existing test ban treaties. It would be possible with successful nuclear fusion results to test weapons without an actual above or below ground explosion due to the nature of the science. The question is raised whether that would be a violation of the nuclear test ban treaties. Also, the potential power of these weapons is mind-boggling -- perhaps 100x existing nuclear weapons. They make the atomic and hydrogen bombs look like firecrackers in comparison.
The mere thought of pure fusion weapons has given pause for thought, and the development of even minor successes in this field cause lessons to be learned about the future control and management of fusion devices.
Present
Most importantly, the fifty years of research into nuclear fusion have brought the world to the point of learning enough lessons to build the latest major fusion project: agreement in 2006 to build the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) in France by a consortium of nations including the U.S., EU, India, Japan, China, Russia and South Korea. This design is a "tokamak" facility, or capable of creating magnetic confinement fusion.
Three other tokamak facilities have been built and are operating in Japan, the UK, and in New Jersey (Nuttall, 2008, p. 6).
What have we learned from the research conducted at these facilities since the early 1980s?
From the Institute of Physics Report:
"Together these three machines have demonstrated the scientific fundamentals of fusion power production. For instance, researchers at JT-60 demonstrated that even once the initial driving transformer sweep has ended, it should be possible to continue to operate the tokamak by means of an external current drive -- an important step towards continuous electricity generation" (Nuttall, 2008, p. 6).
In addition a much deeper understanding of the diffusion of plasmas in tokamak fields has been achieved after years of studying plasma confinement by trial and error. Bootstrap currents which allow continuous electrical generation were not recognized...
And, in 1997, JET (UK) produced electrical energy equivalent to 64% of the amount being introduced into the plasma -- a significant number (Nuttall, 2008, p. 6).
The ITER facility is being developed to take the next step: produce short-term electrical power in the range of 500MW for pulses of about 400 seconds. It is not, as originally thought, being designed to achieve ignition, but the 500MW is similar to a modern-day power plant in its capacity.
Though the original intentions for this facility have been scaled back and it is not intended to ever be a full power-generating plant for continuous electricity, it has been a long, "successfully failed" journey since the 1950s. All the lessons learned from the previous research and failures, some of which we have attempted to outline here, have led to the real possibility of nuclear fusion as an energy source during the first half of the 21st century -- a possibility not even dreamed about not so long ago.
Bibliography
Brooks, M. (2009). 13 things that don't make sense: The most baffling scientific mysteries of our time. New York: Random House.
Buhl, G. (2005, November 8). Nuclear fusion. Retrieved November 12, 2009, from georgebuhl.com: http://www.georgebuhl.com/Assets/PDFs/Fusion.pdf
Doyle, J. (2009, April 1). Scientists take another stab at nuclear fusion. Retrieved November 11, 2009, from San Francisco Chronicle: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/03/31/MN7M16QB7I.DTL
Kahney, L. (1999, December 12). A century of spectacular failure. Retrieved November 12, 2009, from wired.com: http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/1999/12/32916
McCracken, G., & Stott, P. (2005). Fusion: The energy of the universe. New York: Academic Press.
Nuttall, W. (2008, September). Fusion as an energy source: Challenges and opportunities. Retrieved November 12, 2009, from European fusion development agreement: Institute of physics report: http://www.jet.efda.org/documents/brochures/Fusion-as-energysource.pdf
