06/15/2026
Scientists in South Korea held a star alive inside a machine for 102 seconds and it may have just rewritten the future of energy. The Korea Institute of Fusion Energy ran its KSTAR reactor at temperatures exceeding 100 million degrees Celsius 🔥 which is seven times hotter than the core of our actual Sun. This record breaking achievement in early 2024 was confirmed by researchers and puts the world significantly closer to producing energy from nuclear fusion the same process that powers every star in the universe.
Fusion energy produces no carbon emissions no long lived radioactive waste and uses hydrogen isotopes found abundantly in seawater as fuel meaning it could theoretically power human civilization for millions of years 🌊. The international ITER project backed by 35 nations including the US China and the European Union is now under construction in France aiming to demonstrate fusion at commercial scale. Scientists at MIT and private companies like Commonwealth Fusion Systems are racing alongside to build compact reactors by the 2030s. If this works every energy crisis humanity has ever faced becomes a problem of the past.
Sources: Korea Institute of Fusion Energy 2024 / ITER Organization / MIT Plasma Science and Fusion Center / Commonwealth Fusion Systems