2. The $21 Billion ITER Lie
Dec. 15, 2016 – By Steven B. Krivit –
People representing the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) have told journalists and the public that, when complete, the world’s largest fusion reactor will produce 500 megawatts of thermal power from 50 MW of electrical input. This is incorrect.
ITER personnel have told journalists that ITER will produce 10 times more power during its fusion pulses than it consumes. This is also incorrect.
The screen shots below from the ITER Web site illustrate how the facts, while publicly available, easily lead to misinterpretation. Using the maximum values shown, for a 500 MW thermal output, the actual amount of input power that ITER might require could be as high as 620 MW.
Based on 620 MW of input power, ITER will not produce a thermal power-output surplus of 450 MW, as implied on the ITER Web site. Instead, it would result in 120 MW of net power consumption.
Misleading public descriptions of ITER’s energy balances have made it difficult for journalists to understand clearly the electrical requirements for producing a 500 MW fusion pulse. The stated 620 MW of input power isn’t just used for the reactor. The ITER Web site says that the “electricity requirements for the ITER [reactor] and its facilities will range from 110 MW up to 620 MW for peak periods of 30 seconds during plasma operation.” ITER has thus commingled the power requirements for the reactor itself with the power requirements for the entire facility.
The ITER organization has not clarified whether those hundreds of megawatts are required for additional street lights and facility offices during those 30-second pulses or whether most of the 620 MW is required for the reactor to get 500 MW of thermal output. Based on the imprecise stated input power range of 110-620 MW, a 500 MW thermal output could result in either a power output that is 450% of the system input, which is above system break-even (but half as much as the stated 10 times gain) or a power output that is 95% of the system input, which is below break-even.
www.iter.org “What Will ITER Do?” (Retrieved Dec. 15, 2016)
www.iter.org “Power Supply” (Retrieved Dec. 15, 2016)
