Kennedy Maize writes for Power Magazine that the private-sector fusion pioneers bring real value to the search for energy’s holy grail. They are impatient, entrepreneurial, and nimble, often scornful of the cumbersome, slow, and academic emphasis of the big science projects at ITER and NIF. They are all focused on smaller machines using known science, with goals far shorter than the conventional approach. They are largely practical as opposed to theoretical.
The fusion mavericks fit the prescription offered by former AEC fusion head Hirsch, who first advanced tokomaks and then became disillusioned. “We need fewer physicists and more engineers,” he often said.
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