Could we soon have nuclear power WITHOUT toxic waste? Focus Fusion promises cleaner energy solution



US company LPP Fusion claims to be on the brink of solving fusion

They say they are one step away from making cleaner and greener energy



In March 2012 they performed a successful test of their concept



This involved heating fusion fuel to 200 times the temperature at the centre of the sun



Next step is to increase the density and prove their Focus Fusion works



One of the holy grails of energy generation has long been fusion power, replicating the reactions that take place in stars like the sun.



So far such efforts have proved very difficult – but one company claims to have found a solution that could provide the world with a huge, renewable and green source of energy.



The Focus Fusion project is entering its final phase, with scientists aiming to prove that their concept really works.

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Lawrenceville Plasma Physics claim to be close to cracking the 'holy grail' of energy generation with their Focus Fusion project (illustration shown). They have already successfully heated fusion fuel 200 times hotter than the centre of the sun, and now plan to increase the density with sufficient funding

The project is being run by Lawrenceville Plasma Physics (LPP) by chief scientist Eric Lerner.



They are currently running a fundraiser on Indiegogo to seek money for what they claims is the last step in their research.



HOW FOCUS FUSION WORKS

At the heart of the dense plasma focus are two cylindrical electrodes only a few inches across nested inside each other.

The electrodes are enclosed in a vacuum chamber, with a low pressure gas filling the space between them.

A pulse of electricity from a capacitor bank and energy storage device is discharged across the electrodes.

For a few millionths of a second an intense current flows from the outer to the inner electrodes and ionises the gas.

Instabilities first compress the plasma into dense filaments.

These filaments are whirlwinds of current.

The sheath of filaments merges together in a dense pinch or focus, combining all the filaments into one.

This filament kicks and twists itself into a tiny dense ball, only a few thousands of an inch across called a plasmoid.

Instability in the plasmoid creates powerful beams in opposite directions.

Positively charged nuclei stream in one direction, and electrons in the other.

Rapid compression heats the trapped plasma to billions of degrees, hot enough to fuse nuclei together to release fusion energy.

They have passed two of their goals to proving their method of fusion power is successful, with a third apparently within reach.



In a March 2012 paper the team successfully heated fusion fuel up to 1.8 billion degrees – too times hotter than the centre of the sun.



This was confined within a tiny plasmoid for 10 billionths of a second, a short amount of time but enough to achieve this goal.



Their next step is to increase the density of the fuel 10,000-fold, which they plan to do in the next 18 months.



‘Our team fully supports using today's existing renewable energy technologies like wind and solar, but it is clear we need even greener, more affordable energy solutions,’ the company says on Indiegogo.



‘Some 20 per centof the global population is without electricity, while almost half of the world lives on less than $2.50 [£1.50] per day.



‘The International Energy Agency forecasts that 1.2 billion people will remain without electricity. ‘



They say their system would not only stop climate change by lowering the emission of greenhouse gases, but it would also provide nuclear power without nuclear waste.



Current nuclear plants, they say, are based around nuclear fission, which produces as a waste product long-lived radioactive waste.



Fusion energy, meanwhile, is comparatively ‘clean’.



But, as LPP says, governments around the world ‘have spent billions of dollars on fusion with little to no success.’

LPP Fusion claim that theres there innovation will provider cheaper and cleaner energy for all, doing away with nuclear waste (nuclear plant pictured) and other pollutants that contribute to climate change and cause other problems. They also say their system could allow for smaller power stations that are decentralised

So what makes them think they’ll be successful?



‘First, we’re using the natural instabilities of plasmas to concentrate the energy,’ they write.



‘We’re using the same processes, like the pinch effect, that occur in solar flares and other astronomical phenomena, but scaling them down to laboratory size.



‘The government-sponsored programmes have been fighting these instabilities. So they have taken a far more difficult route.



‘Ours is much easier since we are using natural processes, not fighting them.



‘Second, it doesn’t always take billions to get earth-shaking inventions.



‘The first airplane cost $30,000 [£17,900] in today’s dollars, and the first transistor was built by a team of three who only spent two years working on it.



In March 2012 the team published their first research in the journal Physics of Plasma.



At the time the group came under some criticism for the paper, notably from Mike Hopkins, the CEO of Impedans, a manufacturer of plasma diagnostic equipment.



‘I am not expecting to see fusion energy from Lawrenceville Plasma Physics, New Jersey, despite the fanfare,’ he wrote on his website.



LPP, however, are confident their method will work, or at the very least provide useful research into fusion reactions.