Yesterday’s letter to New Scientist: their feature last week on nuclear fusion prospects seemed unpleasantly like an “advertorial”.
Before researching further, let us ask: Do we want to live in a fusion-powered society?
Granted, fusion is better than fission: no horrendously toxic waste. Nor any bomb material, thus no need for parallel investment in anti-terrorist monitoring & control of the populace, nor in worldwide espionage.
But fusion will, like fission, always profligately consume engineering skill and capital investment. Thus the problem of any monoculture: all our eggs in one basket. So, if our fusion plant design throws up an unexpected generic problem, what to do…? Shut down the grid, or keep going with fingers crossed?
Another problem with mega-scale monolithic generators is all too apparent from Hinkley C contracts and subsequent negotiations: to protect their investment, the owners will insist on control and manipulation of power market structures to ensure long-term profitability: fusion generators would become nuclear cuckoos, just as fission plants already are.
According to Abigail Beall, “Wind, solar and tidal energy provide some relief, but they are limited and unpredictable”. Well, never mind commercial fusion being 30 years away – that dismissal of renewables is 30 years out of date!
Wind and solar work at all scales, on and off grid: they offer autonomy and, through social ownership, everyone shares the benefits. They are already the cheapest electricity sources, meanwhile improvements in efficiency and economies of scale are regularly reported. Wind and solar are compatible with energy storage systems of all types; furthermore tidal schemes can incorporate storage. And all electricity-generating renewables are compatible with hydrogen production.
When hyper-rich autocrats want to invest in fusion, what more warning do we need?