The ITER fusion reactor in France, the world’s largest fusion experiment, has reached a significant milestone with the delivery of all special magnets needed to build the reactor core. This marks the completion of a two-decade long design process that involved manufacturing components across three continents. As the world continues to seek more sustainable ways to generate carbon-free energy, fusion technology is offering a promising solution that can be controlled as needed.
Recent advancements in fusion research have shown the potential for extracting energy from fusion reactions. Over 30 countries are collaborating on the construction of ITER, which aims to demonstrate the feasibility of fusion power. The reactor’s design features a tokamak reactor that uses hydrogen to create plasma in a doughnut-shaped vacuum chamber, simulating the conditions at the core of the Sun. The plasma is heated to an extreme temperature of 150 million degrees Celsius to initiate fusion reactions.
To confine the plasma within the reactor and control its behavior, giant superconducting magnets are used. These magnets utilize niobium-tin and niobium-titanium as fuel, with an intricate cooling process to facilitate superconductivity. D-shaped magnets, horizontal surrounding magnets, and a central solenoid all work together to create and control the plasma currents within the tokamak.
The magnetic fields produced by these magnets are incredibly strong, with a total energy of 41 gigajoules, vastly surpassing Earth’s magnetic field strength. Once operational, ITER is expected to produce 500 MW of power, with 200 MW of continuous electricity feed into the grid, providing energy for approximately 200,000 homes.
