The US Department of Energy is preparing to announce this week a “major scientific breakthrough” in the field of nuclear fusion, it said in a statement on Sunday, AFP reported.

The British daily Financial Times (FT) reported a few hours earlier that scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), located in California, recently achieved a “net energy gain” in an experimental nuclear fusion reactor.

This will be the first time that researchers will be able to produce more energy in a fusion reaction, such as that produced on the Sun, than the amount of energy consumed during the process, which will be an important discovery in the field of research related to obtaining a carbon-free energy source. writes Agerpres.

Asked for comment on the FT article, officials at the Department of Energy and LLNL told AFP that US Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm would hold an event on Tuesday to “announce a major scientific discovery”.

An LLNL representative added that “the analysis is still ongoing.”

“We look forward to revealing more information on Tuesday when this process is complete,” the same source added.

The fusion reaction, which produced a net energy gain of 120 percent, took place over the past two weeks, the FT reported, citing three people with knowledge of the preliminary results of the experiment.

Its proponents see nuclear fusion as the energy of the future, especially because it produces no greenhouse gases and produces very little waste.

“If this discovery is real, it could fundamentally change the situation on our planet,” California Congressman Ted Lew wrote on Twitter after the FT article was published.

Fusion differs from fission, a method used in modern nuclear power plants that breaks the bonds between heavy atomic nuclei to recover energy.

Fusion is the reverse process: two light atomic nuclei are combined into one heavy one. In this case, two hydrogen isotopes that give rise to helium atoms.

LLNL’s facilities consist of nearly 200 lasers the size of three football fields aimed at a tiny spot where they send high levels of energy to initiate a fusion reaction.​

(article photo: ©Pop Nukoonrat|Dreamstime.com)