Q&A [Power Fusion]

THE POSSIBILITY of generating electricity from nuclear fusion has intrigued scientists since the late 1950s, but delivering an economical and reliable fusion reactor has proved to be a tough nut to crack. Nuclear reactors are capable of producing huge amounts of energy, which is achieved either by nuclear fission - the splitting of elements of high atomic numbers, or fusion - the joining of elements with low atomic numbers. Nuclear fission is well developed and supplies around 14 per cent of the world??s electricity but the advent of nuclear fusion is still some way off.