• Question: How soon will we have power from nuclear fusion to charge our batteries?

    Asked by to Saiful, Paul, Olivia, Oli, Meggi, Piers on 4 Jan 2017. This question was also asked by .
    • Photo: Paul Shearing

      Paul Shearing answered on 4 Jan 2017:

      This is a great question, and unfortunately no-one really knows the answer!

      Since the dawn of nuclear energy research in the post war period, people have been speculating about when nuclear fusion will become a widespread reality – however, the fundamental problem remains that in a controlled nuclear fusion reaction, you need to put in more energy to create the right conditions, than you get out as useful energy…

      The JET laboratory in Oxfordshire is a leading centre for nuclear fusion research: https://www.euro-fusion.org/jet/

      Its really a massive undertaking! So even if we crack the science of controlled, sustainable nuclear fusion, the design and build process for working reactors will take at least another 20 years I suspect

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