Korea Institute of Fusion Energy
🇰🇷 Daejeon, KR · Active
Also known as KFE
The Korea Institute of Fusion Energy (KFE) is South Korea's government fusion research institute, based in Daejeon. It grew out of a national fusion programme launched in 1996, was named the National Fusion Research Institute in 2007, and became an independent institute under its current name on 20 November 2020. It operates KSTAR, a tokamak with fully superconducting magnets that produced its first plasma in June 2008; in February 2024 KSTAR held a plasma above 100 million kelvin for 48 seconds. KFE also runs Korea's ITER programme.
- Sector
- Fusion
- Technology
- Tokamak
- Role
- Research institute, Operator
It is the operator of record for KSTAR (operating). Measured results for KSTAR are listed below.
Terms
- Tokamak
- Doughnut-shaped magnetic confinement using a strong toroidal field plus a current driven through the plasma itself. The most-studied configuration, and the one ITER uses. Its main open problem is heat exhaust at the divertor, where the plasma edge concentrates power onto a small area, together with the risk of disruptions: sudden, uncontrolled losses of the plasma current.
Results
Ion temperature (sustained)
claimed2024-02
Green light on continuous fusion plasma operations technology
Plasma duration (sustained)
claimed2024-02
Green light on continuous fusion plasma operations technology
Fusion triple product (nTτE)
claimed2014shot 7081
Continuing progress toward fusion energy breakeven and gain as measured against the Lawson criteria
Ion temperature (peak)
claimed2014shot 7081
Continuing progress toward fusion energy breakeven and gain as measured against the Lawson criteria
Energy confinement time (τE)
claimed2014shot 7081
Continuing progress toward fusion energy breakeven and gain as measured against the Lawson criteria
Plasma duration (sustained)
disputed2026-06
KSTAR sustains 100-million-degree plasma for 102 seconds in tungsten divertor campaign
Design values
| Device | Parameter | Value | Unit | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| KSTAR | Major radius | 1.8 | m | design valueclaimed |
| KSTAR | Minor radius | 0.5 | m | design valueclaimed |
| KSTAR | On-axis magnetic field | 3.5 | T | design valueclaimed |
| KSTAR | Plasma current | 2 | MA | design valueclaimed |
| KSTAR | Plasma duration (nominal) | 300 | s | design valueclaimed |
Devices
Related companies
- Commonwealth Fusion Systems
- Maritime Fusion
- Energy Singularity
- Firefly Fusion
- General Atomics
- Institute of Plasma Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences
- ITER Organization
- Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics
- MIT Plasma Science and Fusion Center
- National Nuclear Center of the Republic of Kazakhstan
- Pranos Fusion
- UK Atomic Energy Authority
Sources
- 한국핵융합에너지연구원operator
- 한국핵융합에너지연구원 (Korean Wikipedia)aggregator
- KSTAR (Wikipedia)aggregator