China is one step closer to generating electricity through nuclear fusion.

A massive vacuum vessel—a Dewar flask—was installed for the BEST experimental compact reactor, located in Hefei, China. Its diameter is 18 meters and its mass exceeds 400 tons. The vessel is considered the heaviest component of the BEST fusion facility.

This was reported by the Chinese news agency Xinhua.

The device was installed in the reactor's main chamber. The installation error is less than one millimeter.

This structure, located at the bottom, will support other equipment weighing approximately 6,7 tons. Successful and precise installation of the Dewar vessel will pave the way for the assembly and commissioning of other fusion reactor components.

Once commissioned, BEST can be used for experimental research in the field of burning plasma physics.

This means China is now one step closer to generating electricity through nuclear fusion. If successful, Chinese specialists will become pioneers in this field, as no one else in the world currently produces electricity this way. Similar nuclear fusion reactions occur in the sun. Nuclear fusion is sometimes called a universal energy source.

Final assembly of BEST began in May. Chinese engineers plan to generate electricity using nuclear fusion for the first time in 2027, and three years later, they intend to supply the first consumers.

Comments

[Ross xnumx]

Chinese engineers are planning to generate electricity using nuclear fusion for the first time in 2027, and three years later they intend to provide its first consumers.

We have no time to waste time on this nonsense - Putin's elections are in Russia in 2030...

[AAK]

In the 60s and 70s, both the regular and popular science press of the USSR were constantly publishing articles about how all sorts of "tokamaks," "particle accelerators," "cyclotrons," and similar installations were being assembled in Dubna, Obninsk, Dolgoprudny, and other "science cities" to test the construction and operating principles of future thermonuclear reactors, which, sometime in the early 2000s, would be able to provide our country with an inexhaustible ocean of energy... but then the oil industry won and the scientific projects stalled... and now even the mattresses, the Gayropians, and the Chinese are following the path paved by Soviet scientists (and many scientists emigrated in the 90s from the USA to Iran and North Korea), but we are no longer on that path... thanks to the foresight of our leadership and the "patriotic bourgeoisie"...

[nik-mazur]

Quote: AAK

Then the oil industry won and the scientific projects died out... but now the mattresses, the Gayroptsians, and the Xinjiang are following the path laid out by Soviet scientists.

Oh, another one. A lot of things were in decline in the nineties. And not at all because "the oil industry won."
The Americans have been developing thermonuclear fusion technology independently since the 1950s. The Chinese, of course, are using other people's work, but, firstly, not only ours, and secondly, the current level is very different from what it was sixty years ago.

Quote: AAK

but we are no longer on this path

What's missing? Rosatom is working on a hybrid nuclear-fusion reactor project. Novosibirsk is working on an open-trap reactor. As for ITER, I don't know if our team is currently involved.

[stankow]

Yes, they're working. The fees, Russia's not small, are not being refused...

[nik-mazur]

Quote: stankow

Yes, they are working. The contributions to Russia are considerable.

Yes, indeed – we were kicked out of CERN, but our people remained at ITER. Presumably, this is also because our contributions are mostly in-kind, in the form of equipment that is essential.

[multi-category]

Quote: AAK

In the 60s and 70s, both the regular and popular science press of the USSR were constantly publishing articles about how all sorts of "tokamaks," "particle accelerators," "cyclotrons," and similar installations were being installed in Dubna, Obninsk, Dolgoprudny, and other "science cities," where they would work out the construction and operating principles of future thermonuclear reactors, which, somewhere around the early 2000s, would be able to provide our country with an inexhaustible ocean of energy.

Back in 1956, Lavrentiev (a physicist from Ukraine) presented the Academy of Sciences, including Sakharov and several other scientists, with scientific evidence that all of this simply didn't work. That the designs of "advanced" thermonuclear reactors were dead-end projects. They didn't believe him, his articles stopped being published, he became unwelcome in the offices of the Moscow Academy of Sciences. Then, by 72, numerous and expensive experiments confirmed all of Lavrentiev's calculations, and the thermonuclear program was shut down, based on the failures of these obviously dead-end projects, without even trying to consider other approaches. Meanwhile, Lavrentiev was building his reactor based on an electron trap, and even the first experiments showed some progress, but then the 90s declared, "Enough, kids, let's shut it down." And now the Chinese are practically repeating the same dead-end path with thermonuclear reactors that the USSR achieved in the 60s and 70s. Therefore, there is no talk of any real electric power.
Here is Lavrentyev's device, which made the reactor more stable, 1988.
https://tunnel.ru/media/images/2017-09/post/110135/elektromagnitnyie-lovushki-o.lavrenteva.jpg

[nik-mazur]

Quote: multicaat

back in 1956, Lavrentiev (a physicist from Ukraine)

Yeah, from Ukraine – born in Pskov, served on Sakhalin, studied at Moscow State University, after graduating he was assigned to Kharkiv Institute of Physics and Technology, right in 1956.
Everything else is at the same level.

