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Conference Spotlight
Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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Fusion Science and Technology
August 2025
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The newest era of workforce development at ANS
As most attendees of this year’s ANS Annual Conference left breakfast in the Grand Ballroom of the Chicago Downtown Marriott to sit in on presentations covering everything from career pathways in fusion to recently digitized archival nuclear films, 40 of them made their way to the hotel’s fifth floor to take part in the second offering of Nuclear 101, a newly designed certification course that seeks to give professionals who are in or adjacent to the industry an in-depth understanding of the essentials of nuclear energy and engineering from some of the field’s leading experts.
L. J. Wittenberg, J. F. Santarius, G. L. Kulcinski
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 10 | Number 2 | September 1986 | Pages 167-178
Technical Paper | Fusion Fuel Cycles | doi.org/10.13182/FST86-A24972
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
An analysis of astrophysical information indicates that the solar wind has deposited an abundant, easily extractable source of 3He onto the surface of the moon. Apollo lunar samples indicate that the moon's surface soil contains ∼109 kg of 3He. If this amount of 3He were to be used in a 50% efficient D-3He fusion reactor, it would provide 107 GW(electric)-yr of electrical power. The energy required to extract 3He from the lunar regolith and transport it to earth is calculated to be ∼2400 GJ/kg. Since the D-3He reaction produces 6 × 105 GJ of energy per kilogram of 3He, the energy payback ratio is ∼250. Implications for the commercialization of D-3He fusion reactors and for the development of fusion power are discussed.