NewsTrust - Fusion Energy - Most Recent Stories

Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists' Science and Security Board Chair Nominated to Head the NRC

Thu, 24 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists - By Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists - May. 24 (Breaking News) - President Barack Obama today named Allison Macfarlane, chair of the Science and Security Board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, as his choice to lead the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Macfarlane also served on the Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future.

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Huge blast at Japan nuclear power plant

Sat, 12 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0800

BBC News - By Richard Black - Mar. 12 (Breaking News) - A huge pall of smoke was seen coming from the plant at Fukushima and several workers were injured. Japanese officials fear a meltdown at one of the plant's reactors after radioactive material was detected outside it. A huge relief operation is under way after the 8.9-magnitude earthquake and tsunami, which killed more than 600. Hundreds more people are missing and it is feared about 1,300 may have died.

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Extreme DIY: Building a homemade nuclear reactor

Wed, 23 Jun 2010 00:00:00 -0700

BBC News - By Matthew Danzico - Jun. 23 (News Report) - By day, Mark Suppes is a web developer for fashion giant Gucci. By night, he cycles to a New York warehouse and tinkers with his own nuclear fusion reactor.

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Clean Fusion Power This Decade

Mon, 21 Jun 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Long Now Foundation - By Ed Moses, Stewart Brand - Jun. 21 (Speech) - Finally achieving fusion energy may be closer than everyone thinks. For decades the dream has been to employ the reaction that powers stars to generate high-volume electricity without the drawbacks of fission reactors---no high-level waste, no weapons application, no risk of meltdown, no use of uranium, and (as with fission) no greenhouse gases. Ed Moses is director of the National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Lawrence Livermore Labs. Focusing massive amounts of laser light for a billionth of a second, the NIF is expected to demonstrate ignition of a fusion reaction (more energy out than in) for the first time in the coming year, followed by the prospect of a prototype machine for generating continuous clean energy by the end of this decade. That could change everything. The NIF itself is a spectacular work of "technological sublime." Imminent fusion power All the light we see from the sky, Moses pointed out, comes from fusion power burning hydrogen, the commonest element in the universe---3/4 of all mass. A byproduct of the cosmic fusion is the star-stuff that we and the Earth are made of. On Earth, 4 billion years of life accumulated geological hydrocarbons, which civilization is now burning at a rate of 10 million years' worth per year. In 1900, 98% of the world's energy came from burning carbon. By 1970, that was down to 90%, but it has not decreased since. It has to decrease some time, because there is only so much coal, oil, and gas. During this century every single existing power plant (except some hydro) will age and have to be replaced, and world energy demand is expected to triple by 2100. To head off climate change, fossil fuel combustion has to end by about 2050. The crucial period for conversion to something better is between 2030 and 2050. The ideal new power source would be: affordable; clean; non-geopolitical; using inexhaustible fuel and existing infrastructure; capable of rapid development and evolution. Moses' candidate is the "laser inertial fusion engine"---acronym LIFE---being developed at Lawrence Livermore. The question, Moses said, is "Can we build a miniature Sun on Earth?" The recipe involves a peppercorn-size target of hydrogen isotopes deuterium and tritium heated to 200 million degrees Fahrenheit for a couple billionths of a second. To get that micro-blast of heat, the National Ignition Facility (NIF) uses lasers---coherent light---at a massive scale. Laser engineer Moses notes that photons are perfect for the job: "no mass, no charge, just energy." Moses ran a dramatic video showing how a shot at the NIF works. 20-foot-long slugs of amplified coherent light (10 nanoseconds) travel 1,500 yards and converge simultaneously through 192 beams on the tiny target, compressing and heating it to fusion ignition, with a yield of energy 10 to 100 times of what goes into it. Successful early test shots suggest that the NIF will achieve the first ignition within the next few months, and that shot will be heard round the world. To get a working prototype of a fusion power plant may take 10 years. It will require an engine that runs at about 600 rpm---like an idling car. Targets need to be fired at a rate of 10 per second into the laser flashes. The energy is collected by molten salt at 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit and then heats the usual steam-turbine tea kettle to generate electricity. The engine could operate at the scale of a standard 1-gigawatt coal or nuclear plant, or it could be scaled down to 250 megawatts or up to 3 gigawatts. The supply of several million targets a year can be manufactured for under 50 cents apiece with the volume and precision that Lego blocks currently are. Moses said that 1 liter of heavy water will yield the energy of 2 million gallons of gas. Fusion power, like nuclear fission power, would cost less per kilowatt hour than wind (and far less than solar), yet would be less capital intensive than fission. For the constant baseload power no carbon is involved, no waste stream, no possibility of meltdown or weaponization, and there is no such thing as peak hydrogen.