[multi-category]

There were several Lavrentyevs, for example, another Lavrentyev built an academic town, a university, and the Siberian Academy of Sciences in Novosibirsk.
Are you sure you've guessed right? The one I'm talking about served in the army in '56 and sent a note that got him drafted to Moscow.

[nik-mazur]

Quote: multicaat

The one I'm talking about served in the army in 56 and sent a note that got him pulled out to Moscow.

The one you are talking about graduated from Moscow State University in 1956.
Sergeant Oleg Aleksandrovich Lavrentyev wrote a letter to Moscow in 1948 outlining his ideas for creating a hydrogen bomb using lithium deuteride and the principles of a controlled thermonuclear reaction. After demobilization in 1950, he entered Moscow State University. After graduating in 1956, he was sent to the Kharkiv Institute of Physics and Technology.
In other words, Lavrentyev presented no scientific justification for the dead-end nature of fusion reactors, no experiments took place in 1972, and the fusion program was not abandoned. The TOKAMAK T-3 was launched in 1968, followed by the TOKAMAK T-10 in 1975, which was the largest in the world at the time. Incidentally, the T-15 is currently operating at the Kurchatov Institute, where they are developing the hybrid principle.

[multi-category]

Quote from: nik-mazur

was launched

There is a huge difference between what was launched and the practical result.
None of the reactors were able to stabilize the plasma for a significant period of time.

[nik-mazur]

Quote: multicaat

There is a huge difference between what was launched and the practical result

You can argue about the results as much as you want, but no one shut down the thermonuclear program in 1972, contrary to what you wrote.

[multi-category]

Quote from: nik-mazur

However, no one shut down the thermonuclear program in 1972.

I have different information from the Institute of Nuclear Physics in the Novosibirsk Academic City. All their practical projects related to thermonuclear fusion were effectively closed in the 90s, or their funding was withdrawn indefinitely, and their facilities were mothballed, right after one of the Academy of Sciences meetings in 1972. The same applied to the Academy of Sciences' projects in Moscow. Only theory remained. The Koltsovo facilities were reoriented toward other tasks, with no practical use of thermonuclear fusion.

[nik-mazur]

Quote: multicaat

Projects related to thermonuclear fusion were effectively closed in the 90s... right after one of the Academy of Sciences meetings in 1972.

In the nineties... right after '72... However, they took a long time to wind down. Don't you see any simpler explanations for why projects and/or their funding were curtailed in the nineties?

[multi-category]

They weren't closed down in the 90s - I studied at that time and found out about that - but they were closed down earlier - after the decision of the Academy of Sciences in the 70s.
For a long time, efforts were made to keep the Lavrentyev installation operational, but eventually it, too, fell into disrepair. All that remains are numerous photographs from these programs.

[nik-mazur]

Quote: multicaat

after the decision of the Academy of Sciences in the 70s

You don't have a link to this solution, I take it?
There's also no explanation for why the T-10 tokamak was launched in 1975, just three years after the decision to shut it down. Incidentally, a modernized T-15 is currently operating at Kurchatov, hinting at the project's continued development after 1975.

[multi-category]

I read the link to this decision and the decision itself in a paper yearbook of the Siberian Academy of Sciences archived in the archives, not online. Contact the NSU library—they probably haven't thrown them out yet.

[nik-mazur]

Quote: multicaat

I read a link to this decision and the decision itself in the paper yearbook of the Siberian Academy of Sciences from the archives

OK, I'll take your word for it.
But the second question remains. Did Kurchatov just give up on this decision or what?

[multi-category]

Quote from: nik-mazur

Why was the T-10 tokamak launched in 1975, just three years after the decision to close it?

decision to stop funding new projects.
Apparently, funds had already been allocated for this project

[nik-mazur]

Quote: multicaat

Apparently, funds had already been allocated for this project

And the same for all other tokamaks, up to T-15?

