European scientists say they have made a major breakthrough in their quest to develop practical nuclear fusion – the energy process that powers the stars.

The UK-based JET laboratory has smashed its own world record for the amount of energy it can extract by squeezing together two forms of hydrogen.

If nuclear fusion can be successfully recreated on Earth it holds out the potential of virtually unlimited supplies of low-carbon, low-radiation energy.

The experiments produced 59 megajoules of energy over five seconds, more than double what was achieved in similar tests back in 1997.

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Nuclear power was a major discovery of the 20th century. Today, it continues to play an important role regarding the future energy mix, climate change, innovation, and proliferation. In fact, we observe an increasing interest in nuclear power to combat fossil fuel emissions and climate change. Bill Gates, Microsoft Co-founder and philanthropist, is investing in so-called “new” nuclear technology, and Frank Thelen, a well-know German VC investor, consiers nuclear power sustainable and a key for decarbonization. So do some countries, like China, Russia, and the United States. Even the Fridays-For-Future movement (FFF) is engaged in this discussion.

In this TEDxTUBerlin talk, I take a different position. As an industrial engineer and political economist, I deploy an interdisciplinary approach: I provide technological arguments, in combination with economic analysis and I address the long-term dream about the “potential” of nuclear power that prevails since 1945, but in reality has never come true. Prof. Dr. Christian von Hirschhausen is a German economist and currently the chairman of the Workgroup for Infrastructure Policy (WIP) at Berlin Institute of Technology (TU Berlin). This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx