@Mark-qi2jw

7 months ago

Congratulations for the very informative interview, and for the English subtitles. In fact, I would suggest to hold the interviews in English (with Italian subtitles) to have a wider audience! (also a small mistake, it is not ''perch'', it is ''purge'' at ca 14:37) The interview confirms that, in fact, tritium production remains a big question mark for the development of fusion as a source of energy. There is no proof that it will be possible to make available at least one T atom for every T atom ''fused''. It may be objected that ITER will provide the answer... but, in fact, NO, it won't...as the expert told us, ITER will not have enough fluence to fully test the breeding. ITER will just provide some, important, pieces of info. Unfortunately, those tests on ITER will take place in... well, nobody really knows when... ITER is extremely late compared to plans and, worryingly, there is no schedule... My guess that Tritium will be used in ITER before 2045-2050 (if it will ever be used, that is). And the results are of course to be seen. Another big issue, omitted in the interview, is that there may not even be enough Triitium to develop the breeding of Tritium... ITER, as correctly reported in the interview, will just consume Tritium.. and DEMO will start before Tritium breeding technologies are established. So, for a few years at least, DEMO will also consume Tritium for breeding tests and developments (as some other experiments around the World may also need T). Unfortunately, projections on Tritium availabiliy forecast a depletion of the Tritium reserves over the next decades, made even worse by the massive delay in the ITER programme. Altogether, kudos to the authors of the interview and to the expert! Another myth of Nuclear Fusion (that the fuel is widely and easily availble in massive quantities) has been dispelled...

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