FUSION

Hydrogen fusion

What would you think if you came across the following statement:

“The amount of lithium in a laptop battery combined with the quantity of water necessary to half-fill a bath would give sufficient combustión to fullfill the average needs of a european citizen for thirty years”.

Dear people, this is science and the miracle that stands behind this approach is the phenomenon known as hydrogen fussion.

Although scientists were not familiar with this process until the early 20s, fussion occurs since the existence of stars.

Sun radiates light and heat and both of them are due to hydrogen fussion in the core of the Sun. Summed up, hydrogen nuclei collide and fuse into heavier Helium atoms and release energy in the process. This release is due to the fact that there is a loss of mass and the amount of energy gained is proportional to this loss according to Einstein’s well-known equation E=mc²; what this means is that the mass is not the exact sum of the two initial atoms’ masses and this is the reason why there is such a release.

So, why don’t we build an engine to carry off this reaction?

Well, if anyone comes up with the way to work with temperatures that reach 15,000,000° Celsius please do not hesitate and just let me know.

Obviously, we cannot work as we may have a tiny Sun; however, there is the possibility to reproduce an efficient hydrogen fusion that occurs between two Hydrogen (H) isotopes Deuterium (D) and Tritium (T).

There is no need of such extreme conditions (temperature and pressure) to make atoms overcome the natural electrostatic repulsion between the positive charges and merge. Heat makes electrons get separated from nuclei and a gas becomes plasma. And plasma provides the appropriate environment for fusion and the release of energy.

This process is held experimentally in reactors that use magnetic fields to confine plasma. There is one in the South of France called ‘totamak’ which is ITER’s device for fusion.