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Environmental Implications of the Use of Fusion Power

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 August 2009

John P. Holdren
John P. Holdren
Affiliation:
Professor of Energy and Resources, Rm 100 Bldg T-4, University of California, Berkeley California 94720; Faculty Consultant, Magnetic Fusion Energy Division, Lawrence Livermore Laboratory; Faculty Scientist, Energy and Environment Division, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, Berkeley, California 94720, U.S.A.
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Extract

Long-term limits to growth in energy-use will be imposed not by inability to expand supply but by the rising environmental and social costs of doing so. These costs will therefore be central issues in choosing long-term energy options. Energy from nuclear fusion, like solar energy, is not one technology but many. Some of the fusion possibilities seem likely to have very attractive environmental characteristics; others may be little better in these regards than nuclear fission.

Issues in fusion-reactor design that are crucial from the environmental standpoint include: size of tritium inventory and pathways for its release; nature and configuration of materials that are subject to neutron activation; forms and quantities of the stored energy that are internal to the reactor, and the nature of potential links between fusion technology and nuclear weaponry.

Type
Main Papers
Information
Environmental Conservation , Volume 7 , Issue 4 , Winter 1980 , pp. 289 - 294
Copyright
Copyright © Foundation for Environmental Conservation 1980

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References

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