You’re listening to A Climate Change. This is Matt Matern, your host and I have Bruno Van Wonterghem wouldn’t have a great scientist on the program today, and welcome to the program grown up. Okay,

it’s a pleasure to be here.

Bruno, if you can tell us a little bit about your background, and you know what, what you’re working on?

Yeah. I’m a laser scientist at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. And started to work in lasers. In 1992, that’s actually when we started to build and design the National Ignition Facility at a laboratory, that was a mega scale laser project that immediately drew my attention, having worked with lasers, as a student, and having worked in several Institute, this was the ultimate project.

And it was going to be I mean, the laser that was going to make inertial confinement fusion reality. And that’s what we started out to work on. In 1992. I’ve worked with lasers since I mean, almost since I was 10 o’clock, since I was 10 years old. My grandfather was the professor in physics and I had the chance to mean to work I mean, whether he needs razor, you know, the little laser that points to the red beam. And was used to do all kinds of experiments and working with increasingly powerful lasers.

I mean, of course, as soon as I become a graduate students sort of work in my own laboratory developing bigger and larger systems to even I mean, use the power of lasers, I mean, all kinds of physical phenomena. But nothing, I mean, was more interesting than the lasers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. So in 1991, I was actually at the Max Planck Institute for biophysical chemistry, and getting in Germany, working on ultra short pulse ultra high power lasers.

And a scientist from Lawrence Livermore, basically came on a sabbatical, I mean, gave a talk about the lasers that were at that point in use as part of the inertial confinement fusion effort. And he showed laser beams that were about 60 centimeters across. And once I saw that beam, and that picture on the screen, I said, Well, this is the place to be for lasers. I mean, there’s just no place. One can do more fascinating. I mean, applications using I mean, the largest lasers that have ever been built in the world.

That’s great stuff. And well, it’s been in the news that there has been a breakthrough as far as nuclear fusion. And so tell us a little bit about Lawrence Livermore, yours and your work and how that relates to this breakthrough? And and where do you think this takes us next, on the road to harnessing nuclear fusion?

Just for the background information. Lawrence Livermore, is a national security laboratory. It’s one of the three national security laboratories that is operated by the Department of Energy. Next to the Los Alamos laboratories and the laboratory.

We mean, so I mean, hard national security issues. I mean, whether that’s related to defense, intelligence, energy, and we mean, have scientists, engineers and technicians that are developing and using the most advanced technologies computer simulation leads us towards manufacturing techniques in order to solve number of heart problems for nation including, I mean, how to maintain the safety, reliability and efficiency of our nuclear weapons stockpile, when we basically stopped doing underground testing in the early 1990s.

That was one of the major challenges that the laboratories have been working on is how can we do that? Because it really requires a deep understanding of the physics and requires some in facilities that we can test our modeling on real high energy density prop One is in relevant conditions. So we have to build facilities that can actually test material in these conditions.

And we have to educate and go, I mean, a workforce actually, that can understand and learn how to deal with stockpile problems without actually ever having, I mean, use any device or having conducted any test, it’s still at the same time being able to ensure and testify for the president every year that the stockpile is going to be working as intended, even though we haven’t tested any device in 30 years. So that’s a fantastic challenge.

And the National Ignition Facility is going to be the flagship facility for that stockpile stewardship program, as a place where we can I mean, test all kinds of relative conditions, relevant conditions for materials, or thermonuclear phenomena that take place on the weapon, and demonstrate both I mean, the use of laser power, I mean, at an unprecedented scale, that we can basically, I mean, use these and validate them in the simulations and challenge the physicist to develop experiments and conduct tests that help us I mean, reach the stockpile stewardship goals.

And very recently, I mean, NIF has for the first time now demonstrated that it could indeed, achieve ignition in the laboratory, which is a major, I mean, step forward, in stockpile stewardship. As I said, the ignition is an essential part of a nuclear weapon, and being able to basically conduct and ignite plasma in a controlled form in a laboratory while conducting measurements on it, or it is an unprecedented event.

And for the first time, we’ve been able to do that, I mean, not in the sun, not on a distant star, not in an uncontrolled weapon. But in a laboratory, I mean, inside the target chamber, I mean, using a controlled scientific experiment. So this is extremely exciting.

So I recognize it’s probably hard to predict how the next breakthrough how and when it will come. But what do you see in terms of incremental gains? Are there quantum leaps in this technology that you think are possible, given your study in this area for 30 or 40 years.

