But all is not well for ITER. "To keep momentum, ITER needs the collective efforts and continued support from its members, laying the foundations for a new model of global scientific collaboration," said Kaname Ikeda, director-general of the ITER Organization, in a statement at the meeting.
The bad news comes from the United States which, "cannot live up to our commitments" to ITER, the Energy Department's Gene Nardella told an advisory committee earlier this month. Congress allocated only $20.5 million for the project, just enough for staffing, instead of a requested $214 million for 2009. A National Research Council panel in June warned, "The lack of funding stability will make it difficult for the U.S. to effectively participate in ITER, and ultimately, to access and thus benefit from the valuable scientific and technical knowledge to be gained from the facility."
It seems sad in a way, that the United States will not be able to live up to its commitment to the ITER facility.
The way I see it, enormous quantities of money should be pumped into controlled fusion power.
Fusion fuels have a mass specific energy density for fusion reactions, such as the proton proton reaction sequence that powers the Sun of about 0.7 percent or 1/140 of that of the pure energy equivalence of matter. One kilogram of good fusion fuel could provide the same energy as about 175,000 tons of TNT. This is actually equivalent to one gram of such fusion fuel providing the same energy release as 175 tons of TNT or about 45 tons of gasoline, desiel, or heating oil.
The ramifications of harnessing nuclear fusion for controlled energy release and power generation are astounding. Every thing from electrical power generation, to large, clean, nuclear fusion powered ocean going ships, to space transportation systems such as fusion rocket powered manned space craft can benefit.
Nuclear fusion is truly a cosmic energy source, the energy source that powers all stars during the fusion burning cycles of their lifetimes. It is believed that the era of natural star formation will last another 100 trillion years or so, which is about 10,000 times the age of the universe, and thus fusion fuel will in theory be available for at least that long.
Given that nuclear fusion is a truly cosmic energy source, should we not, and can we not afford to make the best of this resource?