The geeks at Microsoft must not have read the history regarding fusion power, or else they wouldn’t have signed on with the Helion scam (“Everett nuclear fusion company nets first customer: Microsoft,” The Herald, May 10).
Fusion power has been the tantalizing source of infinite energy for the last 60 years. Large institutions and universities have tried, in vain, to make a practical fusion plant. The latest breakthrough was achieved by Fermi-lab with its huge laser-powered monster. After much scrutiny it was discovered that the machine did achieve ignition and that the energy output was greater than the energy input. But the difference was minute and to turn the devise into a megawatt producing factory is probably decades away.
France is building a huge version of the Tokamak machine in the hopes of harnessing the process but that won’t be running any time soon. Lockheed-Martin, a few years ago, announced that it had designed a small fusion reactor but it’s growing in size and it has yet to produce more energy than is needed to run it.
So the chances of Helion producing a workable fusion reactor is zero.
Len St.Clare
Mukilteo
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