The US Department of Energy has announced its plans to construct a nuclear fusion device in a bid to create clean, safe, and limitless energy.
Physicists at the US Department of Energy’s Princeton Plasmic Physics Laboratory have announced that plans to develop a “star-in-a-jar” nuclear fusion device are underway and will lead a new project to develop clean, safe, and virtually limitless energy.
While present nuclear facilities harness nuclear fission (in which energy is the result of splitting the nucleus of an atom) nuclear fusion generates energy by fusion atoms together. While the former generates massive amounts of radioactive waste, the latter requires generating temperatures that are hotter than the surface of the sun.
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Now, physicists at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory cite that compact spherical tokamaks could serve as a model to generate fusion. In English, compact spherical tokamaks refers to a device that can contain superheated plasma with powerful magnetic fields – essentially, this could be one such way to achieve nuclear fusion.
Two spherical tokamaks exist; one is at the National Spherical Torus Experiment-Upgrade (NSTX-U) at Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory , and the Mega Ampere Spherical Tokamak exists at the Culham Centre for Fusion Energy in the U.K.
The US Department of Energy has announced its plans to use these existing devices to build a Fusion Nuclear Science Facility – a plant that could actually function as a viable fusion power station.
The news is significant, as it brings the world as a whole closer to the advent of clean, renewable energy and the replacement of waste-generating nuclear (fission) power stations.
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What are your thoughts on the US Department of Energy’s announcement? Be sure to let us know your thoughts in the comments below!
Follow Bryan Smith on Twitter: @bryansmithSA
Source & Reporting: Seeker
