The discussion centers on the historical and current challenges of achieving commercial nuclear fusion power, highlighting that despite significant investment—over $30 billion since the 1950s—technical hurdles such as plasma turbulence and radiation losses remain unresolved. Participants emphasize that funding issues have compounded these challenges, with funding requests in the mid-1980s for $10 billion annually receiving less than 10% of that amount. The National Ignition Facility, despite its $3.5 billion investment, has not yet achieved ignition, illustrating the complexity of fusion research. Overall, there is skepticism about the feasibility of commercial fusion within the next several decades.
PREREQUISITESResearchers, policymakers, and energy sector professionals interested in the development of nuclear fusion as a viable energy source, as well as students studying plasma physics and energy policy.
consuli said:That's so far the most developed (excess) power generating fusion reactor, I guess.
The article title doesn't look very close to me to the title you gave the link. The part you are citing is a 4 year old announcement that as far as I'm aware hasn't been updated.consuli said:
consuli said:If you are further interested in the Lockheed Martin compact fusion reactor, you have to research on your own.
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I can neither confirm nor deny this, as currently the necessary amount of proof in favour or against is missing. We simply do not know.phyzguy said:If (...) you look at what they have actually achieved, you quickly conclude that they are nowhere close to any kind of viable fusion reactor.
consuli said:I can neither confirm nor deny this, as currently the necessary amount of proof in favour or against is missing. We simply do not know.
Ref: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_European_TorusThe main source of heating in JET is provided by two systems, neutral beam injection and ion cyclotron resonance heating. The former uses small particle accelerators to shoot fuel atoms into the plasma, where collisions cause the atoms to ionize and become trapped with the rest of the fuel. These collisions deposit the kinetic energy of the accelerators into the plasma. Ion cyclotron resonance heating is essentially the plasma equivalent of a microwave oven, using radio waves to pump energy into the ions directly by matching their cyclotron frequency. JET was designed so it would initially be built with a few megawatts of both sources, and then later be expanded to as much of 25 MW of neutral beams and 15 MW of cyclotron heating.[36]
JET's power requirements during the plasma pulse are around 500 MW[37] with peak in excess of 1000 MW.[38] Because power draw from the main grid is limited to 575 MW, two large flywheel generators were constructed to provide this necessary power.[38] Each 775-ton flywheel can spin up to 225 rpm and store 3.75 GJ.[39] Each flywheel uses 8.8 MW to spin up and can generate 400 MW (briefly).
BWV said:The burden of proof is on the claim, not on disproving it. If there is not the necessary amount of proof in favor then they have nothing until they can demonstrate otherwise
BWV said:The burden of proof is on the claim, not on disproving it. If there is not the necessary amount of proof in favor then they have nothing until they can demonstrate otherwise
I doubt that. If it were part of a classified project, they wouldn't be making public announcements about it. Most such projects you only hear about after they are over.consuli said:However, the case of the Lockheed Martin compact fusion reactor is difficult. These guys are most probably working under militarily classified conditions.