What do they mean “infinite energy.”
“What do they mean “infinite energy.”
Helium 3 is the perfect fusion fuel. He3 plus deuterium when you fuse it you get He4 as the only product no radioactive neutrons are produced. That alpha particle is carrying millions of election volts of energy you can use electrostatic force collectors to directly turn that into millions of volts DC current perfect for HVDC long distance transport then locally use HVDC TO HVAC inverters already in commercial use to make 60hz AC distribution voltages.
“1 tonne of He-3 can produce 10,000 MWe-y of electrical energy. 1 tonne of He-3 can produce 10,000 MWe-y of electrical energy.”
https://fti.neep.wisc.edu/fti.neep.wisc.edu/presentations/glk_isdc.pdf
The earth’s oceans contain unlimited amounts of deuterium billions of years worth.
MWe-y is a unit if nuclear power measurement it means one megawatt of power for 24 hours a day over 365 days.
One metric tonne of He3 yields 10000 megawatts of power 24/7/365 or put another way the output of ten one gigawatt sized nuclear reactors running flat out 24/7 for a while year. Starship could with lunar refuel bring back 100 tonnes per each return flight let that number sink in. 100*10000= one million MWe-y per return flight.
There is 61320 hours in a year so one MWe-y is 61320 megawatts hours and one tonne of He3 yields 10000 or those so 613,200,000 megawatt hours. Large power is measured in terawatt hours trillions of watt hours. One tonne equals 613.2 TWh. And one starship brings home 100 of those or 61320 TWh
In “1900, world electricity generation totaled about 66.4 terawatt-hours (TWh). This grew to 29,165 TWh in 2022, a rate of growth that far exceeded overall energy use. As a result, electricity grew from 0.1% to 22% of global primary energy use over this period.1”
Compare those two numbers one starship brings home THREE times the global 2022 energy consumption this is why it’s infinite energy. The moon has been for 4 billion years showered with solar wind loaded with He3 the top meters of regolith are saturated with it billion if not trillions of tonnes worth you can see how the math works out humans could never ever use all of it up even with 10 billion souls on earth or more.