The Energy Department’s fusion breakthrough: It’s not really about generating electricity
John Mecklin writes: This week’s headlines have been full of reports about a “major breakthrough” in nuclear fusion technology that, many of those reports misleadingly suggested, augurs a future of abundant clean energy produced by fusion nuclear power plants. To be sure, many of those reports lightly hedged their enthusiasm by noting that (as The Guardian put it) “major hurdles” to a fusion-powered world remain. Indeed, they do. The fusion achievement that the US Energy Department announced this week is…