PPPL News – PPPL to launch major upgrade of key fusion energy test facility
PPPL News – PPPL to launch major upgrade of key fusion energy test facility
By John Greenwald | 09 January 2012
The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) is getting an earlier-than-expected start on a $94 million, nearly three-year project as the next stage of its mission to chart an attractive course for the development of nuclear fusion as a clean, safe and abundant fuel for generating electricity.
The project will upgrade the National Spherical Torus Experiment (NSTX) facility at PPPL, over the next 30 months, with completion slated for 2014. The work will enhance the position of the NSTX as the world’s most powerful spherical torus – or tokamak – a device that controls the superheated and electrically charged gases called plasmas that create fusion power.
The upgrade “will provide a huge boost to all NSTX science missions and enhance U.S. fusion research capability,” said Stewart Prager, director of PPPL, which is managed by Princeton University for the DOE Office of Science and has been a leader in fusion research for 60 years. Experiments done on NSTX, he said, “will establish the physics basis to determine next steps in fusion research and development.”
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