.

And the only naturally occurring plasma hot enough for fusion is in the cores of stars, where gravity, not magnetic fields, keep it contained.

[devaiops9001]

Safire has had, for about eight years now, a working plasma fusion reactor that stays lit for hours on end. Helion does not.

>> the only naturally occurring plasma hot enough for fusion is in the cores of stars

Plasma that is artificially created is still plasma, not unlike how fire that is artificially created is still fire.

That plasma can be manipulated magnetically does not change. The Safire plasma has self-containing magnetic fields. Helion's plasma does not have this.