DIII-D Researchers Continue To Improve Innovative Operating Regime For Fusion Reactors poweronline.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from poweronline.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
27 May 2021
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Initial results from the UK Atomic Energy Authority s (UKAEA s) new MAST Upgrade experiment at the Culham Centre for Fusion Energy (CCFE) in Oxfordshire, England, have demonstrated the effectiveness of an innovative exhaust system designed to make compact fusion power plants commercially viable. The new exhaust system - called the Super-X divertor - is designed to channel plasma out of the machine at temperatures low enough for its materials to withstand - meaning that components can last much longer.
Interior of the MAST Upgrade spherical tokamak (Image: UKAEA)
Using a machine called a tokamak , a fusion power station will heat a gas, or plasma , enabling types of hydrogen fuel to fuse together to release energy that can generate electricity. A key challenge to commercialising tokamaks is the removal of excess heat produced during fusion reactions. Without an exhaust system that can handle this intense heat, materials will have to be regularly replaced - sign
Commercially viable fusion electricity comes a step closer with promising UK results
Researchers at the Culham Centre for Fusion Energy believe they have solved the exhaust problem for fusion power plants
MAST-U: UK tokamak experiment brings commercially viable fusion electricity a step closer to reality. Pic souce CCFE
Researchers at the Culham Centre for Fusion Energy (CCFE) in Oxfordshire on Wednesday released the first results from the MAST-U (Mega Amp Spherical Tokamak - Upgrade) nuclear fusion experiment, suggesting that the dream of creating commercially viable fusion power plants could be a step closer to reality.
The scientists claim that they have developed an exhaust system that can help deal with the immense temperatures created during the fusion process and can reduce the exhaust heat load by ten-fold.
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