A clean, plentiful fuel so efficient Earth's entire annual supply could fit in a swimming pool. That's the dream, but the science is there, too

The hottest place in our solar system is not the Sun, as you might think, but a machine near a south Oxfordshire village called Culham. Housed inside a vast hangar, it’s a nuclear fusion experiment called JET, or Joint European Torus.

When operating, temperatures here can reach 150 million degrees Celsius – ten times hotter than the centre of the Sun. On December 21st 2021, JET set a new record by producing 59 megajoules of sustained energy through a process known as nuclear fusion.

59 megajoules isn’t a huge amount; just enough to power three domestic tumble dryer cycles. Nevertheless, as far as humanity is concerned, proof that nuclear fusion works is a very big deal indeed.

Fusion produces energy by fusing atomic nuclei together, the opposite of what happens in all nuclear power stations, where atomic nuclei are split through nuclear fission.

Once harnessed on a commercial scale, fusion could produce so much energy from so little raw material, that it may solve all of humanity’s energy problems in one fell swoop – amongst many other things.

I do like efficient energy, including one that could be used in space, but I feel like we should consider potential weaponization (including inadvertent or neglect-based weaponization) of the related energy source/means of producing energy when deciding what to implement IRL. Perhaps they already are, just in the opposite direction of what I’d assume to be better for everyone.

Given how plentiful solar power is out in space, I feel like I heavily favor tech advances in harnessing and utilizing these sorts of energy sources that are just floating out there, free for the taking.

>Once harnessed on a commercial scale,

This is the key sticking point. I am nearing 60 years old and we have been about ten years away from this for about 35 years now. We are still at least ten years away from it now. Fusion is definitely the future, but we need immediate bridge solutions to get us TO that future.

Many scientists see fusion as a techy dream that distracts us from what needs to be done soon - and they're betting bigger.

I feel like we're gambling on (uncertain) technologies like fusion because the (proven) alternatives are so much more difficult.

The following submission statement was provided by /u/filosoful:

A clean, plentiful fuel so efficient Earth's entire annual supply could fit in a swimming pool. That's the dream, but the science is there, too

The hottest place in our solar system is not the Sun, as you might think, but a machine near a south Oxfordshire village called Culham. Housed inside a vast hangar, it’s a nuclear fusion experiment called JET, or Joint European Torus.

When operating, temperatures here can reach 150 million degrees Celsius – ten times hotter than the centre of the Sun. On December 21st 2021, JET set a new record by producing 59 megajoules of sustained energy through a process known as nuclear fusion.

59 megajoules isn’t a huge amount; just enough to power three domestic tumble dryer cycles. Nevertheless, as far as humanity is concerned, proof that nuclear fusion works is a very big deal indeed.

Fusion produces energy by fusing atomic nuclei together, the opposite of what happens in all nuclear power stations, where atomic nuclei are split through nuclear fission.

Once harnessed on a commercial scale, fusion could produce so much energy from so little raw material, that it may solve all of humanity’s energy problems in one fell swoop – amongst many other things.

Please reply to OP's comment here: https://old.reddit.com/r/Futurology/comments/xwhq37/many_scientists_see_fusion_as_the_future_of/ir6h2io/

Can't wait for this new tech to come, have the plants & infra built using gov subsidies and then get billed about the same as now to have it

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We've also been ignoring and postponing converting our local grid to support electric heating and solar panels on the majority of houses for years and now there's a rush on it...

Fusion reactions were weaponized a long time ago, that's what the hydrogen bomb is.

Yeah, but for widespread energy use, we’d be talking about putting like potential fusion bombs everywhere, right, with the required security protocols to make sure some nutter doesn’t mess it up for everyone?

Like wasn’t the whole thing with the Ukrainian power plants and Nuke Zombie Boss Chernobyl kind of stressful, to say the least?

EDIT: Haha, sorry if like this is your profession or what you’ve devoted your life to. I wasn’t trying to suggest it wasn’t worthwhile, and I’d expect we’ve learned and discovered a ton of stuff in our efforts!

Keep ‘em coming, Sunk Costs! ;)

The difference is fission reactions are self sustaining once critical mass is reached, while fusion reactions are damn hard to even get going in the first place.

