[Physicist]

The big picture is that Fusion energy offers only one advantage over fission: no nuclear waste.

Not true. Fusion energy offers unlimited fuel without any dependence on foreign sources. The same cannot be said about fission. The reserves of fissionable materials are comparable to the reserves of oil, but most of them are in foreign countries. The reserves for fusion power are effectively infinite and effectively ubiquitous.

[103198]

I must respectively disagree.

Using breeder technology (which has been stymied in the US but not in France for example), fission fuel sources can last for thousands of years, if not more. There are a multitude of fuel cycles that can not only dramatically extend the U235 cycle but also present a logical way to burn waste materials.

Fusion reactors will produce radioactive waste too due to 14+ MeV neutron activation. Due to the activation schemes, the activation materials and half-lives will be different than fission reactors though.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not against fusion reactor development or research, but from my early '70s nuclear engineering classes I've learned that fusion is still in the future while fission is something that we need to use for more energy production that we do today. 103 reactors is not enough and we're not planning on building any more. We and the world has a serious energy problem with the problems in the middle east (oil), China (all energy), the US growth, and the environment (I can tell you about my coal-fired plant methymercury induced problem if you want).

[Southack]

"Not true. Fusion energy offers unlimited fuel without any dependence on foreign sources. The same cannot be said about fission. The reserves of fissionable materials are comparable to the reserves of oil, but most of them are in foreign countries. The reserves for fusion power are effectively infinite and effectively ubiquitous."

I'm not certain that I follow what you are trying to say. Oh sure, dueterium is slightly more plentiful than uranium, but uranium is found in abundance in the SouthWestern U.S. as well as in Alaska...and in these days of breeder reactors, I'm not even sure that raw uranium reserves are a big deal, either.

I think that you'll find that processing dueterium from sea water is comparable to mining uranium in costs, too.

So I don't see a large advantage to fusion over fission. Both use fuels that are in abundant supply, and both methods provides comparable amounts of energy at comparable levels of safety.

Fusion simply leaves behind less waste. What's the big motivation there?!

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