The NRC has been monitoring the developments in fusion energy systems for several years. NRC’s First Steps Toward Regulating Fusion Energy These particles can also be used to produce heat to generate electricity. When the nuclei fuse, they produce high-energy particles that are used in other nuclear reactions within the system to heat and maintain the plasma or to breed tritium from lithium. Three confinement strategies are being pursued for commercial fusion energy systems: (1) magnetic confinement, (2) inertial confinement, and (3) magneto-inertial confinement. The plasma, which is so hot that the electrons are stripped from the atoms forming an ionized gas, must be confined to allow the nuclei to fuse. To produce fusion energy, hydrogen-typically in the form of deuterium or tritium-is heated into a plasma. This is why the recent announcement on energy breakeven was heralded as a breakthrough in the work to make fusion power a useable energy source. Unfortunately, it also takes vast amounts of energy to get hydrogen atoms to fuse, so attempts at fusion have required more energy to start the reaction than the reaction would produce. But unlike fission, the fusion reaction produces far fewer radioactive byproducts. The fusion reaction also releases tremendous amounts of energy. This is the process that powers the stars, including the sun. Nuclear fusion, on the other hand, involves fusing light elements such as hydrogen together to make a heavier element such as helium. But nuclear fission also generates radioactive fission products (the elements produced when uranium splits) along with small amounts of elements heavier than uranium (e.g., plutonium), which are also radioactive. Nuclear fission releases large amounts of energy. When a uranium-235 atom is struck by a neutron, it splits into smaller atoms and releases additional neutrons to fuel a nuclear chain reaction. Fusion Energy OverviewĮvery nuclear power plant in operation today harnesses the power of nuclear fission-the splitting of heavy atoms such as uranium-235. What is certain is that work on developing fusion energy systems will continue. Until the other four commissioners vote, however, the regulatory path for fusion energy systems remains uncertain. Under Commissioner Caputo’s approach, the NRC would conduct a “limited-scope rulemaking” to regulate fusion energy systems under the NRC’s byproduct material regulatory framework. Based on input from stakeholders and reviews of fusion technologies, in January 2023 the NRC staff submitted to the Commission three proposals for regulating fusion energy systems.Īlready, Commissioner Annie Caputo has expressed her views and approved a modified version of one of the three regulatory options. Over the last two years, the NRC staff has been working to assess the risks from different fusion technologies and the possible approaches to regulating them. In 2019, Congress directed the NRC to develop a regulatory framework for advanced reactors, including fusion reactors. The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has been monitoring fusion energy developments for several years. This scientific breakthrough-the first time that a fusion reaction produced more energy than was used to start the reaction-means that we are one step closer to being able to harness the power of the stars to generate carbon-free electricity with far less radioactive waste than nuclear fission. The scientific community is abuzz about a recent announcement that Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory scientists achieved the first energy breakeven from a fusion reaction.
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