For the first time in history, US scientists at the National Ignition Facility at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California have successfully created a nuclear fusion reaction that produces more energy than is consumed.
“You can’t overestimate the result sufficiently,” says von der Linden. At best, it is comparable “to the taming of fire 700,000 years ago,” he adds, but admits: “There are still technical hurdles to using nuclear fusion efficiently on a large scale.”
The discovery is so spectacular because in a few years, nuclear fusion could be used to generate large quantities of green electricity in a climate-neutral and safe manner.
Matthes and von der Linden also discuss how the breakthrough is already having an impact in the USA, what potential it has for the German market – and why Europe is not open to technology. “Based on this result, the Americans will invest heavily in laser fusion,” says von der Linden. A total of four billion dollars flowed into the merger in the past year in the USA. “In the whole EU, I don’t think there were even 40 million.”
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More: The previous episode of Handelsblatt Disrupt can be found here.