US scientists achieve a landmark in nuclear fusion research

If you are well acquainted with world affairs, you would know that both China and South Korea have been making their own Artificial Sun through the process of nuclear fusion. The goal? To find endless energy source to sustain the world. And now, following in their footsteps, USA too has reached a breakthrough.  

At a federal research facility called Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California, American scientists have achieved a milestone while conducting nuclear fusion research. Sources cite that during a controlled fusion reaction, more energy was produced than used – something that hasn’t happened before. This has been undertaken by the US Department of Energy. Experts are now hopeful that pure and infinite energy are on the cards for the future.  

For those unaware, nuclear fusion is the natural process that offers the Sun its energy; something that scientists worldwide have been trying to recreate since the 1960s. The hope is to find reliable and renewable sources of clean energy for the world. Nuclear fusion is also significant in combating climate change as it doesn’t rely on fossil fuels or generate toxic greenhouse gases. In addition, it doesn’t depend upon weather conditions unlike other sustainable sources of energy such as wind and solar. Moreover, most fusion experiments employ hydrogen that is readily available almost free of cost from either oceanwater or lithium. Do you realise what this means? Such fuel can last till the end of time; maybe that’s why it’s often regarded as the holy grail of energy production.  

Are you wondering how nuclear fusion works? Well, at first, two atoms of a light-weighted element such as hydrogen are heated under controlled temperatures, which in turn combine into forming a single and heavier atom of an element such as helium. When this happens, a nuclear reaction takes place which end up producing huge amounts of energy. The good news is this energy generated can be captured by humanity for their use.  

But there’s a problem. While nuclear fusion does produce a lot of energy, it also ends up using the same. Why? Because getting two identical atoms to combine is very energy-heavy considering they both have the same positive or negative charge and are naturally repulsive. To resist their resistance, thus it’s important to fuel it with massive energy. Now, in case of the sun, it already emits extremely high temperatures of nearly ten million degrees Celsius alongside similar amounts of pressure (over a 100 billion times that of the Earth’s atmosphere). So, nuclear fusion of Sun happens easily, using the energy around it to produce double the amounts. It’s a win-win.  

But until the recent years, recreating the same on the Earth in state-of-the-art laboratories has also proved hard as maintaining high temperature and pressure for that long is difficult. Recently however, the United States’ National Ignition Facility (NIF) declared that they successfully used only 192 beam lasers to convert a fraction of hydrogen into sufficient amounts of energy, that can power 15 to 20 electric kettles. This means that for the first time ever, more energy was produced than consumed.  

Are you thinking what we are thinking? Isn’t this too early and too little to consider it a breakthrough? Well, it definitely is. However, it is also a promising start with large scale nuclear fusion still several years away.