Fusion - Everlasting and Clean Energy

Series produced by ABCtech Media Productions

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The Next Question asks provocative questions about new, emerging and disruptive technologies, their potential impacts on our lives and their broader impacts on the world around us.

This series explores the subject of fusion energy.

There’s an old joke about fusion power (energy created by fusing atoms) - it’s been ten years away for the last fifty years. But this year saw a major breakthrough at the National Ignition Facility (NIF) in Livermore, California. For the first time, scientists were able to get more energy from a fusion reaction than they had put in.

The potential is staggering - the primary fuel component, deuterium, is present in all the water on Earth. The oceans contain enough of it to fuel our global civilization for literally billions of years.

The question is when? The best predictions now are that, at current funding, fusion reactors will be in operation by the 2050s. But note those words: “at current funding”. The United States, one of the leaders in the field, will spend less than $500 million on fusion research this year. That’s 1/46th what will be spent maintaining the strategic nuclear deterrent.

Fusion power is not a pipedream - it is a matter of us deciding we want it sooner rather than later. Hide full description

There’s an old joke about fusion power (energy created by fusing atoms) - it’s been ten years away for the last fifty years. But this year saw a major breakthrough at the National Ignition Facility (NIF) in Livermore, California. For the first time, scientists were able to get more energy from a fusion reaction than they had put in.The potential is staggering - the primary fuel component, deuterium, is present in all the water on Earth. The oceans contain enough of it to fuel our global civilization for literally billions of years. The question is when? The best predictions now are that, at current funding, fusion reactors will be in operation by the 2050s. But note those words: “at current funding”. The United States, one of the leaders in the field, will spend less than $500 million... Show full description


6 Pieces

Order by: Newest First | Oldest First
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We're getting closer and closer to making fusion power a reality - limitless energy created by fusing hydrogen into helium, the same process that p...

  • Added: Jun 04, 2014
  • Length: 02:00
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Physicists are approaching closer and closer to one of the Holy Grails of modern science: creating self-sustaining fusion reactions on Earth, and u...

  • Added: Jun 04, 2014
  • Length: 02:00
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For the past fifty years physicists around the world have been trying to create a fusion power reactor, harnessing the processes deep inside of sta...

  • Added: Jun 04, 2014
  • Length: 02:00
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The Earth gets almost all of its energy from the Sun. It grows plants and creates our climate. Even the fossil fuels we burn are the remains of pla...

  • Added: Jun 04, 2014
  • Length: 02:00
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It was early morning, November first, nineteen fifty-two. The scientists who had gathered on the beautiful Enewetak (A-ne-we-tak) Atoll in the Sout...

  • Added: Jun 03, 2014
  • Length: 02:00
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Taking the listeners back into the early history of the universe, this introductory episode explains what fusion is, how it powers stars, and how i...

Bought by Marfa Public Radio


  • Added: May 15, 2014
  • Length: 02:00
  • Purchases: 1