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One hour of sunlight is enough to power the Earth for a whole year. Why is sunlight so powerful? Because it results from a reaction called nuclear fusion.
This process, which has the potential to generate eternal energy, is considered the holy grail of the energy industry and many of the brightest minds in the world are committed to trying to develop it . [19659003] In an interview with the BBC in late 2016, the famous British physicist Stephen Hawking, who died last March, said the technology to generate nuclear fusion was the most promising for humanity.
"I would like to see the development of fusion energy" he replied, consulted on the idea that could most transform our society.
"Nuclear fusion would be a source of practical energy that would give us an inexhaustible amount of energy, without polluting or generating global warming," he said.
Unlike traditional nuclear energy, which is generated by the separation of atoms – a process known as fission – this new energy source is created by fusion – this is- to say the union – atoms.
Specifically, the fusion of hydrogen to produce helium, a reaction that releases enormous amounts of energy, like what happens in the Sun.
The idea is essentially to create "microsoles" on Earth .
The race to reach the Holy Grail
Today, more than 25 private companies are dedicated to this goal, many of them funded by some of the most successful entrepreneurs. known from the planet, such as Bill Gates (Microsoft), Jeff Bezos (Amazon) and Peter Thiel (PayPal).
The first private project was Tri-Alpha Energy (or TAE Technologies), based in California (United States) and existing for two decades. ] One of his most famous investors is the co-founder of Microsoft, Paul Allen, who died last October
The Commonwealth Fusion Systems, a start-up founded by six professors of the prestigious Mbadachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) , weighs heavily in the sector. ).
Although created only a year ago, it is considered one of the most ambitious projects as it aims to create a prototype reactor by 2025.
Gates and Bezos are two Of those who finance this venture, with other entrepreneurs like Richard Branson and Michael Bloomberg
In addition, some oil companies are starting to bet on a future without fossil fuels . According to the Bloomberg agency, the Italian Eni SpA led a group that had invested 50 million US dollars in Commonwealth Fusion Systems in March
. An international effort
But some experts believe that the project that has the best chance of progressing is not the private sector.
This is the so-called international thermonuclear experimental reactor (ITER, for its acronym in English) built in Cadarache, in the south of France, with a budget of 23 000 million dollars .
35 countries are collaborating in this scientific experiment, which began more than three decades ago.
ITER officials estimate that a large reactor will be ready by 2050.
Several countries are also developing their own initiatives. Last April, the BBC was able to access the facilities of Anhui Province in China, where scientists from that country claim to be more advanced than their peers in the United States, in the United States. European Union (EU), Japan, South Korea and Brazil
The problem
But all these projects face the same problem, which is not interesting to know how to achieve nuclear fusion.
The big challenge is generating more. energy spent during the process .
The fusion is based on the heating of materials at very high temperatures, exceeding hundreds of millions of degrees. In this state, the material is called plasma.
Unlike the Sun, the Earth does not have the conditions to keep this plasma warm. To do this, the plasma must be isolated from other materials. For this we use special ring-shaped cameras called tokamak
The Tokamak uses powerful magnets to create a magnetic field that keeps the plasma isolated. The problem is that today, these cameras consume more energy than they manage to produce.
Companies such as Commonwealth Fusion Systems offer solutions such as the following. use of better magnets, but the truth is that no one has managed to overcome this big obstacle.
Elon Musk, the creator of Tesla, believes that it would be necessary to invest in creating better solar panels and batteries to capture the energy of the Sun instead of wasting money to replicate our star.
However, investor IP Group Plc told the Bloomerg agency that although the development of fusion energy takes longer than desired, many of the innovations created for this sector prove very lucrative .
"Research companies are patenting a large number of their creations, from software simulating the combustion of plasma to 150 million degrees c new type of magnet with medical applications," Bloomberg said.
In the meantime, we will have to wait to see if Professor Hawking's desire for clean, unlimited energy can be realized.
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