US announces 'tremendous scientific breakthrough' in limitless clean fusion energy

By Ovunc Kutlu

ISTANBUL (AA) - US Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm announced Tuesday a 'tremendous scientific breakthrough' in the decades-long effort to develop limitless clean fusion energy.

"Simply put, this is one of the most impressive scientific feats of the 21st century," she said at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, one of many sites in the world where researchers have been trying to develop the possibility of harnessing energy from nuclear fusion.

"It is the first time it has ever been done in a laboratory anywhere in the world," she said, adding researchers have been working on the technology for more than 60 years. "Ignition allows us to replicate, for the first time, certain conditions that are found only in the stars and the sun."

Granholm stressed that the breakthrough strengthens US national security and is "one significant step closer to the possibility of zero-carbon abundant fusion energy powering our society."

She said fusion energy can be used to produce clean electricity, for transportation fuels, to power heavy industry and much more in a clean energy economy.