As much as I would love to see fusion become a reality, there are two problems that few engineers talk about:

First, when they talk about progress regarding getting to a break-even point (as much energy produced as the amount used to produce it), they usually only talk about the energy that goes into the laser (or other device used to initiate the fusion reaction). However, this is misleading, because it ignores all the other input energy required for the complete operation. So, when they claim the fusion energy produces was 70% of the input energy (which sounds very promising), the total input energy was actually much higher. In reality, they are getting out just a few percent of what they are putting in. See https://backreaction.blogspot.com/2021/10/how-close-is-nuclear-fusion-power.html

Second, tritium is needed for the fusion reaction, but the global supply of tritium is only about 25 kg. While it's true that some fusion reactions can produce more tritium, the supply is so low that they could have significant problems getting to the point where a continuous reaction can be sustained. See https://www.science.org/content/article/fusion-power-may-run-fuel-even-gets-started#:~:text=Fusion%20reactors%20generally%20need%20a,%2C%20or%20tokamak%2C%20gets%20burned.

It was always 10 years away if it was funded. It was never Properly funded.

But these plants would presumably be on and going, right, protected by whatever we have in place to keep it from wreaking havoc on our global backyard?

So an ill-intentioned person could focus on attacking and taking down those safeguards, in order to trigger the adverse consequences they’re there to prevent.

I may not be following you on this weaponization point though, because it seems almost like you’re saying that fusion both is (or has been) and isn’t weaponizable?

Are you saying fusion reactors are just much harder to sabotage? Or impossible?

EDIT: I’m pretty sure some of you are trying to double up nation-based (non-global) defense strategies with energy strategies for the savings. But the first needs to be a thing of the past really soon. REALLY SOON.

Here's the issue with fusion, shielding.

It takes 10 feet of steel, concrete and glass to keep fusion radiation contained. And due to the nature of the radiation released by fusion, it transmutes matter. Actually turning lead into gold kinda thing, except it's more like getting Thanos snapped.

Fission is just the only viable energy for a sustainable future. Fusion would be absolutely baller, if it didn't kill fucking everything.

Edit: seeing as I'm getting down voted, I'll add more(here only because mobile won't load the replies I've gotten)

I'm talking about the neutron radiation from fusion reactions. It's incredibly dangerous and Kyle Hill even made a video on it if you're looking for more information. I believe it was the world's heaviest door video.

I haven't read the article, but let me guess...Its justv20 years away?

It would be nice to see alternate designs and things tried vs a new type of tockmack

Solar is going to be a very transformative power source for developing nations. Because it can be bought in small quantities.

While it's less attractive for developed nations because it's still more expensive than fission and coal.

Fusion for developed nations is very attractive. Mostly because it can plug into the already existing infrastructure. The potential is there, which is what makes it attractive.

Also both have the nice feature of reducing hydrocarbon dependency. Which would lead to a more stable economy and not let places like Russia and Saudi Arabia have a gun against your economy's head.

It's not actually clear if fusion power will even be viable within any of our lifetimes though -- for example there's supply issues with the necessary tritium, there's problems replicating the breakthroughs, etc. -- so "betting big" on fusion is quite literally gambling on an uncertain technology, at least for now.

Yes I think it's still a 50 years away technology. SPARC looks promising with its magnet technology and small size (so I assume less tritium).

The target Q factor is 2 but it could be as high as 10 which is atleast approaching a real net gain. We probably need a much larger q factor to make it a viable power source though. Wind, solar and other renewables have become really cheap.

Are there challenges, absolutely. But does that mean we just give up?

JET’s latest result for a prolonged pulse gives huge confidence for ITER, and I’m fully onboard that fusion on the grid won’t be any time soon. Fusion won’t solve our generation it’s to solve the next.

First: Everyone talks about the Q number being power into reactor vs power out because no one knows what the rest of a future plant will need power wise. A bit like a car engine having its BHP tested at the flywheel, it’s tells you the power of the engine. Drop that engine in a mini, mustang or 18 wheeler and test power at the wheels; the numbers are going to be drastically different.

Second: The civilian supply of tritium is short (your number above). But it has dual use so I bet there’s a lot more knocking about. Plus there’s a lot of interesting work going on with lithium and tritium breeding.

