A new fusion record.

[Oliver90owner]

The Chinese seem to be taking strides in the development of a possible working system

[Stinsy]

I've been miserable about fusion for at least a decade.

If they spent a small proportion of the money invested in fusion research into tried-and-tested wind/solar/storage then we'd be there by now.

I saw something saying the US was spending $400 million a year on fusion research. That is a lot of solar/wind they could be installing instead!

[Mr Gus]

You meant "squandering" 400 million, a slip of the typewriter tongue I think Stinsy.

[Paul_F]

If they spent a small proportion of the money invested in fusion research into tried-and-tested wind/solar/storage then we'd be there by now.
I saw something saying the US was spending $400 million a year on fusion research. That is a lot of solar/wind they could be installing instead!

Sounds way too high. JET (a much bigger machine than anything the US has) is approx £50 million/year. If you include NIF you might get there, but that's explicitly about supporting their nuclear weapons stockpile with a few side-projects on fusion energy. By comparison the three Dogger Bank wind farms (first ones I checked) are £9 billion - about half the build cost of ITER, which is a joint venture between just about every advanced country out there. In the grand scheme of things fusion funding is naff all.

[Oliver90owner]

We cannot avoid trying to develop this process. It may be the saving of the planet for the next few centuries, even millennia.

I fear there is insufficient cooperation between different parties. Understandable from a commercial viewpoint, I suppose, but this is a huge challenge and should be at the top of humanities priorities.

Renewables are great. It would be good if it was a universal cure for energy use by humans. I don’t follow fusion progress closely, but we must be closer to the solution - if it is possible - even if it is still “30 years in the future”.

[Stinsy]

Fusion has been a decade away for at least the last 3 decades.