Sir, - Mr Jim Woolridge (October 1st) called on me to comment on the issue of radioactivity arising from nuclear fusion. As a person who has played a modest role in recent years in the European Union's nuclear fusion programme, I am happy to do this.
It is not claimed that nuclear fusion is pollution-free or hazardfree. It does indeed use radioactive tritium as fuel, and some of the materials of a fusion reactor will have to be disposed of as radioactive waste. But its advantages over nuclear fission are substantial: a fusion "Chernobyl" could not happen; there are no routine radioactive discharges to the environment or spent fuel to be disposed of; the waste that is created will be shorter-lived and therefore easier to manage; the fuel is cheap and virtually inexhaustible.
The world's resources of coal, oil and gas will eventually be exhausted (unless the threat of climate change makes it necessary to stop using them even sooner). Renewables and energy efficiency should be promoted, as Mr Woolridge urges, but their most ardent advocates do not claim they can supply more than a fraction of the world's long-term energy needs.
The development of fusion is indeed slow and expensive. But, even with the drawbacks it does have, it may ultimately be the one thing that can save our children's children from freezing in the dark. Could they forgive our generation if we threw in the towel on its development, rather than trying to make it available for them as an option, which they can use if they need and wish to do so?
I wish to add that the views I have expressed about the merits of nuclear fusion are personal ones. The RPII as an institution does not hold a brief for any particular form of energy. - Yours, etc.,
Assistant Chief Executive, Radiological Protection Institute of Ireland, Dublin 14.