How to start a fire?

Evidence of early camp fires was found in Africa. A million years ago our ancestors used controlled fire that changes human diet and the ability to defend themselves against wild animals. Fire has been both helpful and fascinating to mankind.

Nowadays we don’t use controlled fire directly in our houses, but we still take advantage of it: Fossil fuels are burned in power plants to produce the energy we need in our daily life. The predictions how long the reserves of fossil fuels will last differ, depending on who analyses the resources. One thing is certain: some day fossil fuels will be exhausted. Therefore scientists and decision makers are looking for new energy resources. One of them could be the use of the fusion process that has been happening in the Sun for 4.5 billion years with temperatures of 15 million degrees. To use this energy source on Earth physicists and engineers aim to reach temperatures ten times higher than in the Sun. JET as a European fusion experiment can achieve these extreme conditions under which the process is investigated in detail to use it in future power plants.