Sustainable nuclear fusion breakthrough raises hopes for ultimate green energy

www.theguardian.com...

US researchers have achieved a world first in an ambitious experiment that aims to recreate the conditions at the heart of the sun and pave the way for nuclear fusion reactors.

The scientists generated more energy from fusion reactions than they put into the nuclear fuel, in a small but crucial step along the road to harnessing fusion power. The ultimate goal – to produce more energy than the whole experiment consumes – remains a long way off, but the feat has nonetheless raised hopes that after decades of setbacks, firm progress is finally being made.

The dream of controlled fusion remains a distant hope, and Hurricane said it was too early to say whether it was even possible with the NIF facility. The researchers need to get a hundred times more energy from the fusion reactions before the process can run itself, and more for it to deliver an overall surplus of energy.

A step in the right direction. Go Lawrence Livermore.

reply to post by FyreByrd

Not faulting you FyreByrd, because you did what's expected in copying the article title, but I am faulting the writers for a misleading title. Sustainable fusion is still a distant goal it seems, though the headline might seem to suggest it has been achieved.

The details in the story spell out that the energy input was 2000 kJ and the energy output was only 17 kJ.

They wave their hands and say most of the energy in didn't reach the fuel, and if you make adjustments for that the calculations look more optimistic, which while it may be true still says we are a long way from practical generation with energy out less than 1% of energy in.

Here's the same story posted from a different source with a less misleading title:

U.S. scientists achieve 'turning point' in fusion energy quest

The call it a 'turning point' which since it's in quotes helps to emphasize that it's not such a magic breakthrough. It's probably ok for the mods to close this thread and refer to the existing thread with less misleading title.