[multi-category]

Oh, I've heard and read about it since I was in kindergarten in the late 70s! It was the subject of heated debate—not everyone was happy with its design, pushed through by a group of so-called "Westerners." They even made a film about it in Kyiv in... 1982!
Work on it began suddenly in the late 60s. It took a very long time to get it right, partly due to problems with protracted construction projects and partly due to the lengthy production and delivery of specialized equipment.
The launch date isn't exactly a benchmark for the development of fusion. And I'd like to point out that its launch wasn't part of the energy program; it was being developed for purely research purposes, and, as far as I remember, not without European investment.

[nik-mazur]

Quote: multicaat

its launch was no longer carried out within the framework of the energy program

So are we talking about an energy development program or about scientific work on thermonuclear fusion?

[multi-category]

Quote from: nik-mazur

So are we talking about an energy development program or about scientific work on thermonuclear fusion?

the goals are different.
The entire thermonuclear program in the USSR began with energy in mind. And the key parameters there were stability and the duration of reactor operation within the specified parameters.
For scientific purposes, short-term performance, perhaps even record-breaking, is sufficient. A completely different approach. That's the point: the T-15 and its modernization, ITER, and its Chinese copy—all of these are reactors incapable of generating sufficiently stable plasma. They're purely experimental. I spoke with those who participated in the first T-1 (1956) (Pioneer) and other projects. Many say the work was heavily influenced by news from the "West" and Kurchatov, who interned there. They essentially copied solutions that led everyone to a dead end.

In January 2025, China's EAST tokamak set a record by keeping plasma running for 1066 seconds—more than seventeen minutes.

However, I seriously doubt that the diverter was the only solution. I suspect a different type of trap was used.

[nik-mazur]

Quote: multicaat

the goals are different

This is exactly what I asked: what tasks and goals were discussed at the Academy in 1972 – national economic or scientific?

[multi-category]

And once that argument was dropped, funding sank to the level of laboratory work, which was also quite expensive.

[nik-mazur]

Quote: ROSS 42

We have no time to waste time on this nonsense.

So there's no need to mess with grandma - because we're perfectly fine with that kind of crap.

[Ross xnumx]

Quote from: nik-mazur

because we're fine with exactly this kind of crap.

I'd like to ask for the address where the thermonuclear reactor produces an inexhaustible flow of electricity...

[Trapp1st]

I'd like to ask for the address where the thermonuclear reactor produces an inexhaustible flow of electricity...

This is above you and two planets to the left.

[nik-mazur]

Quote: ROSS 42

the address from which the thermonuclear reactor produces an inexhaustible flow of electricity

From nowhere, unless you count electromagnetic radiation from stars. The Chinese, who "do this crap," don't have any of that either. Which didn't stop you from being sarcastic.

[isv000]

Quote: ROSS 42

I'd like to ask for the address where the thermonuclear reactor produces an inexhaustible flow of electricity...

Magadan, st. Lenina, 1...

[Trapp1st]

This is exactly the kind of crap we're okay with.

With Putin's elections?

[ved_med12]

It's funny, let's elect you as president!
Nominate yourself!

[Trapp1st]

It's funny, let's elect you as president!

You can choose anyone, everyone knows who will win.

[ved_med12]

I've always wondered what motivates characters who offer nothing, but scold and criticize everyone...

[bk0010]

Quote: ved_med12

I've always wondered what motivates characters who offer nothing, but scold and criticize everyone...

Bitter experience and common sense.

[ved_med12]

You've got me puzzled.
Why do you think these "characters" have "experience and common sense"? And aren't they just looking to make some extra cash?
Note that, unlike you, I am not asserting, but suggesting!
This in itself raises questions!

[IGOR GORDEEV]

Quote: ved_med12

It's funny, let's elect you as president!
Nominate yourself!

And why not - if there is a more complex program: "shoot/divide".

[nik-mazur]

Quote: Trapp1st

With Putin's elections

With such sparkling humor, you go to the first speaker – find out from him what he meant by crap:

Quote: ROSS 42

We have no time to waste time on this nonsense.

By the way, why do you write the president's last name without a capital letter? Are you demonstrating a disregard for the rules of the Russian language or for the president?

[Trapp1st]

find out from him

I understand everything.

You are thus showing disdain.

It's not convenient to type text on a phone.

[nik-mazur]

Quote: Trapp1st

It's not convenient to type text on a phone.

Yeah, and what's interesting is that proper nouns like "Russia" or "Putin" are particularly difficult to type, for some reason. But words like "England," "USA," or "European" are spelled without any problem. Although the latter doesn't require a capital letter.