So given the breakthrough, there’ll be a bait, which confirms that we are on the right track, and that our understanding is really close. So we were, I mean, basically, still in doubt, that we may not have the physics complete, that they were missing significant phenomena and that NIF and technician actually, it was never even possible on the NIF that we need a facility that would meet.

I mean, have to deliver five times more energy or more, and the fact that we have demonstrated now that, that very small increase in energy, we can achieve ignition, and given the fact that we have so much many more tools, improvements, and changes that we can apply to this process, that we are nowhere near the end of what we can actually achieve on the National Ignition Facility.

So with improvements in the targets, with improvements in the laser delivery, with improvements in the whole round the little capsule that surrounds the fuel capsule, we can achieve significant increases in the output energy of the target, or so called the gain of the target, which is the energy that is generated by fusion ignition, relative to the energy that we put into the target.

And so over the next few years, we expect a significant increase of the game and a significant increase of the robustness of the process. So that we not only, I mean, derive the process to significantly higher levels, but also at the same time improve or precision of the modeling and our understanding of the physics. So I think we are really, really has an exciting time here.

We’re nowhere at the limit of this facility. And the National Ignition Facility was going to be an intermediate facility where we use large a significant increase in laser energy over three If its facilities by a factor of 50, but not a factor of 100, or 200, as originally designed.

And so this also enabled us to start thinking not only about really a high yield facility, or stockpile stewardship applications, but also it now start to open the door to using an innovation to pursue the generation of clean energy, and start to think, and large efforts to create international fusion energy as a means to provide clean, safe, carbon free energy on the grid, I mean, in in the next few decades.

That’s a pretty amazing development. And I guess the question I have is, where does it go to next? And in terms of funding? What kind of additional funding do you believe is necessary in order to give you the tools to take this to the next level and to the next level? And, you know, how are how is Congress doing as far as funding the Lawrence Livermore laboratories? And what other kind of adjacent facilities are necessary that support the laboratories and who are your partners that you’re working with?

We’re going to take a break right now. And we’re going to be right back in after the break and get an answer from Bruno Van Wonterghem, who’s a senior scientist at Lawrence Livermore laboratories. You’re listening to A Climate Change. This is Matt Matern. And we’ll be right back in just one minute.

You’re listening to A Climate Change. And this is Matt Matern, your host I’ve got a great guest on the program. And Bruno, we had just been speaking about whether you have the funding and all that to take these breakthroughs to the next level, maybe you can respond to that quickly.

So the support I mean, to continue the pursuit and the increasing the robustness and gain of fusion ignition, or the National Ignition Facility is supported by the National Nuclear Security Administration, as part of the Department of Energy, we received a main great support by Congress. And by the Department of Energy and NSF stay in terminal timing, funding, I mean, or operations, or researchers, and future extensions, and sustaining the facility into into the next decade.

So they’re part of course receive receive increased Amin attention, now that we have demonstrated ignition, and that has already that is already showing. So there’s this other effort that is being launched by the White House, and being supported by Lawrence Livermore, laboratory and Department of Energy, which is an effort, I mean, to start developing a collaboration between private industry and the national laboratories to work together. I mean, on developing I mean, efforts to investigate and possible the pursuit of intellectual fusion energy in the next decade or the next decades, that is a set of very significant efforts that will require, I mean, both academia, the best engineering and mindsets in industry.

And I mean, the scientific tools and knowledge in laboratories come together to work out an incredible set of challenges that is required to make commercial fusion, energy reality. And marinara notion fusion energy drilling, you don’t take one ignition event, but you try to repeat it 10 times per second using a very efficient system and use that in order to harness the energy of the fusion reactions and turn it into electricity, turn it into a baseload power. And that I mean has incredible I mean, technological challenges. I don’t think they’re really impossible to resolve all of them have, I mean, conceptual solutions, but there is a lot of details.

There’s a lot of material issues, and a lot of new technologies that has to be developed and will require the best mind In both industry and government laboratories to come together and work on all these problems, and it will quite likely, I mean, require multibillion dollar investments, or I mean, many years, in order to make this a reality, and we develop the technologies that we will point that we can start to think about developing, I mean, a prototype, fusion power, inertial fusion energy facility that will be used, I mean, to demonstrate really, I mean, electricity in general generation, which is the big question.

