Nuclear Fusion Technology
by Techwinx

nuclear fusion reactor
Nuclear fusion is the merging of two light atomic nuclei to form a single heavier nucleus, with the release of energy, radiation and sub-atomic particles (neutrons). This definition is at the very basic level. The process of fusion is very complex to the point that whole books have been written on it.

Nuclear fusion is a form of renewable energy. It is different from nuclear fission due to the following:

The radioactive wastes produced are minimal or zero in the case of fusion. Those produced from fission are not easy to work with and dispose.
The energy produced from fusion can be three times greater than that of fission
The raw materials of fusion (isotopes of hydrogen: deutrium and tritium) can be extracted from water, which is abundant on earth, unlike uranium and plutonium. The availability of the raw materials makes fusion a renewable energy source.
A meltdown, which is the destruction of the reacting core cannot occur in fusion. Any serious technical issue automatically switches of the process of fusion.

A bit of technical lingo
Plasma
Plasma has been named the fourth state of matter. At the basic level, it is a gas with a very, very high temperature that has been stripped of its electrons. It's the most abundant state of matter in the universe. Though, rarely seen on earth, it constitutes the stars of the cosmos (like the sun). For fusion to be possible, the reacting components have to form a plasma.


The forces in nature
There are four forces in physics:

The strong nuclear force
The weak nuclear force
Gravitational force
Electromagnetic force
All the forces are involved in the process of fusion. Whenever two nuclei get smashed, the electromagnetic force causes repulsion. If sufficient temperature and pressure is present, the strong force takes over, allowing for fusion. Electromagnetism is involved in electron binding to the nucleus. The weak force is responsible for beta decay and gravity is the effect of the bending of spacetime due to masses.

Superconductors
Superconductors are materials capable of conducting electrical energy without resistance and losses. These class of conductors have been projected to improve elctricity distribution and enable technologies like the hyperloop in the future. With zero electrical resistance, superconductors can form very efficient electromagnets. These electromagnets have the strongest magnetic fields, and so, can trap plasma.


The current problem with super conductors is that they operate close to absolute zero (-273 degrees celsius). Maintaining absolute zero is quite challenging. Progress in this field means the creation of high temperature superconductors (HTS). The current HTS still require very cold conditions. Some close to -196 degrees celsius. This is the boiling point of Nitrogen, and so, more cooling costs are saved. Most demonstartion of high remperature superconductors show them levitating a magnet due to the cancellation of the magnetic field of the magnet.

Tokamak

Tokamak is a russian acronym that stands for "toroidal chamber magnetic coils". A toroid is basically a dougnut shaped structure. Torroids make a good shape for trapping and heating plasma. The plasma is controlled by altering the shape of the magnetic fields. So a tokamak is a toroid shaped structure that uses magnetic fiels to control the plasma of fusion.

Break-even point
Break-even is the point in an energy system where the output energy produced exceeds the input. Most energy systems (like coal powered turbines) have achieved break-even. That's why they are economically viable. But fusion has to overcome a lot of engineering challenges before break-even is realised.

Nuclear fusion is such a beautiful technology that it could provide unlimited, sustainable energy at a very cheap price (which is part of the Sustainable Development Goals). Unlike solar and wind which have fluctuations in output, fusion can keep running for years, producing a steady amount of energy. But over the decades, it hasn't been perfected. The technology and engineering behind fusion is as immenced as the science.

The science of nuclear fusion
Nuclear fusion is based on plasma physics. It follows the principles of quantum mechanics and nuclear physics due to the sizes of objects involved.

One basic thing to note is that two atomic nuclei don't like getting too close to each other due to their positive charge. Electrostatics confirms this. Like charges repel. For fusion to occur, two light nuclei have to be brought so close that a certain force in physics known as the strong force takes over, and the nuclei fuse. This is really hard to achieve, mainly because a tremendous amount of temperature and pressure has to applied to the system of nuclei. This is relatively easy in the sun's core because the gravitation provides the pressure and the temperature is about 10 million degrees celsius.

This is the engineering challenge of fusion. Constructing materials and systems that can provide that amount of temperature and pressure, and still remain intact. No known material can widstand the temperature of fusion (which is considerable hotter than the sun's core). But there's a solution, and progress has been made using this solution.

The solution
The solution is the use of powerful electromagnets with really strong magnetic fields. The positive charges on the plasma enables the plasma to be controlled by magnetic fields.

Fusion has been promised by labs and teams for decades since 1950, but till date, no fusion reactor has achieved break even. For decades, fusion experiments have been connducted by big research labs and institutions. But currently, several startups and companies working to make fusion feasible and commercial. They believe that by applying modern technology like IoT, Big-Data Analytics, High Temperature Superconductors and Machine Learning, they can achieve fusion. If they succeced, we can finally have cheap, clean and sustainable energy. This implies that innovations such as vertical farming, waste managment and desalination can finally be cheap enough to be integrated into 21st century living.

Progress so far
General Fusion
General Fusion's approach is Magnetized Target fusion. The fusion process involves the fusion fuel being injected in the form of a compact toroid of plasma, which is then compressed to fusion-relevant densities and pressures. In contrast to most MTF systems, which use magnets to compress the plasma, the General Fusion design instead uses a large number of steam-driven pistons to mechanically compress a vortex of liquid metal. As of 2017 they were developing subsystems for use in a prototype to be built in three to five years.

If there's one company with a lot of collarboration, it is General Fusion. Recieving support from Microsoft, McGill University among others. Microsoft is to help them optimize the process of fusion uing machine learning and analytics from the thousands of experiments General Fusion is performing peforming. General Fusion claims that their approach is the most practical path to commercial fusion power. Find out why here.

Tokamak Energy
Tokamak energy is a UK-based private company palnning on achieving sustainable nuclear fusion. They plan on using spherical tokamaks and High Temperature Superconductors to achieve sustainable fusion. Their spherical tokamaks offer higher efficiencies due to greater plasma pressures. Learn more about them here.

Commonwealth Fusion Systems
Commonwealth fusion systems (CFS) is a private american company. Their goal is to combine proven physics backed by decades of government funded research with a revolutionary superconducting magnet technology to accelerate the path to commercial fusion energy.


CFS plans to use Rare-Earth Barium Copper Oxide (REBCO) which is the same HTS that Tokamak energy plans on using. Learn more about them here.

TAE Technologies
TAE technologies is a fusion company with commercialisation in mind. They primary fuel would be Hydrogen-Boron because of the availablity. They plan on solving the two most challenging aspects of fusion. Hot-Enough and Long-Enough (HELE). With the aid of lasers, they have achieved temperature of 10 million degrees celsius (hotter than the sun's core), for 10 miliseconds. This is quite an advancement considering other progress made by other reactors. Learn more about them here.

ITER
If there's one project that sounds realistic, ITER should be one of them. This is mainly due to their timeline. They are expected to start experiments by December 2025. ITER is a collarboration of China, the European Union, India, Japan, Korea, Russia and the United States. It is probably the begiiest engineering project in the world today. The fusion complex is to be built in Southern France.

The ITER machine is to consist of :

The Tokamak
The Magnets
The vaccum vessel
Blanket
Divertor
Cryostat
The most important thing about ITER is that it aims to produce 500MW of energy from an input of 50 MW. It also wants to prove the viability of commercial fusion. Once suscessful, a replicated machine would be built in the member countries.

Benefits of fusion
Continue here .
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