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No a fusion reactor is very different from a fusion bomb and you can't just like "convert" one into another. And these aren't like fission plants where they can be used as breeder reactor's to make enriched uranium to make bombs.

Impossible to sabotage. As soon as the containment field is compromised the reaction fizzles out.

So basically the only possible states are:

• On and safely contained; or

• Off and incapable of harm?

That almost sounds too good to be true, but pretty exciting if it is! I think I’d need to understand it better - the last time I remember reading about it is some old article that disappointingly concluded that cold fusion was impossible.

Oh, there might be some risks from contaminated materials that need to be contained, but it's not going to make a big boom and spread fallout. Also, this is hot fusion. Cold fusion is still doubtful...

Haha yeah I was just reading the article and seeing the extensive security measures, including the giant concrete barriers that are intended to stop like neutrons from flying everywhere and destroying us all.

Also seems like still at energy loss in the process, and I’d be leery of any energy efficiency that could be gained by sacrificing safety measures.

Oh well. :(

https://web.mit.edu/fusion-fission/HybridsPubli/Fusion_Proliferation_Risks.pdf

What you just wrote is the most insanely idiotic thing I have ever read. At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to something that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this thread is now dumber for having read it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.

Are scientists particularly good at gambling or something?

It’s clear we need a (clean) base load energy to replace fossil fuels, so this makes so much sense

Isn't the joke among nuclear scientists that stable fusion is always 30 years away? The world just doesn't fund fundamental research well enough to see the kind of progress that gets hyped.

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Fusion faces massive challenges, but neither of these are showstoppers.

Laser-induced fusion isn't a realistic prospect for power generation at the moment because those big lasers aren't very efficient. It's still worth doing because there's a lot of interesting physics we can explore in those labs. Magnetic fusion doesn't suffer from wall-plug efficiency issues so much, and is a more realistic option for an economically viable reactor.

Scientists are probably quite blasé about efficiency calculations because, once you reach ignition, increasing Q to the value you need isn't so difficult (certainly easier than getting to Q=1 in the first place).

Regarding tritium availability, every tokamak power plant design features a tritium-breeding blanket made of lithium. This is not trivial, but it's by no means the biggest technical challenge faced by magnetic fusion devices. These tend to be related to plasma stability issues and surface heat loads on the inner walls of the reactor.

A simple No would have sufficed

Theres a reason wind/solar is about the only real new investment in electricity anyone is making, its cheap(cheapest per KWH). Sure they are still making new natural gas plants but in 10 years no one will be. We have fusion power now, it literally falls out of the sky all day long. We just have to harness it. Its cheap, easy, safe, we just have to sort out storage.

Not impressed after learning that a pistol shrimp produces a bubble as hot as the sun and louder than a bullet.

The Saint: cold fusion

Title reads like the scientists are getting aroused by fusion being the future of energy

Your my boy Blue!

You aren't?

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Well I never said that

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ITER is funded.

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Crystalic fusion - buzz lightyear told us this over 20 years ago…

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This is a fallacy. As fusion experiments have scaled, we learned more about plasma physics and needed more advanced computing to model it and more advanced hardware such as high temperature superconductors to go the last stretch. It’s not going to be always 10 years away. We are probably 5 years or less from Q10 fusion.

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I'm adding a longer comment which will likely be removed as well. Fusion is a scam. We already have a giant, free fusion reactor called the sun. We have no plans for harnessing a terrestrial fusion reaction efficiently. The research money spent on fusion could be put to better uses.

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Okay, but fusion is probably still 10 years away from anything but proof of concept and 25 years away from a commercial power plant being built. In that same time we can put solar on every house roof and wind turbines in all the empty cow fields(assuming lab grown meat takes off) and knock our carbon use down by 90%.

> In my dreams the scientists achieve this

You could have stopped your far-fetched fantasy story right there.

I want to be wrong, but having heard that fusion is only a few years away for decades now, I’m starting to wonder if it’s a well-intentioned grift.

This article was funded through a $1.5 billion government contract for the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, whose primary mission is fusion (so perhaps a tiny bias), and they basically conclude not as dangerous as fission but more research and analysis needed.

Fusion is the power of the future and will be for centuries

Both fission and fusion are both “nuclear” reactions… but that’s where the commonalities end.

