Towards tomorrow's energy supply
Representatives from the federal states of Hamburg and Schleswig-Holstein, as well as DESY and European XFEL, present the next steps in fusion research
Generating power through nuclear fusion – a new alliance that includes Hamburg wants to push forward research in this area. The shared goal is to build the world's first commercial fusion power plant in Germany, with cooperation between research and industry.
At a state press conference on 2 December at Hamburg City Hall, Maryam Blumenthal, Senator for Science, Research and Equality in Hamburg, and Dorit Stenke, Minister of General Education and Training, Science, Research and Culture of the State of Schleswig-Holstein, presented the fusion alliance of the states of Hamburg, Schleswig-Holstein, Bavaria, Hesse, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Saxony, as well as the efforts in the field of fusion research from a northern German perspective. As representatives of the scientific community, Beate Heinemann, Chair of the DESY Board of Directors, and Thomas Feurer, Chair of the European XFEL Management Board, provided an insight into the two large-scale research infrastructures in Schenefeld and Science City Hamburg Bahrenfeld.
‘With European XFEL and DESY, we have two large-scale research infrastructures of global significance in the immediate vicinity in the north, and thus ideal conditions for advancing fusion research in a decisive manner,’ says Maryam Blumenthal, Senator for Science, Research and Equality. ‘Renewable energies remain the foundation of our energy transition. But to meet the energy challenges of the future, we need additional, reliable innovations. Fusion research offers another promising avenue – and we are driving this forward here in northern Germany with combined forces, for a secure and sustainable energy supply tomorrow.’
A potential climate-neutral power source
Fusion is the process by which stars, including our Sun, produce their energy. Under the extreme temperatures and pressures that prevail inside stars, small atomic nuclei fuse together to form larger ones, releasing huge amounts of energy in the process. If this process could be used on Earth, there would be a constantly available, base-load energy source that produces no CO2 or long-lived radioactive waste, makes us geopolitically independent and could feed significantly into the hydrogen cycle. At the moment, there are several promising approaches, which can be roughly divided into magnet-based and laser-based fusion. While Germany is already a global leader in magnet-based fusion with the two facilities Wendelstein 7-X in Greifswald and ASDEX in Garching, there is still some catching up to do in laser-based fusion. The latter has been gaining momentum since a positive energy balance was demonstrated for the first time in 2022 at the National Ignition Facility in the USA.
Looking into the heart of fusion with an X-ray laser
The world's largest X-ray laser, the European XFEL in Schenefeld near Hamburg, is predestined for investigating fundamental fusion processes. In particular, researchers at the European XFEL want to contribute to investigating the critical early phases of the fusion reaction. Its experimental facilities are equipped with powerful lasers that generate the very high energy densities required to produce plasmas, an extremely hot state of matter. With the extremely short and intense X-ray laser flashes of the European XFEL, researchers could study the reactions step by step. This would provide extremely detailed images from inside fusion experiments, down to the atomic level.
‘Fusion is one of the greatest scientific challenges of our time and could become an important building block for a climate-neutral energy future,’ says Beate Heinemann, Chair of the DESY Board of Directors. ‘At DESY, we combine cutting-edge research in accelerator physics and materials science with the expertise of our partners, such as the European XFEL, to achieve decisive progress.’
DESY also has extensive expertise in the development and operation of high-power lasers and is working on novel, highly efficient systems for fusion research. Through synergies with the laser-based particle accelerator KALDERA, which enables accelerations around a thousand times higher, DESY is strengthening its role in the development of the world's most powerful lasers for laser fusion.
The Fusion Alliance
With the Fusion Alliance signed on 31 October, the six federal states have taken a decisive step towards the first fusion power plant in Germany and Europe. By joining forces, the aim is to advance technology development quickly, effectively and in a strategically coordinated manner. The goal: research, development, construction and operation of commercially used fusion reactors – in cooperation with industry and research. In this way, Germany aims to take a leading role worldwide in this future technology and tap into another energy source for the future. The alliance focuses on the two most promising approaches to fusion: laser-induced inertial fusion and fusion under magnetic confinement. Parallel research into both technological approaches spreads the technological risks and increases the chance of finding the most economical solutions for a reliable energy supply for different application requirements. The resulting tasks for the individual countries were set out in the jointly signed key points.