Nuclear fusion - whats the big deal?

suppose a fusion reactor is built would they start telling us that in 50 years our electricity will be free? What is the point of a fusion reactor or reactors unless it makes energy cheap, and available to all?

I dont understand why they want fusion reactors as opposed to chain reactors

 

Well, currently a good portion of nuclear fusion experiments, especially at NIF, the National Ignition Facility, which I think is at Princeton, are to simulate our aging nuclear weapons cache to determine whether the aging uranium would still work if we ever needed to use them, as a part of stockpile stewardship. Fusion energy could be cheap, after a LOT more research and development. I mean, all energy on earth (besides interior heat and them little bacteria and worms that feed off chemosynthesis) comes from fusion energy. All we would be doing in bringing the source closer to the grid. In fact, at the moment, you can build your own fusion reactor for about $500, although you don't get any net energy gain.

 

This is like what the Prof. in Back to the Future was using for his flying train. He put garbage in the fuel tank to power it. That blew me away as a concept; using garbage as fuel.

 

The idea of fusion energy is to use very light and common nuclei such as hydrogen, deuterium and tritium instead of uranium and plutonium which are highly toxic, VERY radioactive and hang around for a long time. The byproducts of fusion are helium and (I think) water. No toxic radioactive waste, and the technicians can make a sideline business selling helium balloons to kids.
Currently, a research site is being built at Cadarache in France (yeah, once again Europe leads the world in science ) to investigate the practicalities of igniting deuterium plasma. We've got the theory - their brief is now to try and design a working pilot reactor that can be scaled up.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadarache

 

We are trying to duplicate the Sun. An energy source that lasts billions of years.

The problem is that the Sun is so dense, it's own gravitational pull deters the reaction from becoming an explosion.

We have not yet learned how to create a fusion reaction on a large enough scale to provide power, yet not destroy itself instantaneously.

 

No, the dense, gravity, provides the needed compression, without requiring an explosion. The ability of the sun to naturally expand or contract, is a balancing mechanism that keeps things more "under control." Too much heat would ultimately reduce density, slowing the reactions.