The Holy Grail of Clean Energy Production
- henrybai091
- Aug 2, 2021
- 4 min read
Updated: Aug 16, 2021
IETR Nuclear Fusion plant in France.
For centuries, ancient civilizations all around the world, from the Romans in Europe to the Aztecs in the Americas worshipped the sun. It was a staple of their myths and rituals. They realized the importance of the sun to their livelihoods. Fast
forward to the modern age, we echo that belief, but in a different tone than before.
What powered the sun? For the civilizations of the past, that question filled the minds of many but was left unanswered. We now know that it is nuclear fusion that powers it, and we are now thinking of harnessing that energy, to create virtually unlimited clean power.
The surface of the sun.
How does the sun shine?
Understanding how our sun shines is a fundamental step towards understanding how nuclear fusion works. Deep inside the core of our sun, extreme temperatures break the electron of a hydrogen atom away from the nucleus. This process creates plasma, where the nuclei and electrons bounce around. Hydrogen nuclei cannot merge with other nuclei because they’re both positively charged…. unless they are going at a very high speed. In this case, a very high speed means high temperatures.
Plasma in Nuclear Fusion Reactor
Stars are able to cheat their way through this obstacle, because of their massive size. The pressure in their core causes the hydrogen nuclei to merge together, forming helium atoms and releasing vast quantities of energy.
The new generation of Nuclear Technology?
Scientists have invented two ways of harnessing “star power”. Those are magnetic confinement and inertial confinement.
Magnetic Confinement- Controlling the magnetic field.
In this form of nuclear fusion, plasma is created when hydrogen electrons are separated from their nuclei. Then, magnetic and electrical fields squeeze the plasma into a doughnut-shaped chamber, where plasma particles are confined. When those particles are close enough, they can collide and release power.
Learn more about how a magnetic field confines plasma:
Inertial Confinement Reactor- Superman could help with this:
What do you think the world’s most powerful lasers are used for? Well, I’ve got the answer for you- they take part in inertial confinement fusion research. This technology uses pulses from superpowered lasers to hit the surface of a hydrogen fusion pellet. It’s compressed to an immense density and temperature by the powerful laser, causing it to explode, making it hot enough to generate energy.
An Inertial Confinement reactor at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.
Let's talk about the Fusion Fuels.
When people think of fuels for nuclear power, they often think of uranium. Well, not in the case of nuclear fusion, it uses different types of hydrogen and helium. Deuterium is one of the proposed fuels, it is both stable and also abundant in oceans around the world.
The tricky part of creating a reliable fuel is finding a partner for deuterium. Currently, tritium is being considered, but it is extremely rare and is radioactive, so it isn’t the most ideal. Another possibility is helium 3, which is also rare on Earth but is plentiful on the Moon. Mining the helium 3 on the moon would generate enough fuel to power our entire planet for thousands of years into the future!
How safe are they?
The growth of nuclear power has halted in the past few decades in many developed countries because of the fear of nuclear catastrophes like the ones at Chernobyl and Three Mile Island. Luckily, it’s a different story for nuclear fusion. When they fail, the plasma in the chamber would simply cool down and the reaction would halt. There will be no disastrous nuclear meltdown!
Chernobyl disaster. Source: The Guardian.
Companies and organizations are jumping on the bandwagon.
GeneralFusion, backed by Jeff Bezos, aims to build a fusion reactor for commercial use in the 2030s. Their technology is a combination of Magnetic Confinement and Inertial Confinement.
How the GeneralFusion Nuclear Fusion plant works:
In a huge sphere, liquid metal is pumped in and spun around in a circle to produce a hole. Into that hole goes hydrogen fuel, heated to a casual few million degrees. Then, pistons, power by compressed gas push down on the liquid metal, squeezing the fuel, and creating a fusion reaction. The heat created is transferred into the liquid metal, that heat is used to create steam, which in turn drives turbines to generate high-quality energy in the form of electricity.
Critics have argued start-ups like GeneralFusion have overestimated their potential and underestimated the challenge placed in front of them. So, could a large multinational organization with billions in funding pull it off?
Well, time will tell. But effort has certainly been put towards making it a reality. The IETR, an international nuclear fusion research, and engineering megaproject has made itself a goal to create the largest and most powerful nuclear fusion reactor in the world by 2024. That’s only three years away! They plan to use magnetic confinement technology to go nuclear in 2035. That being said, there are still challenges being faced, including sporadic funding, largely due to election cycles in the US.
More about the IETR Fusion Reactor:
What if the huge bet on Nuclear Fusion works out?
The fruits of the labor are copious. It quite literally means the end of our energy crisis. 2 pounds of fusion fuel is the equivalent of 55,000 barrels of oil, with no greenhouse gas emissions! In use, a nuclear fusion plant would produce 4,000,000 times as much energy as coal or gas. Yes, that’s six zeroes behind the ‘4’!
It’s not all sunshine and rainbows.
Currently, a huge issue facing companies worldwide is that the energy needed to generate plasma is greater than the energy produced. That means that the net energy output is negative! So, we can ask our future selves some questions, which are:
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