If all goes well, it might take another five-to-10 years before ITER achieves the promised goal of a ten-fold “return on power” (500 MW of fusion power from 50 MW of input heating power). //

Ironically, I am convinced that the ITER fiasco will actually accelerate, rather than slow down, progress toward the practical realization of fusion power. //

One indication is accelerated plans by China and Japan to build their own national “DEMO” plants, without necessarily waiting for the results of ITER to come in. Both nations have reactor projects underway, which could in effect substitute for the role of ITER and accelerate development on the basis of knowledge and technologies that did not exist when the final design of ITER was approved, in 2001.

South Korea is designing a “K-DEMO” reactor, intended to generate approximately 2.2 GW of thermal power and supply over 500 MW to the electricity grid.