Fusion – China’s ‘Artificial Sun’ Explained

fusionnuclear-engineering

So I heard in the radio today about China's "Artificial sun". There is this hype about it having 5x the temperature of the core of the sun.

It is, as I suspected, a fusion reactor. I admit I do not remember figures by heart, but I recall that in our fusion reactors we typically achieve more temperature but less pressure than the sun itself. At any rate, the challenge is to draw the energy back to energy, and not as much to create these conditions.

So, my question is:

Is that title "Artificial Sun" just marketing, or something that stems from the Chinese language, or does this reactor really have some vast difference than other experimental fusion reactors?

Best Answer

I think you are asking about EAST, the Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak. You are correct, other experimental fusion reactors have achieved similar temperatures, and the pressures that can be achieved by the National ignition Facility (which uses an inertial confinement process) are much higher. However, the record that was set by EAST in December 2021 was for the duration of the stable plasma pulse that it achieved, which was over 1,000 seconds. The previous duration record, set by the France's Tore Supra reactor in 2018, was 390 seconds.

Being able to maintain a stable plasma for long periods is one of the key requirements for developing a tokamak fusion reactor that can output more power than it consumes.