News   /   Energy   /   Nuclear Energy

Iran looks to tapping nuclear fusion energy

This visualization shows the expected operation of the ITER fusion reactor.

Iran has discussed joining an international project to generate power from nuclear fusion as the country seeks to capitalize on its scientific capacities in the field of plasma physics.   

The country has about a hundred plasma physicists and about 150 scientists with doctorates in fields related to nuclear fusion, according to Laban Coblentz, spokesman for the ITER project.

ITER stands for International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor, an international nuclear fusion research and engineering megaproject, which will be the world's largest magnetic confinement plasma physics experiment.

Iran’s nuclear energy chief Ali Akbar Salehi and Vice President for Science and Technology Sorena Sattari visited the Cadarache research center for nuclear power in France earlier this month to discuss the country's participation in the project.

"We discussed possibilities of Iran's joining ITER, and the other members welcomed a prospective Iran membership," Salehi told reporters in Tehran on Wednesday.  

Fusion-generated nuclear power has no significant weapons applications and nuclear fusion, which joins atoms together, is the process that powers the sun and stars.

The experimental project seeks to use today's fusion research machines for power generation in tomorrow’s nuclear plants.   

An annex to a nuclear agreement reached in July between Iran and the West as well as Russia and China envisages Iranian contribution to the ITER project.

Coblentz has told the Associated Press that the Iranians are "very eager to get moving" and join the 35 countries collaborating on building the world's largest experimental fusion machine called a tokamak.

An aerial view of the ITER project at the Cadarache facility in southern France

According to the ITER Charter, the project is open to any country that is prepared to have meaningful technological and financial participation, Coblentz said.

Iran began building an experimental nuclear fusion reactor in July 2010 and now has three small tokamak machines and is building a fourth, according to Coblentz.

“So they clearly have a serious academic program," AP quoted him as saying.

Members of the ITER project seek to build the world's largest tokamak which can produce 500 megawatts of fusion power, possibly around 2026, according to Coblentz projections.

“How long it would then take to build a commercial fusion power plant will depend on the level of political will and the sense of urgency," AP reported, quoting him as saying. 

Iran has made harnessing nuclear energy in various fields a prime goal after years of investment in the field which has cost the country enormously because of Western sabotage, pressures and sanctions. 

Under the landmark nuclear agreement, the country is allowed to maintain its activities though at a scaled-back level.


Press TV’s website can also be accessed at the following alternate addresses:

www.presstv.co.uk

SHARE THIS ARTICLE
Press TV News Roku