Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

How Close Are We, Really, To Nuclear Fusion?

Posted by timothy on from the you-first dept.

StartsWithABang writes: The ultimate dream when it comes to clean, green, safe, abundant energy is nuclear fusion. The same process that powers the core of the Sun could also power everything on Earth millions of times over, if only we could figure out how to reach that breakeven point. Right now, we have three different candidates for doing so: inertial confinement, magnetic confinement, and magnetized target fusion. Recent advances have all three looking promising in various ways, making one wonder why we don't spend more resources towards achieving the holy grail of energy.

5 of 399 comments (clear)

  1. Graph explains everything by phantomfive · · Score: 4, Informative

    This graph explains very clearly how far away we are, and why it is taking so long. The reality is, with all the cheap coal (and natural gas), it's just not a priority. Besides, environmentalists hate nuclear so it's not a political winner to fund it. This story is good, too.

    --
    "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    1. Re:Graph explains everything by JoshuaZ · · Score: 5, Informative

      Unfortunately, while some do, many loud and prominent ones do not. Greenpeace is the most obvious example. See especially their opposition to ITER: http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/press/releases/ITERprojectFrance/, http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/news/Blogs/nuclear-reaction/lockheed-martins-compact-nuclear-reactor-yet-/blog/51074/, http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/10/22/fusion_greenpeace_no/.

      The Sierra Club which is in many ways more moderate than Greenpeace weakly opposes such fusion also http://www.sierraclub.org/policy/energy/nuclear-power, and while their main argument is that it is too expensive compared to more conventional renewables, they also cite "The dangers posed by the probable releases of tritium used by fusion plants, the problems with decommissioning these plants" which only makes sense if you both don't fully understand how little tritium is being used and how think that the plants will be highly radioactive like conventional fission plants.

      Sortir du nucléaire, one of the major French anti-nuclear groups are basically treating ITER and fusion in general very close to how they treat fission power. See e.g. http://www.dw.com/en/france-wins-nuclear-fusion-plant/a-1631650

      The environmental movement has done a lot of good and continues to do a lot of good. But there is a definite anti-technology bent in some parts and general anti-nuclear bent which is very unfortunate. There are some environmentalists who understand the potential benefits of fusion and how it is different than fission power, but it is definitely not all of them and certainly doesn't include some of the most prominent organizations.

  2. Re:Cannot scale anyway by phantomfive · · Score: 4, Informative
    Getting tritium is just one more technological hurdle. For example:

    Natural reserves of tritium do not exist on Earth, but it can be made easily from lithium. In fact, tritium can be made using the high-energy neutron released from the fusion reaction and offers the possibility of making tritium in situ in a fusion reactor. The neutron is absorbed by the lithium to produce tritium.

    --
    "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
  3. Re:Cannot scale anyway by Melkman · · Score: 4, Informative

    The only -current- viable source of tritium is fission. However fusion can produce its own tritium in breeder blankets. This is one of the concepts that will be researched in ITER: https://www.iter.org/mach/trit...

    So the last part of your post "but it's not a viable power source unless the need for tritum is eliminated" is just wrong.

  4. Re:Mission accomplished by multimediavt · · Score: 3, Informative

    There are also proposals to put a large solar array several square kilometers in area in the Sahara Desert that could generate power for the entire planet. Then there's the Gobi Desert where it could also be done, the Mojave already has some solar concentrator sites with more planned (if they can fix the bird frying problem). So, there are ways for us to generate the electricity that we will need for a long time from renewable sources. I don't discard or disparage nuclear fusion research because it is also important going forward, but we do have other practical ways of generating electricity from natural phenomena, wind and tidal being two others that are coming along a lot faster than better fission and currently non-existent fusion reactors.