In a year that has brought us a pandemic, a steep economic recession, and widespread urban rioting, there hasn’t been much to celebrate. But little noticed in the maelstrom of news events has been a technological development that could render the debate over global warming moot once and for all.
Scientists have long sought a way to replicate the energy production process of the sun to generate power. The goal has remained elusive and was widely thought to be decades away. But scientists have published several research papers indicating that the creation of a functioning nuclear fusion reactor might just be feasible with current technology.
Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are cooperating with a newly formed company called Commonwealth Fusion Systems to build a reactor called Sparc. Construction, according to the New York Times, is set to begin next spring and to be completed within four years. If it works, it could use fusion energy to generate electricity in a decade.
“We’re really focused on how you can get to fusion power as quickly as possible,” Bob Mumgaard, Commonwealth Fusion’s chief executive, told the paper, with the goal of having the technology play a role in fighting global warming.
If this much carbon-free energy could be produced, it would completely change the debate over climate change. It is also a reminder that, ultimately, the climate issue will be resolved by technological breakthroughs rather than by regulation that would shove society into a more primitive state in which people have to give up driving, air travel, and beef and use less energy in their daily lives.
Despite every attempt by government to bring down carbon emissions, the only significant decrease in recent years has been thanks to fracking. By making natural gas more affordable, fracking has reduced the amount of coal burnt for electricity, leading to a significant reduction in carbon emissions from electricity generation since 2005 — a reduction far greater than any amount of “awareness” or climate activism has caused in the history of the world. A nuclear fusion breakthrough would drive emissions much lower still, almost immediately, and could eventually bring man-made carbon emissions to zero.
A technological breakthrough that eliminated or significantly mitigated the threat of climate change, such as it is, would have the happy side effect of obviating most of the excuses left-liberals use to advance an economic agenda rooted not in science but in the mythology of their ideology and worldview.
The $93 trillion Green New Deal, the signature legislation of the climate alarmist movement, contains many items that are completely extraneous to the climate debate, and it does so by design. It aims to have government create jobs; to build massive new infrastructure; to guarantee “economic security for all people of the United States,” whether they want to work or not; to secure “healthy food”; to “promote justice and equity by stopping current, preventing future, and repairing historic oppression”; to provide socialized healthcare and subsidized housing.
In short, climate became useful camouflage for a lot of really bad ideas. Fusion will soon render all of them unnecessary. This illustrates the power of science, a happy, disruptive force that keeps making the world a better and more convenient place for everyone.