[Trapp1st]

like Russia

Don't whistle, give at least one example to confirm your cheap insinuation of when and where I Russia was written with a small letter.

[nik-mazur]

Quote: Trapp1st

When and where did I write "Russia" with a small letter?

So you have no objections regarding the president’s last name?
You got divorced just like in the joke about painting the Kremlin green.

[Trapp1st]

So you admitted that you were harshly whistling about Russia with a small letter?

[nik-mazur]

Quote: Trapp1st

You admitted that you whistled harshly about Russia with a small letter.

He didn't whistle, he provoked. And you fell for it.
Let me repeat the counter question: I guessed right about your demonstration of disdain for the president, since you have no objections?

[Trapp1st]

He didn't whistle, he provoked.

You have spread deliberately false information; you are a whistleblower, not a provocateur.

[nik-mazur]

Quote: Trapp1st

You have spread knowingly false information.

Officially, how? You should also file a lawsuit for moral damages and compensation for severe psychological trauma.
My question won't be answered, I take it. Which kind of hints...

[Trapp1st]

My question won't be answered, I take it. Which kind of hints...

You just became known as a whistler and you still want people to talk to you?

[nik-mazur]

Quote: Trapp1st

You just became known as a whistler.

You act with such pomposity, as if your artistic whistle about the inconvenience of dialing from a phone is somehow better.

[Trapp1st]

It's really not convenient to use it from a phone; there's no whistling here, unlike in your case.

[nik-mazur]

Quote: Trapp1st

It's really not convenient to use it from a phone.

Childish excuse.

[ved_med12]

Nikolai, you have 100500 pluses....

[VALERIK_097]

(other equipment weighing about 6,7 thousand tons will be supported.) Clumsy translation

[kostik1301]

This is what socialism leads to...

[Trapp1st]

I'm happy for my Chinese comrades! I wish them good luck and success!!!

[Mint Gingerbread]

Authors should also point out Russian developments in such articles, otherwise they resort to the brainwashing of Putin and the all-powerful China.

[Amateur]

in the field of physics burning plasma.

Plasma doesn't burn. It's just hot. Everything else in the article is on the same level.

[Ross xnumx]

Quote: Amateur

Plasma doesn't burn. It's just hot.

It was meant:
Physics of hot thermonuclear plasma
These are such difficulties in translation

[Amateur]

I comment not on what was already there, but on what was written. And I'm offended when an author posts articles for me, the reader, that they haven't read or don't understand.

[nik-mazur]

China is one step closer to generating electricity through nuclear fusion. If all goes well.

If... but it won't. For now, everyone is preoccupied with temperature, duration, and achieving the Lawson criterion. However, even if all these issues are resolved, the main problem will remain: the exceptionally high level of neutron radiation, which will very quickly turn everything surrounding a fusion reactor into radioactive dust. While it's still possible to protect against this at the experimental level, there are no solutions for a commercial reactor. For now, of course, but this could drag on for another thirty years.

[bk0010]

Quote from: nik-mazur

an exceptionally high level of neutron radiation that would very quickly turn everything surrounding the thermonuclear reactor into radioactive dust.

Where will it come from? Neutrons are not released during deuterium fusion:
D+D->He

[nik-mazur]

Quote: bk0010

No neutrons are released during deuterium fusion.

Today, thermonuclear fusion is about deuterium and tritium. And you won't believe it, but when their nuclei fuse, energy is released, including (surprisingly) in the form of neutron radiation:

Neutron radiation is a product of nuclear fusion reactions (for example, the fusion of deuterium and tritium). This radiation consists of high-energy neutrons that escape from the reaction site.
...
Neutrons are formed by the fusion of deuterium and tritium. For example, the reaction occurs according to the formula: 1²H + 1³H → 2⁴He + 0¹n + 17,6 MeV. The result is a helium nucleus (an alpha particle) and a high-energy neutron.
...
The neutron flux for the same generated power is 5-10 times greater than that of conventional nuclear reactors.
...
Only about 20% of the fusion energy is released in the form of charged particles (the rest is neutrons)

[nik-mazur]

Četárž – three downvoters didn’t like the realities of nuclear physics.

[bk0010]

The negative isn't from me. Messing with tritium is a bad idea: it has to be produced in nuclear reactors, and it decays quite quickly. It's better to continue refining the technology.

[nik-mazur]

Quote: bk0010

Handling tritium is a bad idea.

