Iran's atomic body claimed on Thursday it has mastered the technology of nuclear fusion, in a declaration on the eve of the 32nd anniversary of the Islamic revolution. "By the method of inertial confinement lasers, significant research has been successfully conducted in the field of nuclear fusion," the Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran said on its website.
Without saying that an actual fusion experiment had been successfully carried out, it stated that "a machine to make nuclear fusion laser was manfactured by the faculty of science and technology at the AEOI." "With the manufacture of this machine... Iran becomes the sixth country to master this technology," after United States, Japan, France, Australia and South Korea, it said.
In July, Iran said it was looking into how to build an experimental nuclear fusion reactor, adding that if successful it would be the first such plant in the world. Iran's then atomic chief Ali Akbar Salehi said Tehran had set up a eight-million-dollar fund to conduct "serious" research into nuclear fusion.
"It takes 20 to 30 years before this process can be commercialised but we have to use all the capacity in the country to provide the necessary speed for fusion research," Salehi was quoted as saying at the time. Nuclear fusion has long been touted as a cheap, safe and clean energy source of the future, but efforts to harness it for power generation have so far failed to bear fruit.
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