The Nuclear Power Thread

[Dale]

The article does not discuss the expected electrical output, although an article published through ANS suggests 20 kWe, which is confirmed by the INL presentation below (gehinj-w15-hv.pdf).

I can’t see the legal/regulatory issues ever making a 20 kW nuclear power plant viable

 

[Astronuc]

I can’t see the legal/regulatory issues ever making a 20 kW nuclear power plant viable

The 100 kWt (20 kWe) is a demonstration module. I would expect micro-reactors to be larger, and perhaps be used to district heating, as well as electricity. I don't know how such a plant would be scaled up with Stirling engines. An efficiency of 20% is rather poor.

It may be more of economics as it relates to design to meet legal/regulatory (safety) requirements.
https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML2004/ML20044E249.pdf (February 5, 2020)

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is working to have an effective and efficient mission readiness for reactors that differ considerably from those currently licensed. Micro-reactors, that is, reactors that have a thermal power of no more than tens of megawatts, are one class of these advanced reactors. This report is to articulate the technical and regulatory issues that will need to be addressed for NRC to have the ability to review licensing applications for micro-reactors. Many of the issues center around the fact that a) these reactors may be operated remotely and/or semi-autonomously and b) it will be difficult to analyze risk from new, unique, technologies. Initial thoughts are given on how probabilistic methods could be used to determine risk and how the current approach for reviewing non-power reactors could be useful for micro-reactors.

My bold for emphasis.

https://gain.inl.gov/MicroreactorProgramTechnicalReports/Document-INL-EXT-19-55257.pdf
Key Regulatory Issues in Nuclear Microreactor Transport and Siting, INL/EXT-19-55257, September 2019

SECY-20-0093, POLICY AND LICENSING CONSIDERATIONS RELATED TO MICRO-REACTORS, October 6, 2020
https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML2012/ML20129J985.pdf

SECY-20-0093, Enclosure 1, Technical, Licensing, and Potential Policy Issues for Micro-Reactors
https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML2025/ML20254A365.pdf

The NRC has to give them serious consideration, IF there are interested parties willing to put up some support. Micro-reactors have been under consideration for several years, and I understand that the intent is to provide a power source to remote locations.

Nuclear Energy Institute, "Micro-Reactor Regulatory Issues," November 13, 2019
https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML1931/ML19319C497.pdfIF at least one of the fusion concepts is viable, especially if it based on the aneutronic p-B11 reaction, then a lot of current nuclear technology could be short-lived. Then again, an industry devoted to p-B11, will be highly dependent on available B11.

https://www.usgs.gov/centers/nmic/boron-statistics-and-information

According to Statista, "As of 2020, Turkey had the largest reserves of boron globally. Turkey has an estimated 1.1 billion metric tons of boron in reserves. The United States and Russia shared the second highest boron reserves with just 40 million metric tons."
https://www.statista.com/statistics/264982/world-boron-reserves-by-major-countries/

Contrast the boron resources with uranium resources.
https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/pre...seeable-future-say-nea-and-iaea-in-new-report

The world's conventional identified uranium resources amounted to 8 070 400 tonnes of uranium metal (tU) as of 1 January 2019. These represent all reasonably assured and inferred uranium resources that could be recovered at market prices ranging from 40 to 260 USD/KgU (equivalent to 15 to 100 USD/lb U3O8).

https://www.world-nuclear.org/infor...ycle/uranium-resources/supply-of-uranium.aspx

I know of a program to extract U from seawater, among other programs.

 

[Mayhem]

Question: Could you use green energy to enrich uranium for reactor use? Sometimes wind mills will produce excess energy at night due to low consumption and high winds.

 

[russ_watters]

Question: Could you use green energy to enrich uranium for reactor use? Sometimes wind mills will produce excess energy at night due to low consumption and high winds.

You can use any electricity that's on the grid; even baseload nuclear energy that isn't easy to throttle.

 

[russ_watters]

I can’t see the legal/regulatory issues ever making a 20 kW nuclear power plant viable

The 100 kWt (20 kWe) is a demonstration module. I would expect micro-reactors to be larger, and perhaps be used to district heating, as well as electricity.

Well, I'll go a step further and/or clarify: I think modular construction has significant benefits for improving the existing large plant paradigm, but that's it. The legal/regulatory issues make site selection one of the biggest hurdles in plant construction, and building more small plants makes the problem worse, not better. The security issues and costs would be worse with small plants as well.

The benefit I see to small reactors is that it may be able to rapidly mass produce them in a factory, which could shorten construction and economic payback timelines. The "plant" would then be mostly electrical infrastructure, and once that's completed you could start lining/piling-up the modular reactors one at a time, connect and commission them and start generating power (and more importantly, income) faster.

 

[Dale]

I think modular construction has significant benefits for improving the existing large plant paradigm

That is a good point. Standardization and cross training would be easier, and site design would be simplified.

 

[Astronuc]

Well, I'll go a step further and/or clarify: I think modular construction has significant benefits for improving the existing large plant paradigm, but that's it. The legal/regulatory issues make site selection one of the biggest hurdles in plant construction, and building more small plants makes the problem worse, not better. The security issues and costs would be worse with small plants as well.

The benefit I see to small reactors is that it may be able to rapidly mass produce them in a factory, which could shorten construction and economic payback timelines. The "plant" would then be mostly electrical infrastructure, and once that's completed you could start lining/piling-up the modular reactors one at a time, connect and commission them and start generating power (and more importantly, income) faster.

Yes. According to the NuScale paradigm, there are two (or three) principal objectives.

1. Build a system that is inherently safe, such that is requires a much smaller plant site (and emergency preparedness zone).

2. Build a lower cost containment system by requiring less construction material than the typical Gen-3/3+ LWRs. In the NuScale system, it will be important to demonstrate that a failure of one unit will not propagate to the other units. I believe that has been done, but I have not kept up with developments for some years now.

3. Provide modular reactor units and get each up and running in order to being generating revenue ASAP.

4. If at all possible, build on existing sites already approved for an NPP, or on sites of existing fossil generation (e.g., retired coal plants), which would utilize existing infrastructure to connect to the grid.

For non-LWR systems, some are proposing a fuel system and reactor systems that will retain fission products in the event of a severe accident. Such a system requires demonstration, which I understand will be underway soon.

 

[Astronuc]

On the subject of modular reactors based on advanced concepts, i.e., modular Gen4 types, Ultra Safe Nuclear Co. is offering their Micro Modular Reactor (MMR™) system to deliver safe, clean, and cost-effective electricity and heat to remote mines, industry, and communities. Canada is interested for power at remote sites which have high costs associated with fuel delivery for local generation plants (often using diesel generation).
https://usnc.com/mmr-energy-system/

USNC states, "The buried reactor core consists of hexagonal graphite blocks containing stacks of Ultra Safe’s FCM™ fuel pellets. The MMR™ reactor core has a low power density and a high heat capacity resulting in very slow and predictable temperature changes."
https://usnc.com/fcm-fuel/

USNC also has a space reactor program for nuclear propulsion, and power systems for Lunar and Mars bases.
https://usnc.com/space

My guess is that General Atomics (GA) or BWXT would be involved in the fuel manufacture.

 

[etudiant]

Although the economic benefits of a small reactor appear compelling, the regulators are certainly also conscious that suicide squads are now an established aspect of terrorism.
It will be a challenge to design an effective and yet terrorism resistant SMR.

 

[Astronuc]

Although the economic benefits of a small reactor appear compelling, the regulators are certainly also conscious that suicide squads are now an established aspect of terrorism.
It will be a challenge to design an effective and yet terrorism resistant SMR.

The original designs for containment assumed that the US would never be attacked so that the plants would never experience an artillery barrage or bombing by air. Of course, all that change on September 11, 2001.

It is relatively simple to design an appropriate reinforced structure. The details are plant specific and are not disclosed publicly under Safeguards regulations.

 

[Astronuc]

Some recent work involved technology developed in the 1950s-1970s.

Westinghouse Astronuclear Laboratory - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westinghouse_Astronuclear_Laboratory

GE had a similar unit, but I can't find the details at the moment. A fellow graduate student took a job their briefly, about 1 year, but left when work stopped due to cancellation of the program.

A little bit of trivia, "The idea for Ansys was first conceived by John Swanson while working at the Westinghouse Astronuclear Laboratory in the 1960s."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ansys#Origins

 

[artis]

@Astronuc I find it hard to believe that the US did not plan for a possible critical infrastructure attack prior to 9/11?

