I was a graduate student at the University of Texas at Austin in the late 70's. One day I had my Physics class taken on a tour of the tokamak facility, the same tour given to civic leaders, congressmen, etc. We were told that a commercial fusion reactor would be functioning by the year 2000. Absolutely. No doubt.
I was also surprised to learn (as another person noted above) just how much nuclear waste a fusion reactor can generate. It made me and, I hope, my students a bit skeptical of the fission => bad, fusion => good mythology. Note how the ABC article suggests that fission causes air pollution and global warming: "...the fusion process can't cause a "meltdown" reaction and doesn't contribute to air pollution, acid rain or the greenhouse effect."
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I am afraid that I must agree with this comment.
I was a graduate student at the University of Texas at Austin in the late 70's. One day I had my Physics class taken on a tour of the tokamak facility, the same tour given to civic leaders, congressmen, etc. We were told that a commercial fusion reactor would be functioning by the year 2000. Absolutely. No doubt.
I was also surprised to learn (as another person noted above) just how much nuclear waste a fusion reactor can generate. It made me and, I hope, my students a bit skeptical of the fission => bad, fusion => good mythology. Note how the ABC article suggests that fission causes air pollution and global warming:
"...the fusion process can't cause a "meltdown" reaction and doesn't contribute to air pollution, acid rain or the greenhouse effect."