Fusion Ignition at the National Ignition Facility
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory · 2022
"On 5 December 2022, 192 lasers delivered 2.05 megajoules to a peppercorn-sized capsule of hydrogen isotopes and got 3.15 megajoules of fusion energy back — the first laboratory fusion reaction to release more energy than was put into the fuel. It proved the physics of ignition and left every engineering problem of fusion power still to solve."
Just after 1 a.m. on 5 December 2022, the National Ignition Facility in California fired its 192 laser beams into a gold cylinder the size of a pencil eraser. The cylinder converted the light into X-rays, which crushed a BB-sized capsule of deuterium and tritium to densities and temperatures greater than the centre of the Sun. The lasers delivered 2.05 megajoules to the target; the fusing fuel gave back 3.15 megajoules. For the first time in sixty years of trying, a controlled fusion reaction in a laboratory had produced more energy than the energy used to start it. When the result was announced eight days later, the U.S. Energy Secretary compared it to the Wright brothers' first flight at Kitty Hawk.
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