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Who the Hell's in Charge Here? BP Disaster Caused by a Nasty Mix of Government Impotence and Corporate Rule

Mon, 21 Jun 2010 00:00:00 -0700

AlterNet - By Jim Hightower - Jun. 21 (Opinion) - The explosion of BP's Deepwater Horizon well was the inevitable result of deliberate decisions made by avaricious corporate executives, laissez faire politicians and obsequious regulators.

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The Future of Nuclear Power

Sun, 20 Jun 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Scientific American - Jun. 20 (Special Report) - Nuclear power--like most forms of electricity generation--carries inherent risks. Is it worth the minor chance of a major catastrophe? ...[and] can it really help?

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Harnessing a star's power for clean energy

Fri, 04 Jun 2010 00:00:00 -0700

CNET News - By Daniel Terdiman - Jun. 04 (News Report) - The hope is that NIF will be online as a power plant within 15 to 20 years. For now, the facility is a proof-of-concept system, albeit one comprising two 10-story buildings and more than $3 billion of investment. Eventually, the 192 laser beams reunite to focus on a target fuel pellet that is just millimeters in size, yet placed inside a target chamber that towers over the technicians who sometimes work inside.

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Financial meltdown imperils reactor

Fri, 28 May 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Nature - By Geoff Brumfiel - May. 28 (News) - It has been billed as the solution to tomorrow's energy crunch, but ITER, a massive fusion experiment by seven international partners, is under serious threat from a present-day problem: the financial crisis.

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Fusion Power: More Promising Than Ever, but Hamstrung by Budget Concerns

Fri, 28 May 2010 00:00:00 -0700

industry.bnet.com - By Chris Morrison - May. 28 (News) - Starting from relatively small pilot units, research has progressed to huge, complex projects that promise the breakthroughs needed to make fusion usable. But now that it’s come time to built these fusion mega-projects, the unfortunate reality is setting in.

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Russian Nuclear Reactor May Supply Unlimited Electricity

Tue, 25 May 2010 00:00:00 -0700

MIT Technology Review - By Phil McKenna - May. 25 (News) - If the Italian-Russian project is successful it could prove to be a roadmap for self-sustaining hydrogen fusion reactors to provide unlimited power. Skeptics say it's more of the same "pie-in-the-sky" as in space solar power that beams down electricity from satellites via lethal microwaves, as described in Sunstroke by David Kagan.

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North Korea reports nuclear fusion success

Wed, 12 May 2010 00:00:00 -0700

BBC News - By John Sudworth - May. 12 (News) - North Korea has announced that it has made significant progress towards the development of thermo-nuclear power. It is a claim that is likely to be met with some scepticism. Despite hopes that the technology can produce large quantities of cheap, clean energy, no country has so far succeeded in making it work.

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Fusion power

Sat, 01 May 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Wikipedia - May. 01 (Special Report) - Fusion power is the power generated by nuclear fusion reactions. In this kind of reaction, two light atomic nuclei fuse together to form a heavier nucleus and in doing so, release a large amount of energy.

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Nuclear Fusion Power

Sat, 01 May 2010 00:00:00 -0700

World Nuclear Association - May. 01 (Advocacy) - Fusion powers the Sun and stars as hydrogen atoms fuse together to form helium, and matter is converted into energy. Hydrogen, heated to very high temperatures changes from a gas to a plasma in which the negatively charged electrons are separated from the positively charged atomic nuclei (ions). Normally, fusion is not possible because the strongly repulsive electrostatic forces between the positively charged nuclei prevent them from getting close enough together for fusion to occur. However, if the conditions are such that the nuclei can overcome the electrostatic forces to the extent that they can come within a very close range of each other, then the attractive nuclear force (which binds protons and neutrons together in atomic nuclei) between the nuclei will outweigh the repulsive (electrostatic) force, allowing the nuclei to fuse together. Such conditions can occur when the temperature increases, causing the ions to move faster and eventually reach speeds high enough to bring the ions close enough together. The nuclei can then fuse, causing a release of energy.

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Can world's largest laser zap Earth's energy woes?

Wed, 28 Apr 2010 00:00:00 -0700

CNN - By John D. Sutter - Apr. 28 (News) - Scientists at a government lab here are trying to use the world's largest laser -- it's the size of three football fields -- to set off a nuclear reaction so intense that it will make a star bloom on the surface of the Earth.

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Laser 'punch' could bump up fusion power

Thu, 01 Apr 2010 00:00:00 -0700

New Scientist - By Colin Barras - Apr. 01 (News) - Nuclear fusion – creating energy by fusing together light atomic nuclei, such as hydrogen – could begin at the National Ignition Facility (NIF) in California this year. To kick-start the reaction, the plan is to focus 192 high-power laser beams onto a tiny hollow metal cylinder that contains a small spherical fuel pellet of deuterium and tritium. The lasers would heat the cylinder to several million degrees, encouraging it to emit high-power X-rays into the pellet.

