Fusion vs fission energy release7/29/2023 ![]() Simply put, we have been working on it for decades and are already on our way to having it. Fusion has been "20-30 years away" since the 1950's because we got to the point where we can't go further without massive investment, and that investment just hasn't happened.įusion, but probably with an antimatter boost. ![]() The science is done, but the very expensive development has never been funded. This is what caused one of the early fusion pioneers, Lev Artsimovich, to say, "Fusion will be ready when society needs it." (Note that the problem of nuclear waste and nuclear contamination are more political problems than technical problems.) From a technical standpoint nuclear power is just as clean as fusion power would be, and in the modern era there's much more of a focus on making renewables incrementally cheaper and more efficient rather than building a whole new technology. Unless there is a clear and convincing reason to spend billions to trillions of dollars developing this technology, it's much cheaper not to. The only problem is that all of this is terribly expensive. That will be another big learning experience, and probably 5-10 years after that you will see the first generation of Mark 1 fusion reactors starting to be installed around the world. Eventually we get to the point where all of the apparent kinks are ironed out and we will build the world's first pilot fusion plant. We will have to do a lot of very expensive modeling and simulation, then build prototypes, then go back to the design stage and improve those prototypes, then build more prototypes. These are really questions of the geometry of the reactor, of the mechanisms that need to be built, of how many and how strong of magnets do we need to confine the reaction, etc. So how do we keep that fusion reaction stable enough that we can keep feeding it new hydrogen and keep the reaction going? Once the fusion reaction is started, it generates so much heat that any fusion reaction naturally wants to blow itself apart. How do you reliably start a "cold" fusion reactor by cramming enough hydrogen together and getting it hot? The problems are technical, not conceptual: You use that energy to boil steam, and after that a fusion power plant looks just like a regular coal, gas, or nuclear power plant. The process of fusion is pretty well understood: you cram a bunch of very hot hydrogen together, it fuses into helium, and releases a bunch more energy. In fact, we (probably) have done all of the basic science that's needed to build fusion power plants, the only thing that remains is a very expensive development process. "We're long overdue to have converted something so destructive that finally it could be used for a peaceful purpose in the service of civilization," deGrasse Tyson said.Fusion power. Even thought it's not burning fossil fuel, meltdowns like Chernobyl and Fukushima are evidence that our nuclear fission can still harm humans - and our environment.īut now, fusion's moment appears to finally be here. 13, 2022 in Washington, DC.Ĭurrently, nuclear power plants use fission, which breaks atoms apart to make energy. Marvin Adams for a news conference at the Department of Energy headquarters to announce a breakthrough in fusion research on Dec. Arati Prabhakar and NNSA Deputy Administrator for Defense Programs Dr. Kim Budil, National Nuclear Security Administration head Jill Hruby, White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director Dr. Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm (C) is joined by (L-R) Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories Director Dr. ![]() That's the goal of a multinational, multibillion-dollar project called the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor, or ITER, which is under construction in southern France. Scientists believe fusion plants would be much safer than today's nuclear fission plants - if the process can be mastered. ![]() "And just remember, fusion power has no nuclear waste to speak of, no meltdowns to worry about." Michio Kaku, a professor of theoretical physics at the City College of New York. "They took 200 laser beams, some of the most powerful on the planet Earth, converged that energy down to a pellet, a pellet the size of a BB," said Dr. Nuclear fusion technology has been around since the creation of the hydrogen bomb, but using that technology to harness energy has required decades of research.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply.AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |