this post was submitted on 31 Mar 2026
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Science Memes

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Turbine go brrrr (lemmy.world)
submitted 3 months ago by Agent641@lemmy.world to c/science_memes@mander.xyz
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[–] Monument@lemmy.sdf.org 6 points 3 months ago (1 children)

It’s funny (in a sad and sardonic sense) - I pay attention to the energy industry and the outcry over data centers has got me watching these generators closely. If they deliver on their promises, they could represent a great way to deliver on mirror-based solar reactors in areas with limited water resources. (And to recapture and use waste heat from the servers of data centers.)

Society is on the precipice of investing a lot into increasing energy generation for data centers that have to be near the same sorts of resources that people need - fresh water, environs conductive to generating power, stable (enough) climates. But this technology is arriving/set to reach adoption just in time for this boom-bust cycle. All those data centers in populated areas already have a timer ticking for when the shell corps have their rugs pulled.

[–] Tlaloc_Temporal@lemmy.ca 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Unfortunately, there's no way to get energy out of waste heat that won't be spent pushing that heat a little harder. Already a significant amount of energy is spent cooling data centers, any attempts at energy recapture will just make that cooling harder.

The best we can do is something like district heating, because heat pumps can get over 100% effective efficiency.

[–] Monument@lemmy.sdf.org 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

The energy needed for phase change for supercritical CO2 is substantially lower than steam.

There’s more wiggle room. My understanding is that similar to heat pumps, they can build systems with different optimal temperatures, and even daisy chain them together. They’ll never make a perpetual motion machine, but they can waste less energy.

[–] Tlaloc_Temporal@lemmy.ca 2 points 3 months ago

True, we can optimize the cycles more. Like double expansion piston engines, or that crazy proposal for a hydrid steam-mercury super high pressure power plant.