Well, in terms of I know, there’s a lot of private companies out there they’re working on or maybe not a lot, but there are some private companies working on harnessing nuclear fusion, and wonder how closely they’re working with the Lawrence Livermore laboratories? And are they able to get the technology from these breakthroughs are they license? Or do you do give license to say American companies and or foreign companies to use the technology that you’re developing there at the National Laboratories?

So most of the private companies at this point in time are working on competing technology, because magnetic fusion, using magnetic fields in electrical currents to contain and heat up large volumes of plasma in a vacuum chamber. So it’s quite a different technology, and then using lasers to drive and compress very tiny, small amount of VT fuel, and he needed to ignition. So we also have, I mean, a very small effort in magnetic fusion, some of our scientists support it.

And we are working directly on developing a process to license some of the technology share some of the tools, the modeling the physics, codes, testing capability, material science problems, that we are that we have been developing in the last 20 years in the laboratory in the area of inertial fusion energy, and how to leverage those together with a private industry. So there is a very mean active effort that is currently being launched, both by the Department of Energy, in collaboration with better laboratories, and several upcoming climate companies. So all that is happening actually, in real time, as we speak.

So in terms of next steps on the on the frontier of fusion, maybe you could walk our listeners through that, and maybe taking a step back, just describing nuclear fusion and what it is and why it’s so powerful, and why it’s so important.

So, the beauty of fusion or nuclear fusion as an energy source comes in the fact that it is clean, it is non proliferating, it is safe. And what it basically does it, it is replicates the energy source that drives the universe. I mean, it is how stars I mean Creator energy, it’s how the sun Creator energy and how the sun creates life on Earth. And stars use gravity basically, as a means to compress matter.

And compress small nuclei and bring the nuclei so close together, that they actually can overcome the repulsive forces. And once that happened, you can combine two nuclei creates a larger nucleus nucleus. And in that process, little bit of maths is converted into energy. Remember, we use the Etherium and a tritium atom of isotopes of hydrogen to create a helium atom, which weighs a tiny little bit less than the sum of those deuterium and tritium atoms.

And we use the Einstein equation E equals MC squared to convert that little bit of mass into energy with an extremely high efficiency. So you can I mean use the fusion reaction, as opposed to the fission reaction as one of the most effective means to create energy lasers use the discovery call inertial confinement fusion process, where we heat up a little metal shell around the fuel capsule, that metal shell starts to generate copious amount of X rays and X rays ablate, the outer layer of the fuel capsule, the fuel capsule starts to accelerate inwards. In other words, we’re starting to compress it.

And we can accelerate that a little fuel capsule to about a million miles per hour until it collapses onto itself and converts and in a very small amount of fuel to extremely high pressures and densities, where we can start fusion reactions. And then those fusion reactions will create enough energy to fuse the fuel that we compressed and basically cause an ignition reaction to propagate to cold fuel, and leads to the energy gain that we’ve seen demonstrated here last December, December 5. be used at that point in time, 2 million joules of laser energy, and we created 3 million joules of fusion neutrons in output. It’s an incredible event because that compressed fuel capsule is about the size of a hair.

And so we have a laser of the size of three football fields to generate 2 million joules. And then we have a tiny little mean point, the size of air that generates 3 million joules in I mean, a fraction of a billionth of a second musically to render trillions of seconds. And that is really a demonstration of the awful, I mean, power that that fusion represents. And that’s only for me in a tiny little compressed capsule for a tiny little amount of time.

So our next step now is demonstrate an increased gain gain from that shot was 1.5. So we create the 50% more energy. And we really want I mean, 10 times or 50 times more energy out of the capsule than the laser energy in order to compensate for the losses in the laser FX efficiency and whole process in order to make it an effective energy source. So we have quite a few challenges, but I think we are right now.

I mean, on track, I mean to demonstrate that of current understanding. I mean, it’s close and close enough to help us guide. I mean, through not only I mean high yield applications, or stockpile stewardship signs have four energy applications and four inertial fusion energy.

But it’s pretty amazing. The science behind it is somewhat mind boggling. You’re listening to A Climate Change. This is Matt Matern, your host that got thrown over, I’m working him, Bruno, we’ll be right back with him after the break to ask him a lot of questions about this fascinating technology, which could be the breakthrough that leads to clean and green energy source throughout the planet, which would solve really the whole climate crisis. So this is big stuff. So we’ll be right back in just one minute.

You’re listening to A Climate Change. This is Matt Matern. And I’ve got Bruno Van Wonterghem, who’s with Lawrence Livermore laboratories. And we’re gonna kind of want to go back to this issue of the technology that that kind of is behind the lasers that you were just talking about. And I think you had said that some of the lasers were two or three football fields long or something, maybe you could describe that for the audience.

So the National Ignition Facility uses 192 laser beams to illuminate the target. And it needs to do that. I mean, with very demanding requirements on the precision and accuracy of the delivery. Where do you deliver the energy? The balance between all the two runners different beams exactly the way you want it so that you can compress the targets in a very uniform fashion.

So it’s an extremely I mean, demanding requirements to not only run 192 laser beams on average shocked but do the To get an unprecedented precision, and we will always I mean, requested that no matter how good we do it, we will physicist in the process will always demand I mean better accuracy, better precision of the power, more energy more power. And so we have been able to not only build the system starting in 1997 with the groundbreaking facility, but it took us 10 years to put these lasers together. And we started to operate the lasers and doing experiments in 2009.

And it took us another 30 years since need to improve the delivery of the lasers to the target and improve the technology I mean to produce the targets to produce the capsules. And to deliver the energy in such a way that the implosion reaction or that the fuel are delivered in a very stable way and compressed to the exact density, the exact temperatures the exact shape that is required in order to make this happen. And so this requires over 30 years of precision, I mean engineering, precision science modeling, and experiments.

I mean we have done several almost 200 implosions in order to get to the point where we really control it, and understand the level that we now can push from yields that originally started, I mean, factor 4000 lower than where we are right now to almost a factor of 10 from the limit of what we can safely conduct on this facility. So that has been a tremendous evolution, and a tremendous I mean, success story. I mean, not only for the science, the physics and the engineering on this type, I mean of cutting edge facilities at the National Laboratory.

Well tell us a little bit about just for us lay people who don’t know what 400 joules of energy, what does that translate to? Kind of for kind of a lay person? How much power really is that? Is that enough power to power a small city or is that how much power is that, mega joules itself is another huge amount of energy. So like the same amount of energy, I mean, to boil, I mean a kettle of water.

It’s about the amount of energy. I mean, in a sports car, I mean driving at about 120 miles per hour. So it’s a significant amount of energy, not a huge amount of energy, it’s not the amount of energy that is going to power. So of course, that’s why in order to create some in the future power plants, you really need to have I mean 10 to 50 times more energy per implosion. And then instead of main conducting one of these shots in about 24 hours, which is what the National Ignition Facility can achieve, conduct an intense 20 of those implosions per seconds and keep running it around the clock.

So there is a significant amount of scaling that needs to be done. I mean, to turn the energy into a single implosion, I mean, into real I mean, solid baseline power production. So it’s a relatively small beginning from their point of view. But on the other end and an absolute scale. I mean, for I mean, delivery or laser. I mean, it’s an it’s, it’s an incredible, amazing amount of energy to achieve the 3 million joules of neutral energy coming in from 2 million joules of laser energy.

I mean, in our progression of performance, having worked on systems where we only generated I mean 10s of kilojoule, originally, of neutrons. So our progression and our extrapolation, I mean, towards improved performance. I mean, it’s looking really good at this point in time. So, I think we will see I mean, significant improvements in gain in the next few years. And we also have an incentive to work them on the technology, I mean, to understand how to scale this, I mean to not only come in a very high yield facility, but also to do high yields at a very high repetition rate, which is yet I mean, another development in technology.

That one click needs to be looking at. Considering that mean when the inertial confinement fusion was first proposed in 1970. At the laboratory, the idea was to use a one kilojoule laser, instead of a 2 million Joule laser to compress targets and achieve fusion ignition.

And so over the last 50 years, the laboratory has built in an increasingly an increasing number of increasingly large laser facilities ranging from one kilojoules to five kilo Joules, I mean 30 kilo Joules now to 2 million euros in lift, and who knows, there may be a 10 mega joule facility somehow, in our future, that this has been I mean, I mean, incredible journey, I mean, and has required us I mean, over 770 years of continuous development.

I mean, basically, I mean, learning, I mean, having problems, I mean setbacks, making progress. But in me, I’m always on average, I mean, having mean, the good records then improving, I mean, not only are technology for those who are in physics or simulation or understanding of the process, and keep driving coming towards success, and think will be achieved in December is not, I would consider a submarine, the holy grail of ICF.

And, finally, having Arling at a position where we actually can meet the criteria that the National Academy of scientists put forward, namely, exceeding the laser energy required to generate a fusion energy. I mean, it’s such I mean, a testament I mean, to the technology in our country, that I think it bodes well for all of us.

Well, congratulations to you and to your entire team for the great work that you’ve done, over decades to make this breakthrough possible, as you’ve just kind of described how challenging that process has been, and how you’ve stuck with it to continue to try and sometimes make mistakes, but continue to adapt and make changes to make it better.

Give us a little sense of how many people are on your team, how many people are working at the laboratory on this project? In particular, and, and how has it grown over the 30 years that you’ve, you’ve been working there.

So right now, the laboratory employs about 7000, scientists, engineers, technicians, for all of their projects, and about 1000s of those people, I mean, work on the National Ignition Facility, both come into support operations, the engineering, the sustainment, and do the the physics design modeling, data analysis of controls of the facility.

So, over time, I mean, over the duration of the project, I mean, the staffing started out at a few 100 people and went almost close to 2000 people during the peak in construction. And so I mean, over the years, I mean, it’s literally been maybe 10,000 people that have worked on this problem, not only at the lab work at Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, but also assisted laboratories, academics in order to support the science, the manufacturing, the components, and technology and improvements in optical components, improvements in electrical components that was required for basically industry to help us put together I mean, this laser system.

And so I think it’s been an incredible undertaking that has taken place over so many years, across so many different industries, and laboratories. And it all shows I mean, that I mean, if you set your mind, then you can keep your going. You can solve any problem. I mean, but you just need to keep keep keep going at it, I think up to me several years ago, I mean, at some place at some time, it wasn’t looking all that great. We didn’t have all the support again, but still, I mean, we kept going and believing in what we’re doing.

I think you’re still now I need to go, I mean to the next steps in order to make a similar transition towards inertial fusion energy, which has a whole set of I mean, incredible technological challenges. But I mean, we need to have the same mindset and keep going at it, we’ll we’ll find solutions to create inexpensive small targets for very high rates, to contain and fire those targets and extract the energy and to develop very efficient, very reliable, and the laser drivers that can operate at a power plant type level, in order to make this reality to be, but we already come in to support it.

And we are ready to provide the impetus for both industry and our future generation of scientists and engineers. Keep working on this.

Well, great work on this front, an incredible breakthrough and tremendous work by as you said, 1000s, if not over 10,000 people working on this project for decades. You’re listening to A Climate Change. This is Matt Matern, your host and we’ll be right back with Bruno Van Wonterghem, senior scientist at the Lawrence Livermore laboratories talking to us about nuclear fusion.

You’re listening to A Climate Change this is Matt Matern. And I’ve got Bruno Van Wonterghem, a senior scientist with Lawrence Livermore laboratories on the program. Bruno is telling us about nuclear fusion and and the developments over the last 50 plus years. And I would just going to ask you, what do you see as the next step given that this project probably has as much priority or should have more priority than the Manhattan Project where a nuclear weapon was created back in the 1940s.

Certainly creating nuclear fusion power that is that is free from creating pollution seems to be maybe the most important thing that our government and the world needs, what more resources should we be throwing at this problem in order to solve it.

Because as you said, resources are certainly part of the equation that you need to do the the incredible work you’re doing with the scientists on the ground at this moment, are as a perfect place in order to increase the momentum towards fusion research and make sure that we can indeed develop it to be the tool that we need for the future of stockpile stewardship and to make sure that we can resolve some very significant technological issues coming forward to do for the life extension of nuclear weapons and to ensure future reliability and develop I mean, a new generation of stockpiles they will chips of stockpiles towards as the need to attract more talent, more scientific and engineering talent into this field.

For stockpile stewardship and to support the lofty goals are the Northshore fusion energy, which we will need to attract them in the best and brightest in this country? In a similar effort? I mean, the Manhattan Project or the Apollo Project? Definitely, I mean, the the political support is there, the White House has made it very clear statement about a bowl decadal plan for development of inertial fusion energy. So all the other the support, I mean, is there right now.

And I think what our task right now is is really attracts I mean, the next generation and make people interested in science and engineering and turn towards this field to help potential development of all these different technologies, which will keep us at the, at the forefront. We are currently I mean, ahead of everyone else in the world. And there are all efforts going on in Europe, or efforts going on in Russia and China. But we are clearly ahead and we need to maintain that in order to maintain competitive and in order to just make sure that we keep ourselves at the forefront and nobody else.

I mean, we’re walking away from us now. So I think right now, I mean, our largest challenges. And I mean, basically replenish, I mean, our staff and grow for team of people that are working into this field, and they will make it happen. And I think it’s now in an incredible time, I mean, to make that swap, and to provide that support. And I think we’ve seen signs everywhere, that that will happen. And I think it puts us in a real good position.

And it will basically benefit, I mean, not only, I mean, the laboratories and the, the deterrence makers say, it really gives credibility to our teams. And people will take that as a very serious part of establishing it towards but also establishing, I mean, it credibility and a drive forward towards I mean, making fusion energy, I mean, real trouble golf and start to drive towards developing the pilot plants, and demonstrating the technology and challenging resolving the challenges that will come along the way.

So tell us what kind of cooperation or collaboration does the Lawrence Livermore Labs have with, say, labs in Europe or labs in Russia? Obviously, we’re having big challenges with Russia now. and China. We’re kind of competitors at best of ours. Where, where’s this going? Are they going to copy what you’re doing? Or is it easy to replicate kind of the amazing science that you’ve generated there at the lab?

So we have a formal agreement with France as a similar type of laser system, the laser, megajoule in Bordeaux. There is not yet at the level, I mean, of completion of the National Ignition Facility, we have been working with them, I mean, for the last few decades. We do not have I mean, collaborations or any agreements with Russia or China and courts.

And we know that they are building laser systems that are similar, I mean, to the systems that we are using at National Ignition Facility. So I’m sure that they are looking very closely at what we are doing that we are definitely trying to stay well ahead.

So what do you do what, what is done to kind of keep these things secret, but obviously, there’s some publicity related to, to the breakthroughs that you’ve had. And some of the science kind of comes out at conventions, or where you share your papers and findings. And how much of it is kind of kept more secret. So that our, you know, people, countries like China and in Russia are not benefiting from the taxpayer dollars that we’ve spent to do the work at Lawrence Livermore.

Yeah. Yeah. So we are very, very careful about what information legalese and what information we share, and what information we keep towards or towards industrial partners, and information. I mean, that is critical to make it actually work. Both the current rate and Department of Energy invested mean, a lot of resources into this project, and we want to make sure that we stay on top of that, we don’t hand it out.

Sure. So where do you see this going next? And how, how are you going about recruiting top scientists to take the lab to the next level?

Of course, the of the reasons, I mean, interest, the notes interest and in the articles, the press, then the scientific articles, lectures, I mean, we see us going to schools giving talks, I mean, making people aware of what’s going on how they can participate, allowing people I mean to conduct some experiments on enabling people to participate. So there will be a very active effort that of course, has been started, I mean, by the press.

By I mean, you broadcast by our advertisements to raise the interest and raise awareness and hopefully that will be followed up by more active managers. Stop people and people joining the ranks. And not only mean that the laboratory but also the industry. And in general, I mean, certainly get interest in science and engineering in in this country.

Now, do you see any of the private companies being able to switch technologies? Because you had said the private companies are using a different methodology of creating nuclear fusion? Do you see any of them shifting over to doing it the way you’ve done it the lab, Lawrence Livermore, or? Or do they have the resources necessary to create that type of reaction?

So that is now I mean, being bored by the New World and the laboratory in their working I mean, proposals with private companies for technology that is relevant. I mean, to notional fusion energy, I mean, specific, I mean, are similar to the technology that is being used in life? And so, yes, that is actually happening.

And we’ll see that I mean, even continue into the future, as I mean, people start to realize and start to invest more understand better about how this is going to go. And so this is going to be I mean, a wave that is going to propagate through industry to the energy industry.

And it will take a little bit of time to settle in, but we have no doubt that there will be an increased Amin interest into inertial fusion energy, magnetic fusion energy, I mean, is several large facilities going, but I mean, it’s still quite a while away from a similar type of demonstration.

Well, you’ve been listening to A Climate Change. This is Matt Matern, your host I’ve had Dr. Bruno Van Wonterghem on the program with the Lawrence Livermore laboratories, top scientists there, who they’ve been working on nuclear fusion.

I greatly appreciate the work that you’ve been doing there and tremendous breakthroughs and thank you for being on the program with us.