Japan's JT-60 Tokamak Sets New Plasma Record

Dipster writes "The Japan Atomic Energy Agency has announced that its JT-60 Tokamak has almost doubled the previous record for sustained plasma production, which is now sits at 28.6 seconds. It is believed that once 400 seconds can be achieved, a sustained nuclear fusion reaction will be possible. While 28.6 seconds is a long way from 400, it raises hopes for what will be possible from the ITER reactor, expected to be finished in 2016."

Re:Almost there... still

[Zadaz]

With only these two data points (16.5 sec in 2004 and 28.6 in 2006) we can get 400+ seconds by the year 2018. While two years behind the 2016 date, is probably ahead of schedule if I know anything about building schedules.

Movies have let me down. I was supposed to be flying around Mars on my Mr. Fusion powered space car 15 years ago.

Re:How long

[enitime]

"[How long] until fusion power can be put into production? I know a lot of advances have been made in the last few years, small scale fusion using pyroelectric crystals and such, but really how far are we from the goal? Can anyone in the know comment?"

I know its pretty unreasonable to ask "when is technology x coming out," but a rough order of magnitude (are we talking 10 years? 100?) has got to be doable."

Depends on how much money gets thrown at it. If ITER shows promise, and there's really no technical reason it shouldn't do what they expect, these projects will get more funding and it'll be a matter of decades. France and Japan will be along for the PR alone, which means China and the US will have play as well to save face. This could very well turn out to be the next Space Race. With ITER in 10 years, I'd guess commercial plants (likely government funded or subsidised) within 25. I expect to see it in my lifetime.

"Also, if we do get large scale fusion, is it really going to be cleaner and safer than modern fission plants?"

Yes and no. You'll still get a lot of low-level radioactive waste that's not especially dangerous, but you don't get anything that needs to be stored securely for thousands of years. You might still need to store it away for as much as 50-100 years, but on that time-scale it's basically just warehousing, and it'll be mostly harmless long before that.

It'll be safer because you cannot get a meltdown. Unlike fission power plants, you can cut off the fuel supply. If something goes wrong the plasma will dissipate. A fusion reaction is difficult to start and maintain, whereas a fission reaction is difficult to halt. If something goes horribly wrong, at MOST you'll need to replace parts of the tokamak. The fuel is toxic, but that's a negligable hurdle.

A big plus you didnt mention is the fuel. We can't make uranium. We can create tritium/deuterium without too much hassle. It won't run out.

Another big one is that it can't be weaponised. It won't even produce the radioactive waste needed to make a decent dirty bomb.

Re:secret government withholding alien technology

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh c'mon this is all just a fun gag. The energy problems were solved long ago. This artificial scarecity is just a tool of manipulation and entertainment. Got the herd all chasing their tails. Of course if I offered any real proof of my claims they'd kill me, just like they did the others.

maybe the "50 year" prediction was wrong

[backslashdot]

But, progress is being made, maybe the rate of progress is a lot slower than anticipated. But it's clear physicists are getting closer and closer. The public needs to be patient and not cut off funding. Just because the 50 year prediction was wrong doesnt mean that this is a fundamentally impossible acheivement, as we can see, progress is being made.

My main concern is the current environmentalist movement which doesnt want humans have a decent quality of life with cheap access to energy. They are stuck on what they think is pollution free energy production methods such as solar (solar cell production is not eco friendly), wind (motor magnets & airfoil manufacture not necessarily pollution free, ugly, noisy, bird killing, proven to effect natural weather) and ethanol (combustion still produces pollutants including carcinogens, large scale production monopolizes vast areas of arable land).

So, even though at least one of the co-founders of greenpeace is in favor of nuclear power. Greenpeace and other "environmentalist" movements have gotten so hateful of the nuclear industry that they have apparently lost all rationality when it comes to examining the benefits of fusion.

And so it seems that many modern environmentalists don't care enough about the environment to be rational in trying to protect it. Let's not forget that most humans are environmentalists, who wants to live in pollution? The entrenched environmental lobby is actively blocking any workable ideas in reducing pollution and improving quality of life.

Double the research.

Re:fusion

[Guppy06]

"There is no perpetual motion energy source."

Perhaps, but when your fuel source is the most abundant substance in the universe, there's "close enough for engineering purposes."

"Where is the balancing "bad" for fusion energy?"

You seem to be confusing thermodynamics with kharma.

Re:Is the almost exclusiv funding of fusion worth

[amliebsch]

Simple economics. Thermal depolymerization works, sort of, but not at anything like "high efficiency." The same is true of most "alternative" energy schemes: they simply don't scale.

Efficient. Reliable. Decentralized. Pick any two.

My prediction

[ceeam]

I predict that we will have fusion power not before oil reserves are exhausted - too much money/politics/everything involved. Can't be allowed. If we have fusion power production tomorrow - what would all those arabs do? Huh?

What about making plasma in the microwave?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sure since this is /., all of you have tried the match/fire/etc in the microwave trick which generates what can only be described as plamsa balls that fly around inside. One trick that I found online was to place an inverted glass bowl over the candle which contains the plasma. I've done this and sustained the plasma for way more than 30 seconds. Of course, it melted the glass and created some micro-stress fractures which eventually caused the bowl to shatter once it cooled enough. (much to my wife's chagrin) But what am I missing here... If I can make that much for so long in a simple microwave using a match, shouldn't we be able to get the 400 seconds one to work as well? Maybe its the containment issue since my glassware wasn't up to the task. Of course, this would be a carbon plasma, right? I don't know how to do deuterium in a microwave... I do know that the amount of light/heat that a single plasma ball gives off is really a lot. Anybody ever done any serious experiments with this?

Re:How long

[rneches]

It isn't a question of how long. It is more a question of dollars.

It is often said that 20 years ago, the physics community estimated that they could have reactors working in 20 years. People usually ignore that this was only the first half of the estimate -- the other half was the level of funding needed to achieve the result. Needless to say, they received a small (and still shrinking) fraction of the funding they said was necessary, and the result is unsurprising.

Everyone laments the expense of large scale research in creating new basic technology. Bare in mind, however, that the production cost of the movie Spiderman 2 was a bit larger than the budget for the whole US fusion program the year it was released.

Re:Erm...

[khallow]

But compared to a fission or coal burning plant? I don't see the radiative waste problem being that onerous.