China’s ‘artificial sun’ project to harness nuclear fusion energy
By Chen
Xi
China’s “artificial
sun” will achieve nuclear fusion by the middle of this century, one of the
project leaders said on April 24.
HL-2M
Tokamak, the modified Chinese-designed “artificial sun” and a device to harness
energy from fusion, will be completed this year. It is expected to increase the
electricity intensity from one mega amperes to three mega amperes, an important
step to achieve nuclear fusion, a spokesperson surnamed Liu with the press
office of the Southwestern Institute of Physics (SWIP), affiliated with China
National Nuclear Corporation, told the Global
Times. An ampere is a standard measurement of electric current.
For
instance, the deuterium (also known as heavy hydrogen) extracted from one liter
of seawater releases the energy equivalent of burning 300 liters of gasoline in
a complete fusion reaction, Liu said.
The “artificial
sun” aims to release nuclear fusion in the same way as the sun by using
deuterium and tritium (radioactive hydrogen-3), and finally generate
electricity. It is clean energy that will not generate waste, which makes it
ideal for people to use in the future, Liu said.
The
shape of the current “artificial sun” looks like one of the imagined “planetary
engines” in Chinese sci-fi blockbuster The Wandering Earth, and its core device
is a red rectangle, The Beijing News
reported on Wednesday, April 24, saying this was the first time that the
picture of an “artificial sun” had been published.
Conditions
inside the nuclear fusion device are displayed on a large screen in the central
control hall. The screen showed an image that looks like a letter “S” next to
two connected dots with reddish light.
Xu said
the temperature of the device can be estimated to go higher if the brightness
of the items in the image becomes weaker, according to a video by The Beijing News.
Source:Global Times
People visit the model of
artificial sun in Hefei, capital of East China’s Anhui Province in October 2006.
Through the model, they can know how the machine generates electricity. (Photo from
Global Times)
China’s ‘artificial sun’ project to harness nuclear fusion energy
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