I mean unlike the jihadists the USSR had all kinds of missiles including ICBM's with thermonuclear warheads and I think I can bet my money that at least a dozen were aimed at the largest nuke generating plants.
Well surely no containment could withstand a thermonuke warhead but it should at least withstand a conventional missile with explosives ?
I guess it depends on the type of missile used.

 

[russ_watters]

@Astronuc I find it hard to believe that the US did not plan for a possible critical infrastructure attack prior to 9/11?

There was this:
https://interestingengineering.com/crashed-jet-nuclear-reactor-test

Well surely no containment could withstand a thermonuke warhead but it should at least withstand a conventional missile with explosives ?
I guess it depends on the type of missile used.

Yeah, protection doesn't need to be absolute, just enough that the attack has to be more extreme than the damage. I live just a few miles from a nuclear plant and if someone blows it up with a nuclear bomb, it won't be fallout from the plant's fuel that kills me.

More likely a state actor attack would go after the electrical distribution, which is unprotected. Different goals.

 

[gmax137]

it should at least withstand a conventional missile with explosives ?

Why? Why should the nuclear containment be built to a different standard than any other structure? Say Hoover Dam? or The Astrodome? The NY Stock Exchange?

I'm not denying that a military attack on nuclear power plant could make quite a mess. But so could an attack on any number of other targets. And the containment buildings are already among the most robust of targets, short of underground bunkers like Mt Weather.

 

[Astronuc]

@Astronuc I find it hard to believe that the US did not plan for a possible critical infrastructure attack prior to 9/11?

They did, but not with a large commercial aircraft. Other, more conventional attacks were considered, and protections were in place. I witnessed these in person.

I mean unlike the jihadists the USSR had all kinds of missiles including ICBM's with thermonuclear warheads and I think I can bet my money that at least a dozen were aimed at the largest nuke generating plants.
Well surely no containment could withstand a thermonuke warhead but it should at least withstand a conventional missile with explosives ?

In most cases, a typical PWR containment would. Fukushima demonstrated some shortcomings in the older containment systems for BWRs. More modern containment systems are more like PWR containment systems.

I guess it depends on the type of missile used.

Of course.

There was this:
https://interestingengineering.com/crashed-jet-nuclear-reactor-test

Aircraft are mostly light aluminum alloys with some steel and nickel-bearing alloys. The main concern is the spindle from the aircraft engines. However, that has now been considered. New methodologies and design tools have been put in place, and new plants are even more robust than existing plants.

Outside of containment, the concern would be loss of offsite power (LOOP) and loss of heat sink. That is now considered, and to some extent has been demonstrated with some recent natural disasters.

 

[Astronuc]

Just some historical material, a bibliography of LITERATURE ON LIGHT WATER REACTOR (LWR) FUEL AND ABSORBER ROD FABRICATION 1960 - 1976. I believe NSA is Nuclear Science Abstracts.

https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/7290655

I remember when some of this stuff was relatively new, and I know and have worked with a number of authors.

 

[Astronuc]

Hopefully, lessons learned.

The US Army tried mobile nuclear power at remote bases 60 years ago, and it didn't go well
https://techxplore.com/news/2021-07-army-mobile-nuclear-power-remote.html

We have learned a lot in 60+ years.

The military boasted that the nuclear reactor there, known as the PM-2A, needed just 44 pounds of uranium to replace a million or more gallons of diesel fuel.

The PM-2A was the third child in a family of eight Army reactors, several of them experiments in portable nuclear power.

AEC, October 1968 - POWER REACTORS IN SMALL PACKAGES
https://www.osti.gov/includes/openn...Atom/Power Reactors in Small Packages V.2.pdf

 

[Vanadium 50]

The US Army tried mobile nuclear power at remote bases 60 years ago, and it didn't go well

It did not.

On the other hand, the Navy's NR-1, with a reactor the same scale, did.

 

[anorlunda]

It did not.

On the other hand, the Navy's NR-1, with a reactor the same scale, did.

Thanks for the lead. I never heard of NR-1 before. An internet search did not turn up much about the design. It is probably classified. But I did find this. This and other references hint that it was a scaled down version of the reactors used on submarine warships -- that's where Knolls' expertise was.

https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/ship/systems/nr-1.htm
The preliminary design study Rickover assigned to Knolls. By January 1965 the Schenectady laboratory had determined that a small pressurized-water-reactor propulsion plant was feasible. To no one's surprise, the study showed that the nuclear research submarine would be larger than non-nuclear research submersibles. The reactor compartment had to be a certain size to provide for space and shielding to reduce radiation levels. Shielding posed a special problem; it was not only heavy, but its weight was concentrated in a small area.

