Finally energy source that doesn't pollute.. Hopefully this makes it to production and just doesn't disappear like some things have.

Why does this read as a glossy ad? Just read the spin. Could be available in ten years? Oh come on now. Its an experimental reactor to be completed by 2027. At the bare minimum, it will be another twenty years before we see anything. In that time, we also have gen3 to come on song. Give me a break, they have been working on fussion since the 1950's and no gen 3 s are anywhere near service ready. This is all interesting but it is research premissed on a vacuum of alternatives. Just read the yearly report on the nuclear industry and it doesnt look pretty.

I really think this is the future of power and electric cars the future of transportation. Its not a matter of "if" really.

This article is very confused. It never really says how long it will take to build a test reactor using this technology. It mentions 5 years but reads as if no one proof read that paragraph. If they are saying 5 years. Why so long and how much will it cost? It does clearly make it sound like it is a total waste to spend time, effort and money on the existing ITER program.

Didn't Lockheed/Martin have a compact fusion reactor in the works at the Palmdale, California Skunkworks? Last I heard in 2014, they were just months away from having a working prototype that could fit in a Winnebago. Comparisons to Walter Heisenberg White and Breaking Bad are too tempting!

Someone hasn't told these students and professors that this isn't possible. I appreciate the efforts of Rann Xeroxx, to tell us this. Rann should really be writing to the students and professors at MIT and the University of Washington (they are working on something like this), and Lockheed Martin. It may be too late already for Rann. More and more students and professors and research scientists are becoming confident about this. Rann should have worked towards a doctorate in nuclear physics and another in electrical engineering so that his protests could be more effective.

"affordable, robust, compact" ... Or someone really wanted to call it an ARC reactor.

Sounds promising if what they say about conventional magnetic coils having to be shut down to prevent overheating is the reason for stopping the reaction.If they can maintain field intensity indefinitely,that would be a major advance.

In my lifetime, fusion power has always been 50 years in the future...and it still is. Terrestrial containment systems seem close enough to impossible that I think we should wind down the costly research...and put the money into other systems. I am not opposed to thermonuclear power. In fact, my preferred thermonuclear concept is simple: procure or find a ball of hydrogen gas so large that it compresses itself to fusion ignition. Then, because such as gas ball is going to be large...and very hot...place it far in space, say, 93 million miles away from the Earth. Extracting the endlessly flowing energy from this thermonuclear reactor would require large photovoltaic panels across the Earth, but that should be very feasible. Why do I have to come up with all the good ideas myself?!

" the potential to turn almost all other major electricity sources into an historical footnote overnight." Yeah. In 25 odd years time when my solar panels might need replacing, I'll see how well they are doing with fusion. Given that solar PV is still getting better and cheaper ... I wonder when they will give up trying stuff like this.