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Laser fusion test results raise energy hopes

Thu, 28 Jan 2010 00:00:00 -0800

BBC News - By Jason Palmer - Jan. 28 (News Report) - A new study says a potential obstacle to laser fusion has been swept aside, as has the record for highest-energy laser pulse.

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World's highest-energy laser to create mini-stars

Mon, 13 Apr 2009 00:00:00 -0700

New Scientist - Apr. 13 (News Report) - In early April, the $3.5 billion National Ignition Facility in Livermore, California, was given the green light to begin a series of experiments. Researchers hope they will culminate in the first ever self-sustained, stable fusion reaction that will release many times more energy than the energy used to trigger the reaction. The stadium-sized facility will train 192 laser beams on tiny targets, producing pressures and temperatures that could illuminate the interiors of giant planets and pave the way to the first fusion reactors.

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Plan B for Energy: 8 Revolutionary Energy Sources

Thu, 02 Apr 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Scientific American - By W. Wayt Gibbs - Apr. 02 (Special Report) - If efficiency improvements and incremental advances in today's technologies fail to halt global warming, could revolutionary new carbon-free energy sources save the day? Don't count on it—but don't count it out, either

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Calif. Scientists Advance Toward Producing Fusion Energy

Tue, 17 Mar 2009 00:00:00 -0700

NewsHour - By Spencer Michels - Mar. 17 (News Report) - Spencer Michels reports on the ongoing efforts of scientists in California, who say they are getting closer to producing fusion energy to help fuel American energy independence. Imagine producing energy the same way the sun does: cheaply, cleanly and infinitely. That's what scientists like Ed Moses at the Lawrence Livermore National Lab in California say they think they can achieve.

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This Machine Might* Save the World

Tue, 23 Dec 2008 00:00:00 -0800

Popular Science - By Josh Dean - Dec. 23 (Special Report) - Two desktop-printer engineers quit their jobs to search for the ultimate source of endless energy: nuclear fusion. Could this highly improbable enterprise actually succeed?

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US lab debuts super laser

Fri, 30 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

AFP - May. 30 (News) - A US weapons lab on Friday pulled back the curtain on a super laser with the power to burn as hot as a star.

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Will Nuclear Fusion Fill the Gap Left by Peak Oil?

Thu, 11 Jan 2007 00:00:00 -0800

The Oil Drum - By Nick Rouse - Jan. 11 (Opinion) - The Oil drum publishes a very detailed review of nuclear fusion technology. The article not only discusses the technological background, but also future developments and limitations; since commercial fusion reactors are still far away, will fusion power ever become a major part of our energy production or will we have found better solutions?

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Should Google Go Nuclear?

Thu, 09 Nov 2006 00:00:00 -0800

Google Tech Talks - By Robert Bussard - Nov. 09 (Research) - Goodbye thermonuclear fusion; hello inertial electrostatic confinement fusion (IEC), an old idea that's been made new. While the international community debates the fate of the politically-turmoiled $12 billion ITER (an experimental thermonuclear reactor), simple IEC reactors are being built as high-school science fair projects. Dr. Robert Bussard, former Asst. Director of the Atomic Energy Commission and founder of Energy Matter Conversion Corporation (EMC2), has spent 17 years perfecting IEC, a fusion process that converts hydrogen and boron directly into electricity producing helium as the only waste product.

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NewsTrust - Fusion Energy - Most Recent Stories

Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists' Science and Security Board Chair Nominated to Head the NRC

More questions than answers about Japan nuclear crisis

Huge blast at Japan nuclear power plant

Extreme DIY: Building a homemade nuclear reactor

Clean Fusion Power This Decade

Who the Hell's in Charge Here? BP Disaster Caused by a Nasty Mix of Government Impotence and Corporate Rule

The Future of Nuclear Power

Harnessing a star's power for clean energy

Financial meltdown imperils reactor

Fusion Power: More Promising Than Ever, but Hamstrung by Budget Concerns

Russian Nuclear Reactor May Supply Unlimited Electricity

North Korea reports nuclear fusion success

Fusion power

Nuclear Fusion Power

Can world's largest laser zap Earth's energy woes?

Laser 'punch' could bump up fusion power

Laser fusion test results raise energy hopes

World's highest-energy laser to create mini-stars

Plan B for Energy: 8 Revolutionary Energy Sources

Calif. Scientists Advance Toward Producing Fusion Energy

This Machine Might* Save the World

US lab debuts super laser

Will Nuclear Fusion Fill the Gap Left by Peak Oil?

Should Google Go Nuclear?