i have a question about fusion.?

Question

if nuclear fusion is sustained wouldnt that mean that a sorta of mini-sun kinda thing would be produced? and if so wouldnt this mean that this little sun would behave much the way our real sun behaves. what im thinking is that if we sustained fusion then we would create a kind of sun and if this is a sun then wouldnt it produce radiation making it just as dangerous as nuclear power plants assuming we used this as a power source.

Answer 1

The only harmful byproduct of a hypothetical commercial nuclear fusion reactor would be a radioactive structure after a lifetime of use which is of little harm to humans. The daughter products are also much less dangerous then the products of nuclear fission and are easier to control. Unlike fission reactors, the fuel isn't stored in one large vessel. The fuel would be brought into the reactor instead of having the fuel part of the reactor. Thus, you would only have about a minute of fuel in the reactor at any given time.

The real danger with fission power plants is the fact that all that radioactive fuel is sitting there in the reactor, years worth. It's daughter products are also dangerous and unpredictable. The reason fusion plants would be less dangerous are because of the small amount of fuel used, the lack of any dangerous byproducts other then the actual reactor structure, and the relatively less dangerous (and possibly inert) reactor fuels used.

Of course, there are ideal reaction methods that use nearly benign fuel and have almost no dangerous byproducts.

Answer 2

Yes, fusion does produce radiation; on the sun, there are constant nuclear explosions which can be seen with proper observation techniques. At the moment we have no way of producing the type of energy that fusion has. Fission is the closes thing we have to fusion, and it is nowhere near as powerful! but, yes, it is true that if we could harness the power of the sun (fusion), we would have radioactive capabilities that would be even more dangerous than nuclear power plants because there would be even greater energy stored. If any sort of explosion would occur, the results could be catastrophic......which is why i hope we never are able to create nuclear fusion here on earth.

Answer 3

yeah, you're sort of right, but with current fusion technology it's a ring of energy, not a ball like the sun. Also, the radiation from nuclear fusion is what we use. The whole point of fusion is to use it in a nuclear power plant.

Fusion is less dangerous than fission(what is currently used in nuclear power plants) because there is little or no radioactive waste to dipose of, making it easier & cheaper to maintain, so NO, IT IS NOT VERY DANGEROUS.

Answer 4

Absolutely. A sustained fusion reaction would generate lots of dangerous radiation.

However, this radiation could easily be absorbed by a few feet of special material -- just like the sun's dangerous radiation is blocked by the earth's magnetic field and the earth's atmosphere.

The big bonus with fusion is that it produces no permanent dangerous waste: After you block the radiation, that's it! The only waste or by-product that remains is HELIUM, which is absolutely non-toxic and harmless (unless you fill your lungs with it while trying to sound like a cartoon).

So, fusion plants would be far less dangerous than fission plants (like we have now), and would not produce ANY pollution -- provided the radiation is properly absorbed by the shielding materials.