One day we can hopefully harness fusion to the extent that it can be done with Actual Net output. This Shows we are making promising steps in that direction, but it is far from being close to that reality.
The idea that 17,300 joules out for just 9,400 joules in without accounting for the 1.8 million or so joules of energy that streamed in from the lasers shadows that hard reality. (yeah I clipped that)
The article further says: "When they're taken into account, 99% of the reaction's total energy was lost".
The ITER should be another great leap toward that goal (2027?), but even then it is only designed to produce 500 MW of fusion power sustained for up to 1,000 seconds? This is really just to demonstrate the principle of producing more energy from the fusion process than is used to initiate it, something that has not yet been achieved in any fusion reactor. (Rossi's E-Cat aside
) Another purpose of ITER is to explore the scientific and engineering questions like how and/or if reactor walls can be designed to last long enough to make a commercial power plant economically viable in the presence of the intense neutron bombardment. I'm guessing there will be fears by some similar to the "Opening a Black Hole" claims when the LHC was ready to start operation.
Reminding me of the Fleischmann/Pons "Cold-fusion" claims that ultimately had them pilloried in the press, denounced by their peers and the idea all but banished from mainstream science. Although they were not the first, they are the most known. There was a lot of evidence "something" was going on in their experiments, if only LENR (as Cold fusion is currently termed) could be realized. Since the US D.O.E. included low energy nuclear reactions in a $10 million funding opportunity announcement in 2013, maybe researchers could progress something on that front as well.
Fusion FTW