In fission, a radioactive isotope (such as uranium or plutonium) is constantly shedding particles and melting down. And the reactor uses graphite rods and heavy water cooling to moderate and manage how much of a chain reaction can take place. Without the rods and water, you could have a runaway chain reaction which could lead to reactor core meltdown… and if there’s more than critical mass of nuclear fuel… an A-bomb explosion to go with the meltdown. (Edit: As u/dewafelbakkers pointed out, this isn't really a concern as reactors don't use anywhere close to the critical mass required for an atomic explosion, nor do they do they enrich the fuel enough to reach such a critical point.)

Not to mention, radioactive decay of spent fuel and remaining uranium/plutonium goes on for aeons.

In Fusion, there is no natural radioactive decay. The natural state doesn’t lead to a meltdown, and there’s not really a need to actively moderate the reactor. In fusion, a lot of energy is needed to get the reaction going as well as to sustain and confine it. If the Torus breaks down for some reason, the magnetic confinement will fail, and plasma pressure will drop and the reaction will stop. And you are left with hydrogen/deuterium gas or heavy water.

It takes a lot of energy to get atoms to collide. Even in an H-bomb, the reaction trigger is provided by an A-bomb. So the energy from the first fission explosion collides the hydrogen atoms together to release the much larger output of the fusion reaction. And, in the fusion reactors, most of the energy spent is trying to get the hydrogen atoms in a hot plasma to collide inside a confined magnetic donut. If the magnets fail, the plasma disappears… sure it might do some damage due to hot gas, but that’s about it.

Thanks! I did like the remote ancillary support structures design of ITER, which means that anyone with bad intentions would need to figure out how to keep the reaction going and keep the tritium flowing in particular. The latter part seems very hard to surmount, but I’d guess that tech improvements that actually let us run fusion with energy gain would also help with “hacks” to both of these for bad actors.

What are your thoughts on this article, written by someone who worked for decades on the Princeton fusion project, which notes in particular the danger of neutron radiation (which seems to erode the very structures intended to keep it contained and protected over time)?

EDIT: Found this!, wherein we are testing out how bad neutron radiation can fuck shit up! Damn!

Also, I admitted at some point that it’s been years since I looked at any of this stuff, and will admit now that I’m about two levels below layman on the topic. Also, I absolutely do not mean to offend anyone or make anyone feel bad (at least not too much if I can help it), but my suspiciousness hackles really get raised when people shut down what seem to be reasonable questions with fanatic fervor. That type of reaction always makes me suspect that there’s some sort of bullshit shield being put up.

Just need an efficient muon source...

well the UK is building a Fusion Power Plant now. It won't be operable until the 40's but still, cool

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I heard ur mom can supply a lot of that on her back

Now how will they conceive to charge us all money for completely renewable energy…

This is not either-or but both renewables and fusion development must be funded sufficiently.

Both are much cheaper than what we currently pay for fossile fuels.

No, the joke started out at around 50 years and it's been decreasing ever since. Now, people think the joke was that it was always 10 years away, but it wasn't. The jokes and reality are converging on a point around 15-20 years away.

I bet the fossil fuel mafia is already plotting to stunt the growth of this industry

For 50 years they have been betting that in the next decade fusion will be big. It’s clear there’s something that we don’t understand and until we do Fusion is going nowhere

> Are there challenges, absolutely. But does that mean we just give up?

No, it just means we need to be realistic about the challenges and how far in the 'future' the reality of fusion energy actually is.

Fusion was 30 years away when the Physicists I worked with dismantled their Tokamak. That was 1994.

> Solar is going to be a very transformative power source for developing nations. Because it can be bought in small quantities.

100% Agree

>While it's less attractive for developed nations because it's still more expensive than fission and coal.

100% wrong. This hasn't been true for a while now. Today solar and wind are often cheaper than even running a fully paid for Coal or nuclear plant.

https://cleantechnica.com/2022/07/21/most-renewables-cheaper-than-cheapest-coal-in-g20/

The cost of fossil fuels never includes the cost of wars and military infrastructures to protect access to oil.

So you're telling me there's still a chance?

Lol Leave Billy alone. Didn’t bring him into this.

