Not with present technology. There have been many attempts. But the working temperatures are so high that right now there is no place on earth that can stand those kind of temperatures. There was an experiment, which may still be ongoing, which attempted to contain the heat with the use of magnetic waves. No known earthly material can stand up to that degree of heat. That is only the beginning of the problems involved.
About thirty years ago some fellows claimed they came up with cold fusion. Everybody got excited, but it proved out to be a bust. But the thought of it was exhilarating as long as it lasted!
However, there are just too many political roadblocks to practically advance this energy avenue.
Quote by Paul Ehrlich, professor, Stanford University: “Giving society cheap, abundant energy would be the equivalent of giving an idiot child a machine gun.”
Quote by Jeremy Rifkin, Greenhouse Crisis Foundation: “The prospect of cheap fusion energy is the worst thing that could happen to the planet.”
Quote by Paul Ehrlich, professor, Stanford University: "We contend that the position of the nuclear promoters is preposterous beyond the wildest imaginings of most nuclear opponents, primarily because one of the purported “benefits” of nuclear power, the availability of cheap and abundant energy, is in fact a liability."
So you can see, fusion is a long way off, both scientifically and politically.
Fusion energy powers the Sun, so it IS possible. Now the question is can we make a small machine on Earth to do it in a smaller scale? We have been trying for over 50 years. No success yet.
Not really.
We know fusion reactors are possible. It is no longer a question of 'if' we can get fusion working but 'when' we can get it working. The ITER project, for example, is not some esoteric physics experiment. It is a project to build a working prototype based on research over the past 50 years. I think there is little doubt that ITER will be able to produce a sustained reaction and will generate power. We've already long passed the 'break even' point where the reaction generates more power than you put in.
The problem for fusion is threefold, in my opinion. Firstly, even if ITER works, we then have to take what we learn and build commercial stations. That's going to take decades yet so I'd be expecting the first commercial station becoming technically viable around about 2030-2040.
The second problem is cost. At the moment we've no idea how much a commercial fusion reactor would cost to build. So, for me, the issue will not be technical but commercial. Lots of good ideas in science and lots of higher speced equipment failed to turn into good products that people wanted to buy. Betamax tapes, for example, were superior in image quality to VHS. And yet everyone went with VHS. The PAL system used 625 lines whereas NTSC used 525 to display images on TV sets. Despite the worse image quality, the US and Canada went with NTSC. So the fact that a reactor can be built doesn't automatically imply we'll use them if the costs aren't right and, even if they are, there's still no guarantee.
Finally, on the global warming/energy issue, by the time we have fusion reactors we'll have had to solve many of the issues already. If we take the oil fields we currently use, then they will be depleted by around 2060. Natural gas will dry up around 2070 and coal around 2130 based on current energy consumption. However, the estimate is that by the mid-2030s, energy consumption will be about 50% higher than it is now due to extra demand by developing nations.
So you can see that we're going to have to rethink our dependency on oil. We can continue to tap new oil fields but the whole reason we haven't tapped those is because they're more difficult to get at. More difficult means less production capacity. Less production capacity means lower numbers of barrels. And higher demand for fewer barrels means greater cost. The point is, from an economic standpoint, alternative sources will start to become cost competitive probably around the mid 2030s and those, at that time, won't include fusion.
Also, many nations are legally committed to CO2 reductions. So as they try to reach those targets, and attempt to mitigate against the costs of high demand for fossil fuels, we'll see greater diversity in the means by which energy is produced. Those will not include fusion because it'll arrive too late.
Fusion energy would solve the energy crisis and global warming;
If we could get it to work.
Yes but they have been trying for 60years and haven't succeeded yet, and I expect if they do succeed it will be hugely expensive to build the plants.
I believe fission with thorium reactors is the way to go especially the liquid salt version.
The biggest new experiment in this area is the ITER reactor in France - http://www.iter.org/
It is considered to be feasible in 30 odd years time. Unfortunately , since the 1950s it has been feasible in 30 years time
Still science fiction I'm afraid.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/7972865.stm
I have to present my Idea to solve energy crisis. I optioned out for fusion energy.
In your opinion, is it really a solution of energy crisis?
Can I produce more energy as output than the input energy in fission process?
