The nuclear fusion reactor, also known as the thermonuclear reaction, is being developed commercially by Tokamak Energy.
Unlike conventional nuclear fission reactors, which release energy through the splitting of uranium atoms, thermonuclear power plants never melt down. The fusion reactor is based on the reaction of fusing two hydrogen atoms into helium, releasing enormous amounts of energy, and only cools down when a malfunction occurs. Furthermore, the fuel for this reactor does not produce emissions and is cost-effective since the raw material, hydrogen, can be extracted from seawater.
Tokamak Energy’s ST 40 reactor. (Photo: Power Technology).
The portable small version of the reactor can provide energy for aircraft and container ships, significantly reducing CO2 emissions. The heat generated from the fusion reactor can be harnessed through a device invented by researchers at the UK Atomic Energy Authority in Oxfordshire, called a heat exchanger. This heat source will be used to heat water vapor to turn turbines, generating electricity to power propulsion engines.
According to Dr. David Kingham, co-founder and vice president of Tokamak Energy, in the coming weeks, the ST 40 reactor in the industrial park in the Thames Valley near Didcot will surpass a significant milestone when the plasma reaches a temperature of 100 million degrees Celsius, which is six times hotter than the core of the Sun (around 15 million degrees Celsius). He emphasized that the company is on track to deliver the world’s first commercial thermonuclear power plant by the end of the 2030s. Many plants will be opened worldwide with equipment produced in the UK, each machine having a stable output of 150 MW, sufficient to meet the electricity demand for a city of 150,000 people, such as nearby Oxford.
The Didcot plant has attracted $207.6 million from private investors along with $13.8 million in funding from the government. Currently, the plant employs 165 people, including leading scientists from the UK and around the world. This number is expected to double by the end of next year when the company opens additional laboratories and workshops.
Other reactors use electromagnets to maintain the plasma flow. They are made from superconducting materials, which do not resist electric current when cooled to near absolute zero at -273 degrees Celsius. However, maintaining such low temperatures requires enormous energy, enough to consume a large portion of the reactor’s power. To address this issue, Tokamak Energy has developed and patented high-temperature superconductors that consume only one-tenth of the energy, using rare earth compound barium copper oxide.
The company’s second innovation lies in the apple-core shape of the reactor. Previous designs were ring-shaped. This change makes the company’s design significantly more efficient. Combining high-temperature superconductors with a spherical reactor provides a substantial advantage, making this type of energy much cheaper, according to Kingham.
Several other private competitors of Tokamak Energy are also rapidly developing commercial thermonuclear energy, including Lockheed Martin in the United States and billionaire Jeff Bezos, who recently announced plans to build his own plant in Oxfordshire. Additionally, the international ITER project, a test reactor being constructed through collaboration among 35 countries, is located in southern France and began construction in 2007, with operations expected by the end of the 2020s. ITER is the size of 60 football fields, while Tokamak Energy’s reactor model is only the size of an average house.
