2 Fusion performance

Derived in 1955, the Lawson criterion specifies the conditions that must be met for fusion to produce a net energy output (1 keV ≃ 12 million °C). From this, a fusion "triple product" can be derived, which is defined as the product of the plasma ion density, ion temperature and energy confinement time. This product must be greater than about 5 × 10²¹keV7nbsp;m^-3s for a deuterium-tritium plasma to ignite. Due to the radioactivity associated with tritium, today's research tokamaks generally operate with deuterium only (solid dots). The large tokamaks JET and TFTR, however, have used a deuterium-tritium mix (open dots). The rate of increase in tokamak performance has oustripped that of Moore's law for the miniaturization of silicon chips.

Back to article