Me too. Unlimited free energy. It will be the end of the old world, the economic thinking that destroys and will send us to other planets. Hope.

Where have you been hearing that it's 10 years away? For commercial implementation to be 10 years away, the experimental implementation would have to be ready basically right now. That's obviously never been the case.

No legitimate scientific source has ever pretended that it's a few years away. It's only clickbait garbage that does that.

The prove. Options don’t even come close

And the benefits are so potentially enormous, we can’t afford NOT to pursue it with great vigor.

Yes, and also not the environmental damage.

Both renewables and fusion power can be produced locally and with much smaller environmental footprint.

Your first point is almost universally glossed over in reporting, especially in the big media outlets.

I always get a chuckle out of these articles. We've been building fission reactors for almost 70 years and can't build them economically, and they just use hot sticks to heat water.

Now they're working on suspending a plasma stream using super conductors and magnets, then somehow extract the energy to heat water. Even if they get to the point of having a stable, sustainable reaction, the economics are going to be terrible.

Exactly my point.

Pragmatic and nihilistic as I like to be, I support fusion for exactly the same reason I do space travel.

There's gotta be the remains of some civilisation, on some planet, somewhere in the universe, who made the "oh so logical" decision to abandon space travel, and to live of their star's waning rays instead of figuring out the mechanism behind them.

And I hope it's not us.

Fusion is not likely to be cheap, even with sufficient research funding, and even in 10-30 years when the next generation of prototypes are ready.

Even within our own solar system, solar power gets weak quickly (hence the need to dig into both if we want to leave the solar system on a generational ship). But you are right-- mastering it would give us safe power for the inner planets when humans start the next wave of colonization and we become a multi-planet species.

Hey, did you see this recent article about chaining photons together in like a quantum relay?

I have to admit I was like making up some words and concepts in my head for all the stuff I wasn’t getting, but it sounded like if you started with an already entangled pair of photons, you could much more easily tack on additional entangled photons to make like a long entangled photon chain, and for some reason (super curious but not sure I followed that part), it’s easier to do that than trying to entangle two random photons from scratch.

Who’s up for a relay race around the multiverse?

Cutting back energy use, adopting carbon sequestering technologies without the requirement that they're profitable, and implementing nuclear / solar / tidal / geothermal are already viable today, the only deterrent is they're expensive and would require the 1% to chip in. It's not even clear fusion on the other hand will even be technologically viable in any of our lifetimes.

>stop like neutrons from flying everywhere and destroying us all.

What the hell are you talking about

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The relevant links are probably scattershot throughout the comments to the post, but here’s the most recent research paper that I’d found talking about it.

Here’s another article, somewhat older and using more impassioned(-ish) language, though easier to follow for folks like me.

>In fission, a radioactive isotope (such as uranium or plutonium) is constantly shedding particles and melting down. And the reactor uses graphite rods and heavy water cooling to moderate and manage how much of a chain reaction can take place. Without the rods and water, you could have a runaway chain reaction which could lead to reactor core meltdown… and if there’s more than critical mass of nuclear fuel… an A-bomb explosion to go with the meltdown.

Formerly in the industry. Most of this is a pretty OK explanation, but that last bit is very wrong and I fear you've been* exposed to some disinformation or are repeating misinformation. You may want to read up on the definition and usage of 'critical mass', but more importantly, there are no fission plants that could accidently result in a nuclear explosion. nuclear accidents can result in meltdown, as you stated correctly, and there are - in extreme and sometime unprecedented circumstances - risks of gas explosions or explosive pressure events... But not nuclear explosions or spontaneous nuclear bombs made from reactor cores. That exists purely in the realm of propaganda and cinema

Your language sounds like you think one fusion reactor without shielding will result in neutron escaping and killing everyone is some kind of apocalyptic scenario. Neutrons do not work like that lol

AFAIK, they have still to make a return above 1%. 1 fucking percent!?!

It's just easy to get Billion dollar grants going absolutely nowhere.. but hey, gotta feed the kids.

What energy might that be?

This is the point that always gets me. So many people in the solar and wind for some reason also support fusion. But when it comes to conversations about fission, it's too time consuming to build, it's too expensive, the supply chain isn't there, it's too complicated, etc.

But then in the next breath it's all about how.excited they are for fusion.

