New design could finally help to bring fusion power closer to reality
It's an old joke that many fusion scientists have grown tired of hearing: Practical nuclear fusion power plants are just 30 years away—and always will be.
It's an old joke that many fusion scientists have grown tired of hearing: Practical nuclear fusion power plants are just 30 years away—and always will be.
Plasma Physics
Aug 10, 2015
174
20449
Scientists seeking to bring the fusion reaction that powers the sun and stars to Earth must keep the superhot plasma free from disruptions. Now researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Princeton Plasma Physics ...
Plasma Physics
Jan 9, 2019
11
13615
It was a moment three years in the making, based on intensive research and design work: On Sept. 5, for the first time, a large high-temperature superconducting electromagnet was ramped up to a field strength of 20 tesla, ...
Plasma Physics
Sep 8, 2021
13
3931
Sawtooth swings—up-and-down ripples found in everything from stock prices on Wall Street to ocean waves—occur periodically in the temperature and density of the plasma that fuels fusion reactions in doughnut-shaped facilities ...
Plasma Physics
Jul 18, 2018
16
6943
Scientists are working to dramatically speed up the development of fusion energy in an effort to deliver power to the electric grid soon enough to help mitigate impacts of climate change. The arrival of a breakthrough technology—high-temperature ...
Plasma Physics
Nov 5, 2018
52
629
Fusion energy almost sounds too good to be true – zero greenhouse gas emissions, no long-lived radioactive waste, a nearly unlimited fuel supply.
General Physics
Oct 8, 2014
515
0
The visible surface of the sun, or the photosphere, is around 6,000°C. But a few thousand kilometers above it—a small distance when we consider the size of the sun—the solar atmosphere, also called the corona, is hundreds ...
Astronomy
May 25, 2021
23
1059
After successful recommissioning in autumn 2022, the Greifswald nuclear fusion experiment has surpassed an important target. In 2023, an energy turnover of 1 gigajoule was targeted. Now the researchers have even achieved ...
Plasma Physics
Feb 22, 2023
4
800
Physicist Sam Lazerson of the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) has teamed with German scientists to confirm that the Wendelstein 7-X (W7-X) fusion energy device called a stellarator ...
Plasma Physics
Dec 4, 2016
2
5786
In a world struggling to kick its addiction to fossil fuels and feed its growing appetite for energy, there's one technology in development that almost sounds too good to be true: nuclear fusion.
Plasma Physics
Jan 17, 2017
53
99