[toveja]

59 megajoules of sustained energy ^over the course of a few seconds^.

Ideally this energy output would be sustained for days within ITER.

JET is not designed to do this, as it has a copper magnet system, which means if you try to sustain such a plasma (confined with around 5 T magnet and around 2 MA plasma current) for longer than a few seconds, you would melt the magnet.

Edit: ITER would operate at 5-10 T, and around 15-20 MA plasma current.

[tsimionescu]

Note that these are 59MJ of energy released by the fusion reaction. No attempt was made to actually catch them. And even if they had been captured, they would not have been able to power the magnets + cooling systems used to confine the plasma. We are very very far away from actually producing even 1W of usable fusion power.

[toveja]

You are correct that at JET there is no tech installed to absorb the neutrons, nor will there ever be in JET, since (as pointed out above) it is a _research_ device.

Current fusion devices are not nor were they ever designed to generate electricity for a grid.

This is why we build ITER, and DEMO thereafter. Generating 'usable fusion power' is limited to building reactor scale experiments, which to date, has not been done (ITER will be the first).

[tsimionescu]

ITER is also not planning to capture the neutrons. It is only planned to produce more thermal energy than the total amount of electrical energy put in.

DEMO will be plants built independently by several nations following the research from a successful ITER. They will be the first time that any attempt is made to actually convert the fusion products into electricity. There are currently no concrete plans for any DEMO plant - those are contingent upon ITER's success.

If everything goes to plan, the first model DEMO plant would begin operation in 2051. So, as I said, we are a long way away from producing even 1W of usable electrical power from fusion.