Its like, friend, how fast and cheap do you think think massive centralized fusion plants are going to be when they are commercially viable (in 2075. Or 2100)

I agree completely. Because Sabine Hossenfelder!

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It is a nice dream. I wish for the same. Infinite energy. Sadly I believe fusion is not it. I do believe a Mercury bound Dyson sphere is.

Except it doesn't deliver.

Lel. Always was..

Ah, thanks for pointing that out! I stand corrected. I was thinking about what happened at Chernobyl with the explosion, and yes… at worst, it could be considered a dirty bomb. There was an explosion, and enough fissile material ejected to be considered radioactive fallout, but it wasn’t an A-bomb. It was a steam explosion from all the coolant overheating.

Ha, no, I also mentioned elsewhere that I really like the ITER shutoff design that allows for multiple different circuit-breakers to basically turn the whole thing off for any number of more dangerous scenarios.

What I’m mostly worried about, for immobile energy sources that can be “weaponized” (used broadly to mean being harm to others), is:

• The ability for a small group of coordinated bad actors with the right knowledge to weaponize it, in this case presumably by somehow keeping the reaction and tritium replenishment (or equivalent) going despite the mechanisms in place to prevent that. I consider this a more likely scenario than people might realize, because my view is that the tech to “hack” any defensive tech structure exists simultaneously with the creation of that defensive tech structure, effectively converting all of those scenarios into like these condottieri-style waiting games with only one ultimate absorption point: the defender slips up and fails to maintain all the necessary resources to defend against hacking attackers. I do think that an inside job is more likely to succeed for sabotage.

• The fact that this neutron radiation is deadly to humans, and also eats away at the very structures that are designed to keep it safely isolated. That’s like putting deadly acid in a jar and hoping that you’re still going to be around later to replace it. And what weirds me out is that all the formal safety/risk papers don’t even mention the fact that the neutron radiation from the fusion reaction itself can be weaponized, instead focusing only on like uranium production or whatever to make bombs (in what they categorize as like three different ways, that sound to me like Sneaky Mode 1, Sneaky Mode 2, Grunt Rush).

• If there’s even a possibility that it can be weaponized, then people need to consider strategic defensive and war-related crap, too. And I’m going to guess that’s going to mean a lot of annoying-as-fuck games of chicken and wasteful positioning. Also, my guess is that it’s going to be rare that “best for us in terms of energy infrastructure” is going to perfectly line up with “best for us if we’re fighting,” which means that whatever we do won’t be optimal, and at worst, we’ll just be missing two birds with one stone.

Haha, and yeah, I did hit the high hyperbole note with the “doom for all” rhetoric - you’re right about that and I don’t have any good excuses for that bit!

These bafoons...

Yes. Also remember that chernobyl had no proper containment in place, so even a steam explosion and meltdown today wouldn't result in an event like that.

And my point is that only crappy clickbaiters would have claimed that commercial fusion was only 10 years away over the last 35 years. It's basically a straw man.

>only crappy clickbaiters

Click bait has only been a thing for the past few years, and I have seen these fusion stories since the 80s

Similarly, I am in aerospace machining, and "they" have been saying that 3D printing is going to put us out of business in 10 years since the late 80s. 3D printing is still a very long way from overtaking standard machining processes.

I think it is more wishful thinking and being overly optimistic.

You can actually get there though, ask Xeno

That you can. But in that 25 years, it would be prudent to concurrently continue research into fusion (so we can have fusion in 25 years), continue installing renewables while attempting to fine tune the design and continue improvements with the knowledge that this will never be a baseline load but the load peak chasers to the existing grid, see how we can improve the humming electric lines on those pole (Like Betsy the cow running into a pole should not be the reason why power was out in town), and find out who's the person I need to talk to about getting Zoboomafoo back.

Whether we like it or not, we all have to work together to win this. But I require Zoboomafoo as a condition.

Maybe because it isn't finished? Have some sence of adventure! We can't throw everything away because we don't know if it can deliver

I'll bet you that 99% of the funding towards fusion is being spend on projects that will take us nowhere because the people who hand out our money are closer to chimps than you and me are.

pretty sure you just dismissed my point and stated your opinion again without any good arguments i will not be commenting any further