A study group of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) has compiled a policy to add "realization of a society that utilizes nuclear fusion in multiple aspects" to the goal of the "Moonshot R&D Program," a large-scale national research project that tackles challenging research issues. If officially added, research support will be provided with a budget of tens of billions of yen over a maximum of 10 years.
Nuclear fusion is a reaction that occurs inside the sun, and in addition to artificially generating a huge amount of energy, it does not emit carbon dioxide, etc., and has the advantage of being able to procure resources almost infinitely by using hydrogen as fuel, and is expected to be the next generation of energy.
The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) discussed the need to support challenging research in collaboration between research institutes and the private sector, and formulated a policy to add nuclear fusion targets to the scope of the Moonshot Research and Development Program, a large-scale national research project.
Specifically, it calls for "multifaceted utilization of fusion energy by 2050."
The "Moonshot R&D Program" is a project to tackle challenging issues in science and technology with an eye on society 30 years from now, and has so far set goals in nine fields, including AI and quantum computers, and a total of 9 billion yen has been set in funds.
If the goal of nuclear fusion is officially added, research support on the scale of tens of billions of yen will be provided over a period of up to 1950 years.