[Genuine Realist]

We are about 50 years from commercial nuclear fusion, as we have been for the last 70 years.

On the flip side, we have a ginormous working fusion machine that makes more power than we could ever hope to use.  And we've gotten a lot better at using it:



By the way, if you are interested, the Economist had a recent podcast on all the major scientific papers that were big deals but were overlooked because of COVID-19.

https://www.economist.com/science-and-te...-this-year

A few of the ones I'd highlight:
Cancer screening in a blood test: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-17316-z
Room temperature superconductors: https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/10...ductivity/
Why there's more matter than anti-matter: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2177-0

BC

Cynic. 

About 30 years. The progress made in creating the magnetic fields necessary to control the heat has been monumental.

FWIW, there were skeptics about practical fission a century ago. Then WWII came along, the best physicists in the world gathered in the United States, and Fermi did it at Chicago in 1941.

[Genuine Realist]

We are about 50 years from commercial nuclear fusion, as we have been for the last 70 years.

On the flip side, we have a ginormous working fusion machine that makes more power than we could ever hope to use.  And we've gotten a lot better at using it:



By the way, if you are interested, the Economist had a recent podcast on all the major scientific papers that were big deals but were overlooked because of COVID-19.

https://www.economist.com/science-and-te...-this-year

A few of the ones I'd highlight:
Cancer screening in a blood test: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-17316-z
Room temperature superconductors: https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/10...ductivity/
Why there's more matter than anti-matter: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2177-0

BC

Cynic. 

About 30 years. The progress made in creating the magnetic fields necessary to control the heat has been monumental.

FWIW, there were skeptics about practical fission a century ago. Then WWII came along, the best physicists in the world gathered in the United States, and Fermi did it at Chicago in 1941.