 

[Vanadium 50]

It is also worth mentioning that the NR-1 reactor design was 10-15 years after the Army small reactor design. And of course, land is not sea.

 

[berkeman]

I never heard of NR-1 before.

Yoiks...

A book about NR-1 by a crewmember, states that it was "unsafe" to go aft of the sail on the surface on the NR-1 when the reactor was operating.

 

[anorlunda]

Yoiks...

Yeah, the same article I linked earlier said.

The reactor compartment had to be a certain size to provide for space and shielding to reduce radiation levels. Shielding posed a special problem; it was not only heavy, but its weight was concentrated in a small area.

The propulsion motors were already outside the hull. I wondered if anyone back then considered moving the reactor away from the inhabited spaces, as in the movie 2001. Water makes a good radiation shield.

 

[Astronuc]

It is also worth mentioning that the NR-1 reactor design was 10-15 years after the Army small reactor design. And of course, land is not sea.

According the AEC booklet, ALCO was the manufacturer of PM-2A (criticality in October 1960), and design was probably done ~1958-1959. ALCO was struggling at the time as their locomotive business cratered in the 1960s. One of the main suppliers of generators and motors, GE, decided to enter the locomotive business as a competitor. Prior to that GE had manufactured custom electric locomotives.

NR-1 was done by the Navy with their BAPL and KAPL laboratories. Their program was generally of higher quality than those of the Army. The limited information indicates the reactor was operational in 1969, so was probably designed ~1967-1968 and constructed ~1968-1969.

 

[Astronuc]

16 August 2021 - Turbine tests completed at China's HTR-PM
https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/Turbine-tests-completed-at-Chinas-HTR-PM

Testing of the steam turbine using non-nuclear steam has been completed at the demonstration high-temperature gas-cooled reactor plant (HTR-PM) at Shidaowan, in China's Shandong province. The twin-unit HTR-PM is scheduled to start operations later this year.

Non-nuclear steam flushing is an important test for nuclear power projects to check the operating quality of steam turbine units and conventional island systems prior to start up. The test verifies the design, manufacturing and installation quality of the steam turbine set.

The steam turbine of the HTR-PM reached operational speed using non-nuclear steam at 8.30pm on 14 August, China Huaneng announced today. It said all parameters, such as power and temperature, attained good standards; the main protection parameters were normal; and the auxiliary engine system operated stably.

Construction of the demonstration HTR-PM plant - which features two small reactors that will drive a single 210 MWe turbine - began in December 2012. Helium gas will be used as the primary circuit coolant. China Huaneng is the lead organisation in the consortium to build the demonstration units (with a 47.5% stake), together with China National Nuclear Corporation subsidiary China Nuclear Engineering Corporation (CNEC) (32.5%) and Tsinghua University's Institute of Nuclear and New Energy Technology (20%), which is the research and development leader. Chinergy, a joint venture of Tsinghua and CNEC, is the main contractor for the nuclear island.

 

[Astronuc]

Interesting statement: https://www.royce.ac.uk/collaborate/roadmapping-landscaping/fusion/

The UK is a world leader in fusion technology and has an ambitious programme for a net positive energy spherical tokamak by 2040. The programme is at the concept stage and major opportunities exist to identify, select and develop materials systems for structural and functional requirements which will then be used in the prototype and commercial reactors.

Royce worked with the UK Atomic Energy Authority to develop a focused technology roadmap for baseline and value-add materials for fusion. The output is a clear commentary on the current strengths and opportunities, technology gaps, and investment requirements.

Since there exists an ITER Materials Property Handbook, I'm wondering what we have been doing the last 50 years that we still need to identify materials to accomplish CTRs.

 

[anorlunda]

Interesting statement: https://www.royce.ac.uk/collaborate/roadmapping-landscaping/fusion/Since there exists an ITER Materials Property Handbook, I'm wondering what we have been doing the last 50 years that we still need to identify materials to accomplish CTRs.

It sounds like, "Fund me for (at least) the next 29 years before judging my success."

 

[etudiant]

Cruel, but true.

