18 Dec (NucNet): The US Department of Energy should start a national programme of research and technology to build a compact pilot plant that produces electricity from fusion at the lowest possible capital cost, says a report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.
The report calls on the US not to withdraw from the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor project under construction in France and says “now is the right time for the US to benefit from the investments in burning plasma research and take leadership in fusion energy”.
“We are seeing tremendous progress being made in the path to achieving fusion energy around the world,” said Michael Mauel, professor of applied physics at Columbia University and co-chair of the committee that wrote the report.
The committee expects the implementation of its recommendations, including both continued partnership in Iter and the start of a national research programme for a pilot plant, will require additional funding of nearly $200m annually “for several decades”.
Burning plasma – an ionised gas heated to extremely high temperatures by fusion reactions, similar to processes that power the sun and stars – is a key requirement to make fusion energy. A magnetic fusion reactor can be thought of as a miniature sun confined inside a vessel.
The report says as an energy source, fusion has environmental advantages because it produces abundant energy from heavy hydrogen found in water and lithium.
The report warns that US withdrawal from Iter could isolate scientists from the international effort. “Iter plays a central role in US burning plasma research activities and is the only existing project that is expected to create and study a burning plasma. It is the next critical step in the development of fusion energy,” says the report.
As a partner in Iter, the US receives full benefit from the technologies developed for Iter while providing only a fraction of the financial resources, the report says. If the US is to profit from its share, the nation’s strategic plan for fusion should combine its Iter experience with additional science and engineering research needed to develop reliable and economical fusion electricity.
“There is a critical need for research in addition to our participation in Iter, or else the US risks being overtaken by other countries that are ramping up their science and technology to achieve fusion energy,” said Melvyn Shochet, professor of physics at University of Chicago and co-chair of the committee.
The committee is calling for a compact pilot plant that could produce power similar to that expected in Iter, but in a device much smaller in size and cost and employing design improvements that would allow net electricity production. As a pilot plant, its purpose will be learning, and the knowledge obtained would be sufficient to design the first commercial fusion power systems, the report says.
The report is online: https://bit.ly/2Bk9EX7
