In the latest test, the WEST Tokamak held its reaction for 1,337 seconds.
They could have gone a few seconds longer but decided to stop it there.
this post was submitted on 19 Feb 2025
180 points (99.5% liked)
World News
644 readers
891 users here now
Rules:
- Be a decent person
- No spam
- Add the byline, or write a line or two in the body about the article.
Other communities of interest:
founded 4 months ago
MODERATORS
Them 1337 ~~gamers~~ scientists.
France really ~~becoming~~ returning to it's position as an international leader in so many different ways.
Has been for centuries. There’s dozens upon dozens of “treaties of Paris”
True, I guess I just meant in the face of fading US post-WWII dominance.
Going for the cultural victory late in the game.
Meanwhile Russia going for that lategame domination victory after having a tough dark age where a bunch of cities declared independence.
It amuses me that the two longest-running tokamaks are now EAST in China and WEST in Europe
It’d be way funnier if the China one was named WEST and the European one was EAST
Holy fuck that's pretty fucking good.
According to CEA, the next step will be to create even longer reactions that could amount to a combined time of several hours, with the temperature growing increasingly hotter.
Is it too hot to hold though? I am interested in the power of the sun in the palm of my hand.
is your hand a magnetic containment field per chance?
I'll check and get back with you.
It's been two hours. He ded.
Rip, YamahaRevStar
You can do it once.
TAIYOHHHH
This is actually pretty huge right? I know for the longest time there was always the joke of '5 more years and we will have fusion' but this is measurable progress right?
Yeah the fusion train has been picking up speed. Might be 2.5 years until Fusion now.
Not me being baffled by "The tricky bit isn't to get atoms to fuse. That's a fairly simple lab bench experiment." before remembering that we did that in high school.
When will they be able to start ITER though?
Even assuming no delays, that's about ten years off.
All I want to know is when I can finally buy a Mr. Fusion for my car.
France baise ouais!
The tricky bit isn't to get atoms to fuse. That's a fairly simple lab bench experiment. The problem is creating the right conditions where the fusion reaction is self-sustaining, with a net energy output. That means reaching temperatures of between 100 – 150 million °C (180 – 270 million °F), a pressure of five to 10 atmospheres at the point of reaction, and keeping a high-energy plasma stable for at least 10 seconds.
Nowhere in the article is said that they actually achieved these temperatures. This is poor journalism at its worst
The CEA seems to have done considerably better than 10 seconds and gone 25% beyond what China achieved in January 2025 with 1,066 seconds. In the latest test, the WEST Tokamak held its reaction for 1,337 seconds.
It's the very next paragraph... not to mention the very FIRST paragraph...
France has upped the ante in the quest for fusion power by maintaining a plasma reaction for over 22 minutes
What more do you want?
edit: The article talks about a sustained plasma reaction, not a fusion reaction. I agree that this could have been made clearer. Even in quoting it, I missed that
There is an influx of "this isn't the final result, therefore it's irrelevant" shit going on here and I don't like it. Across subjects. People would seemingly prefer radio silence over any information at all...it's astounding to me.
"Don't report on it until you have a commercially viable fusion reactor, this is just filler" filler these nuts nerd, I want to read about fusion reaction advancements.
I think they're trying to say that this reactor sustained a plasma reaction, but not a fusion one. By describing fusion and then talking about this successful test without outlining the difference, it makes the test seem more successful than it was.
Thanks, you're right. I missed that.
The CEA seems to have done considerably better than 10 seconds
Dude, did you even read my post? I'm talking about temperature, not time
The temperature, and pressure are the conditions for a self sustaining fusion reaction. The fact that they maintained a fusion reaction for ANY length of time would imply that, yes, they reached those temperatures and pressures...
Your argument is essentially that the article is talking about how long they ran a steam engine, but that it doesn't say that achieved water boiling temperatures.
edit: @[email protected] has done a better job of explaining your issue. I missed that the article talks about a sustained plasma reaction, not a fusion reaction, which is subtle enough that I think I can be forgiven for missing your point. Especially since, at the end of the day, I'm just a layman.
Having a look at the source article here shows that you're correct, it was only 50 million celcius.
I've actually changed my mind, and I agree with you that that is misleading and the article author could have done a better job at making clear that, while this is still an impressive milestone, no fusion reaction took place.
Lol what's your problem? Do you think the article is making claims about temperatures reached? Don't insult others' reading skills when you're not using your own.