Forum: English : General

on Fri 25 of Dec., 2009 23:18 CET, by admin posts: 236 5 stars

Here is physicist Steven Cowley, talking about fusion at TED-talks. He estimates that fusion power plants will be available some time in the 2030s.

on Sat 26 of Dec., 2009 21:59 CET, by admin posts: 236 5 stars

I got some feed back that this video will not start. It is embedded from YouTube?. Seems like there is a problem with this video on YouTube?. They will probably fix it eventually, but meanwhile you can also see the video at http://www.ted.com/talks/steven_cowley_fusion_is_energy_s_future.html (external link)

on Fri 08 of Jan., 2010 22:59 CET, by david.williams

posts: 136 4 stars

> I got some feed back that this video will not start. It is embedded from YouTube?. Seems like there is a problem with this video on YouTube?. They will probably fix it eventually, but meanwhile you can also see the video at http://www.ted.com/talks/steven_cowley_fusion_is_energy_s_future.html (external link)

Back in the 1950s, when I was at school in England, an experiment called ZETA was done at the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Establishment at Harwell, England. It was one of the first of the toroidal devices to produce plasma in which fusion might occur. ZETA produced evidence that fusion had been achieved! This led scientists to make confident predictions that fusion power would be a reality within 20 years from then. Later, it was found that mistakes had been made in interpreting the ZETA results, and fusion had not occurred. Nevertheless, it was still predicted that fusion power would be available within 25 years or so.

Here we are, more than 50 years later, and people are still predicting that fusion power will be a reality about 25 years from now. It's like the end of a rainbow. The more you move toward it, the more it moves away. Maybe, eventually, we will catch up with it, but I'm not holding my breath...

David