 

[Astronuc]

Meanwhile, back at MIT

In 2015, a group of physicists at MIT did some calculations to rethink how we're approaching the problem of fusion power. High-temperature, nonmetallic superconductors were finally commercially available and could allow the generation of stronger magnetic fields, enabling a simpler, more compact fusion reactor. But the physicists behind the work didn't stop when the calculating was done; instead, they formed a company, Commonwealth Fusion Systems, and set out to put their calculations to the test.

On Tuesday, Commonwealth Fusion Systems announced that it hit a key milestone on its quest to bring a demonstration fusion plant online in 2025. The company used commercial high-temperature superconductors to build a three-meter-tall magnet that could operate stably at a 20-tesla magnetic field strength. The magnet is identical in design to the ones that will contain the plasma at the core of the company's planned reactor.

https://arstechnica.com/science/202...ts-key-milestone-big-superconducting-magnets/

Let's see where we are 4 years from now.
https://news.mit.edu/2021/MIT-CFS-major-advance-toward-fusion-energy-0908

Commonwealth Fusion Systems - https://cfs.energy/
https://cfs.energy/technology

Commonwealth Fusion Systems is collaborating with MIT’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center to build SPARC, the world’s first fusion device that produces plasmas which generate more energy than they consume, becoming the first net-energy fusion machine. SPARC will pave the way for carbon-free, safe, limitless, fusion power. This compact, high-field tokamak will be built with HTS magnets, allowing for a smaller device than previous magnet technology. SPARC is an important step to accelerate the development of commercial fusion energy.

Three and one-half months, or 114 days, left in 2021
https://www.psfc.mit.edu/sparc

The MIT Plasma Science & Fusion Center in collaboration with private fusion startup Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS). is developing a conceptual design for SPARC, a compact, high-field, net fusion energy experiment. SPARC would be the size of existing mid-sized fusion devices, but with a much stronger magnetic field. Based on established physics, the device is predicted to produce 50-100 MW of fusion power, achieving fusion gain, Q, greater than 2. Such an experiment would be the first demonstration of net energy gain and would validate the promise of high-field devices built with new superconducting technology. SPARC fits into an overall strategy of speeding up fusion development by using new high-field, high-temperature superconducting (HTS) magnets.

The first step in this roadmap will be to carry out research leading to development of the large, superconducting magnets needed for fusion applications. Once the basic engineering of HTS fusion magnets is established, the next step will be to use that technology to build SPARC. Preliminary analysis has led to a conceptual design with a 1.65m major radius and 0.5m minor radius operating at a toroidal field of 12 T and plasma current of 7.5 MA, producing 50-100 MW of fusion power. Its mission will be to demonstrate break-even fusion production and to demonstrate the integrated engineering of fusion-relevant HTS magnets at scale. While audacious in its goals, SPARC leverages decades of international experience with tokamak physics and is a logical follow-on to the series of high-field fusion experiments built and operated at MIT.

 

[artis]

From what I understand SPARC is just "another" tokamak which suffers/benefits from most of the features of tokamaks in general, namely the pulsed operation due to plasma induced currents via transformer action, need for a blanket to breed tritium as well as absorb neutrons etc.

Also @Astronuc from your quoted text , I don't understand how SPARC benefits in the toroidal field direction , it says 12 T toroidal field , Iter also has such field strength toroidally, but Iter has a larger size so the curvature bending is less, I can't find the plasma current for Iter so can't compare on that note.
Maybe you can comment on where the potential "upshot" is for SPARC as compared to Iter purely performance wise not considering time/cost etc.?

 

[Astronuc]

Also @Astronuc from your quoted text , I don't understand how SPARC benefits in the toroidal field direction , it says 12 T toroidal field , Iter also has such field strength toroidally, but Iter has a larger size so the curvature bending is less,

Of hand, I don't know. I'd have to look at the dimensions, but my initial guess would be that SPARC should have lower Surface/Volume ratio, so losses should be less. I'd have to look at the plasma temperatures as well in order to determine the confinement pressure which is limited by the mechanical strength of the structure supporting the magnet(s). I recall that 70 atms pressure was a typical limit, but it might have been increased during the last 35 years.

 

[green slime]

As was fleetingly mentioned much earlier in the thread, I'm wondering if the enormous amount of effort (money, materials, research, energy) spent on chasing Nuclear fusion, wouldn't be better employed utilising currently available technologies to solve the energy issues... We are literally talking trillions of USD, man-centuries of research, and exotic materials. Yes, Fusion research is nice. But if the technology is still decades away, is this really a good way to be spending these sums of money now?

