Written by Tim Lash, Focus Fusion Society Contributor. Far and away the largest fusion project on earth is the ITER reactor under construction in France. An international slate of countries support this research effort with billions of euros. The timeline for development and testing of this facility stretches into the 2050s. As the king of fusion projects ITER draws widespread press coverage. But bigger isn’t always better. In an article published in February of 2018, fusion research physicist physicist Daniel Jassby lays out some drawbacks of the ITER project. Dr. Jassby outline four critiques of ITER: electricity consumption, tritium fuel losses, neutron activation, and cooling water demand. When operational ITER will consume as much electricity as a medium sized city. […]
Read MoreWritten by Tim Lash, Focus Fusion Society Contributor. The School of Global Affairs and Public Policy (GAPP) at American University in Cairo (AUC) recently published an energy piece in their quarterly Cairo Review of Global Affairs. The article about renewable power sources was written by Jeffrey Ball, scholar in residence at Stanford University’s Steyer-Taylor Center for Energy Policy and Finance and a lecturer at Stanford Law School. The article posted last week here at focusfusion.org covered renewable energy trends in western Europe. Mr. Ball’s article extends that story to the Middle East and Northeast Africa (MENA). Here too, renewable energy is beginning to make a significant contribution to the regional energy demand. The article lays out the global trends for […]
Read MoreWritten by Tim Lash, Focus Fusion Society Contributor. One of the most challenging aspects of sustainable fusion power are the high temperatures required. These high temperatures stress any imagined containment device. Researchers from the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) tested a containment model lined with liquid metal. They believe such an approach could improve dealing with the severe temperature gradients of fusion plasma. Their findings are documented in an article published in the journal Nature. A plasma reactor trying to sustain fusion is a very corrosive environment. Solid reactor walls and any equipment in proximity to the plasma will become degraded over time. Metallic parts become pitted and brittle with prolonged plasma exposure. Refreshing the liquid metal in this […]
Read MoreWritten by Tim Lash, Focus Fusion Society Contributor. The world is in desperate need of energy. Growing populations, dwindling natural resources and continuing global strife place enormous strains on delivering enough energy to all earth’s inhabitants. The primary goal of Lawrenceville Plasma Physics research is to deliver abundant, cheap, green fusion energy to the world. A story recently carried by Reuters emphasizes the ever present need for such energy solutions, and the horrific lengths society can go to satisfy those needs. A town called Douma in war torn Syria supports an energy production facility detrimental to both its workers and the environment. In a series of open furnaces, workers feed plastic waste into the flames. The fumes generated by this […]
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