Nuclear Fusion power – how long will we have to wait ?

Atom

Just before Christmas, it was announced for the first time that researchers at the National Ignition Facility at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in the US had successfully achieved “ignition” within a nuclear fusion reaction. This generated a lot of excitement in the press, not all of it well-informed, so I thought it might be interesting to explore this topic in more detail. What is nuclear fusion ? Why was this news so significant ? When will we begin to benefit …

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Revisiting Nuclear Power : Part 3 : Can it be weaponised ?

Nuclear explosion mushroom cloud

Following on from my previous articles on how nuclear power works, and why we need to rethink the dangers posed by it, it’s time to talk about the other safety-related concerns that are often raised in the debate about the viability of nuclear power. Can a nuclear power station explode like a nuclear bomb ? What happens if a nuclear power station finds itself in the theatre of military conflict, as is currently happening in Ukraine ? To deal with …

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Why – really – did Gordon Brown walk away from coalition?

It is now nearly three weeks since the general election and something still keeps nagging away at me. Back on May the 10th and a few days after the election, the intensive Tory-LibDem talks which had been going full tilt, had run into difficulty. The Daily Telegraph was reflecting the deep anxiety that must have been sweeping through the Tory party that they had been ‘outflanked’ as the LibDems had now opened talks with Labour. To add to Tory unease, …

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