 

[Astronuc]

We are literally talking trillions of USD, man-centuries of research, and exotic materials.

Since 1954 through early 2021, the US has spent about $17.1 billion on fusion, or ~$34.1 billion adjusted for inflation. I believe ITER is included in the total funding, but one must peruse the cited references to figure out if that is the case.
http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2021/ph241/margraf1/

But if the technology is still decades away, is this really a good way to be spending these sums of money now?

Previous posts indicate a goal of 4 to 5 years. We'll see in 4 or 5 years.

As for exotic materials, same can be said for fission systems. Many are not so exotic, but the US, UK, EU and Japan, South Korea, and Russia and China, have spent considerable sums on variations of stainless steels and Ni-based alloys (and related alloys), a variety of ceramics, carbon-composites, graphite, and various reactive metal and refractory metal alloys for exotic fission systems, but also for fossil fuel systems. There is a huge array of Ni-based and Co-based alloys for aero-derivative combustion turbines.

Many of the alloys used in nuclear power systems (LWR, CANDU and Gas-cooled reactors) evolved for fossil fuel technology, e.g., austentic and ferritic/martensitic stainless steels. Each of the Gen-IV reactor designs requires some 'exotic' materials.

Ni-based alloys evolved from aerospace technology, e.g., Inconel for the X-plane program. Zirconium-based alloys (e.g., Zircaloys and their successors) are unique to the nuclear industry, although analogs of Zircaloys (Zircadynes) with natural levels of Hf still intact are used in certain applications in the chemical process industry. Similar, Nb, Ta, Mo, W and Re alloys have special applications in a variety of process industries other than nuclear power.

What is unique about nuclear applications is the presence of neutrons and gamma radiation in the operating environment. The radiation, in addition to temperature, affects the alloy microstructure over the course of years, or decades. Neutrons transmute elements (nuclei), sometimes in a beneficial way, but also in deleterious ways. Gammas influence the chemical potentials of atoms in an alloy, and this is an area that is not well-understood.

 

[bhobba]

I'm wondering if the enormous amount of effort (money, materials, research, energy) spent on chasing Nuclear fusion, wouldn't be better employed utilising currently available technologies to solve the energy issues... We are literally talking trillions of USD, man-centuries of research, and exotic materials. Yes, Fusion research is nice.

If Fusion is achieved, the payoff is staggering. It is without a doubt a transformative technology like driverless cars will be when finally perfected. Everything is risk/reward. With such a vast reward, the risk for many looks worth it. For me, it is. But of course, opinions will vary. That's the thing about science/technology/engineering - probably best expressed by this amusing video by Sabine Hossenfelder on Climate Change:


It gives us knowledge and tools. What we do with it is up to us.

Thanks
Bill

 

[green slime]

If Fusion is achieved, the payoff is staggering.

It gives us knowledge and tools. What we do with it is up to us.

Thanks
Bill

If... Undoubtedly. And yet... Research is all fine and dandy. When is it time to have the discussion on the consequences for our society? Researchers gladly fob off morality discussions onto the wider audience, which is gladly ignoring everything but the latest entertainment buzz. Politicians wait until it is a fact. Corporations lobby for their own profiteering.

Once the cat is out of the bag, you cannot put it back. So postponing the discussion until the research is achieved get's us nowhere. If ever achieved, it will be implemented. It will be too late to have the discussion.

What has cheap energy in the form of fossil fuels really meant for life on the planet? If we look beyond the obvious benefits for mankind (for example, increased agricultural output, increased wealth and trade, etc): We see accelerated extinction rates across all wild species, global warming, increased pollution, etc.

Given Joven's paradox, is commercial nuclear fusion really an ambition worth striving for?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox

 

[Dale]

When is it time to have the discussion on the consequences for our society? Researchers gladly fob off morality discussions onto the wider audience, which is gladly ignoring everything but the latest entertainment buzz. Politicians wait until it is a fact. Corporations lobby for their own profiteering.

Frankly, I think this is nonsense. The consequences are always part of the discussion, from the beginning. Pretending like such discussions are not happening all the time is ridiculous. How do you think researchers get funding? The consequences are always part of that discussion

What has cheap energy in the form of fossil fuels really meant for life on the planet?

This is not a particularly relevant question in discussing cheap energy in the form of nuclear fusion.