The bright outlook for fusion energy

- Chengyou J

On December 16, 2022, at the National Ignition Facility (NIF), located at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, researchers went about their daily tasks, checking if all settings were in place. They then pointed 192 powerful lasers at a very small amount of Hydrogen isotopes. With a power of 2.05 megajoules, they fired it. Immediately, the deuterium and tritium atoms reached unimaginable temperatures. The pressure built up. Each atom attempted desperately to repel each other with the electromagnetic force. Everything seems to be stable. Even so, thelasers pushed on ruthlessly until the atoms couldn’t stand the pressure anymore. For a billionth of a second, there was a spark. The fusing of the atomic nuclei created 3.15 megajoules of energy, generating about 50%more energy than the amount that was initially there.

For years, scientists have sought to create a net gain of energy fromfusion with few successes. But this is the first time that fusion is proven to be sustainable.

Fusion is the idea of combining atoms. With immense heat and pressure, scientistshope to combine them and endeavor to capture the energy produced in the process. However, combining atoms isn’t an easy task. One example of nuclear fusion already exists in our solar system: the sun. There, it’s the immense pressure at the sun’s core that causes fusion. Since that kind of pressure cannot be reproduced, scientists opt to use heat—about four to five times as hot as the sun’s core. In other words, we are trying to create a sun on earth. However, while sounding terrifying, fusion is safer and cleaner than any other energy source. With fusion, there won’t be extra waste such as carbon dioxide. With it, there also won’t be Fukushima-type accidents that will affect a city or country for thousands of years. Fusion is also extremely effective. One gram of material is enough to produce the energy needed for one person for 60 years in a developed country. Furthermore, there will always beenough material to use as deuterium can be extracted from water and tritium will be formed during fusion.

Decades ago, fusion technology was considered to be infeasible due to theextreme conditions needed.In addition to that, many think that fusion will be too expensive for many consumers given the success of the project. However, more recent views have been more optimistic. According to the Washington Post, fusion can come as early as 2030 which is the year the first fusion energy plant will be built if everything goes as planned.

ViaISTOCK