At the end of 2021, China’s artificial sun broke global energy records producing 120 million Fahrenheit Plasma. This breakthrough in artificial energy is substantial for nuclear fusion and Earth's growing need for sustainable power.
The artificial sun operating in China’s fusion facility, the Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST), is named aptly to mimic fusion processes that occur within stars. The end goal of duplicating this form of energy is to bring clean and sustainable energy into homes and cities. In a world where fusion power functions on Earth, many current environmental issues surrounding energy and power would be obsolete. Fusion power would supply safe, sustainable, environmentally responsible, and abundant energy.
Fusion power would be an alternative to fission nuclear power. The main difference between fusion and fission are that the processes use opposite processes to generate power. In nuclear power plants using fission, atoms of heavy elements split apart, while fusion pushes atoms of light elements together to create heavier atoms for energy production. Fusion is also cleaner than fission because there is no radioactive waste generated. Instead, fusion generates helium and uses fuel that is lighter in composition. Fission plants tend to use more expensive fuel with more dangerous elements such as uranium and plutonium. Scientists predict that fuel for fusion can be sourced in substantial amounts from seawater. Experts say one liter of seawater could supply enough raw material to produce the same amount of energy that three hundred liters of oil could produce through combustion.
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