There's no better option yet. Using deuterium with deficient helium-3 is two orders of magnitude more difficult than using deuterium and tritium, and deuterium plus deuterium is even more difficult than using helium. In all cases, the reaction produces tritium, which will react with deuterium to produce neutron radiation.
The technology has been under development for nearly seventy years. For now, the idea of ​​a hybrid reactor seems the most realistic.

[Comrade Beria]

The article doesn't cover the topic. Where are the formulas and results of theoretical and practical research?

What is this Dewar flask used for? And what will it contain?

Okay, I won't grumble like an old man anymore.

I'll add in the white lines:

The purpose of the Dewar base in the Burning Plasma Experimental Superconducting Tokamak (BEST) is to insulate the superconducting magnets, which must operate at minus 269°C, and allow them to contain plasma heated to over 100 million°C. Impressive.

This way, it is possible to ignite a supernova on the scale of planet Earth.

[multig]

This is what happens when someone who doesn't understand the subject posts a text... And based on the text, his experimental setup will start delivering to consumers in three years...

[rocket757]

If you suffer for a long time... well, not suffer, of course, but invest a lot, a lot of effort and resources to complete a specific task.
Which is what they have been doing for many years.

[Nikname2025]

The photo shows a completely different installation – the Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak – EAST, which has been operating since 2006.
The Burning Plasma Experimental Superconducting Tokamak (BEST) is still under construction. The first photo shows the construction site, the second shows the installation of the foundation, which is mentioned in the article.

[Eugene 62]

During my pioneer childhood, which took place under dear Leonid Ilyich, I often heard and read statements from intelligent scientists that the first thermonuclear reactor, which would produce more energy than it consumed, was 10-15 years away, or at most 20. Then such predictions stopped being made. And now, equally intelligent scientists aren't making predictions even for the end of the 21st century. The closer humanity gets to solving this problem, the further away the solution itself is.
Experimental TOKAMAKS have worked before and even generated energy. It's possible to produce plasma. But it's not yet possible to initiate a self-sustaining reaction. And how many years it will take to achieve this is still unknown. So it's too early to drink champagne.

[Trapp1st]

So it's too early to drink champagne.

Damn, should I put it back?

[Eugene 62]

put it back?

Hold on until the New Year or until our Victory!

[nordscout]

Thermonuclear fusion is a good "feeding trough" and source of funding for "high-energy physics," which has been faithfully "feeding" generations of physicists around the world for decades. The results, however, are very, very modest.

[gridasov]

So-called thermonuclear editors and the processes themselves have an incomplete understanding that plasma is not only a breakdown in linear conductors, but also a breakdown from a source of correspondingly modulated energy and momentum with the external environment and its corresponding potential. Schauberger also clearly explained that the dynamics of the process allow for the modification and regulation of the environment's potential to achieve breakdown in the appropriate plasma range. In other words, a dynamic understanding of the physical process, in the truest sense, will allow not only for thermonuclear processes but also for their conversion into electrical energy without intermediate steps. This also opens a direct path to nuclear technologies for the creation of engines for aviation and space.

[abc_alex]

As of today, there's no way to generate electricity using thermonuclear fusion. There's not even the technology for the fusion itself. The energies involved are so high that even starting a reactor requires the power of a nuclear power plant. That means you need a couple of tons of uranium fuel to smash together several nuclei of a hydrogen isotope and produce a burst of energy. Not electrical, mind you. And not even thermal. This energy must first be "captured" and then converted. And no one has yet explained how. The reaction itself occurs in a vacuum. A vacuum is an ideal heat insulator. So, all you can get is radiation. And what about radiation conversion technologies? Nothing?

In short, the Chinese are pursuing high-energy physics. Good luck to them. But to say they're moving toward a fusion power plant is, at the very least, bold. Even the fuel situation is unclear. Currently, they're theoretically considering deuterium, tritium, and helium. None of these isotopes are mined; everything is synthesized, and with great difficulty.

[Disant]

Everything is under control. The tokamaks are resting for now.
There are other ways.
City of Sarov. Tsar laser for heating the target.
a laser room for amplifying laser beams with an area the size of a couple of football fields.
The interaction chamber—a 120-ton sphere with a diameter of 10 meters—is installed inside a nine-story building. 192 beams will converge at a single point.
Based on this installation, it will already be possible to build reactors.
The sphere was installed in 2019. It's currently in the light photo stage. The rooms are equipped with a fan and adjustable temperature control. Launch is expected around 2028.