Iran’s Atomic Energy Chief Says Nuclear Fusion Is the Energy of the Future

TEHRAN — Iran must accelerate its efforts in nuclear fusion because the technology is considered a potential source of future energy and developed countries are investing in it, Mohammad Eslami, head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, said on Wednesday.

Speaking at a ceremony marking the unveiling of four knowledge-based achievements by the organization during Government Week, Eslami said Iran could not afford to fall behind global advances in fusion technology.

“ The nuclear fusion project, which is considered the energy of the future and in which all developed countries are investing, is not something we can neglect or allow ourselves to fall behind in,” Eslami said.

He said Iran’s nuclear industry had advanced despite what he described as psychological operations, sanctions, conspiracies and acts of sabotage aimed at preventing its development. According to Eslami, the Atomic Energy Organization has developed industrial and technological capabilities that enable it to provide products and services to various sectors of the country and reduce its reliance on foreign sources.

Eslami said Iran should rely on its domestic capabilities and create opportunities for all qualified talent and organizations willing to cooperate with the Atomic Energy Organization, asserting that no country was assisting Iran in this field.

He said the organization’s “open innovation” model, launched in 2023, had helped establish a network of knowledge-based companies. In the fusion sector, he added, Iran had moved beyond proving the technology and entered stages involving the construction of systems, platforms and capabilities.

Expanding this network could accelerate the development of a final product, Eslami said. He also emphasized the need to strengthen university laboratories and train professors and students alongside the implementation of fusion projects.

Eslami said Iran’s national fusion and nuclear-energy development plans had been established within the country’s broader policies in the 1990s. He called for the national fusion program to proceed more rapidly and intensively so that it could produce practical results, including through the organization’s Shams network, which he said would initially support research development.

The ceremony also included the opening of a center for training in nondestructive testing, or NDT. Eslami said industries across Iran require such testing and that the new center would provide assessment, qualification and technical training services.

He said industrial quality and standardization depend on knowledge of material properties, including their capabilities and expected service life, as well as precise measurement and adherence to tolerances. The center, he added, could contribute to improving industrial quality and technological development in Iran.

Ali Norouzi, an Atomic Energy Organization deputy and head of the Iran Advanced Technologies Company, said plasma-diagnostic projects were among the organization’s important initiatives because they function as “the eyes of plasma.”

He said diagnosing and controlling plasma is particularly challenging because fusion plasma reaches temperatures of several million degrees Celsius. Specialized diagnostic systems are therefore required to measure factors including ion and electron temperatures, density and energy loss, he said.

According to Norouzi, Iran had previously unveiled one such system and introduced three additional systems this year. He said a number of the systems were now available for installation and use.

The unveiled achievements included tokamak plasma-diagnostic systems known as the photoelectron, bolometry and charge-exchange systems, as well as the NDT testing laboratory.