Abstract
There is a growing recognition that we need an alternative to conventional fossil fuels. Shortages of oil and gas have the potential to cause economic and political instability, and burning fossil fuels can cause environmental damage, as well as being the likeliest cause of global warming. Fusion - the process that powers the sun and stars, has the potential to provide large-scale, safe energy production, without adding to global warming and without the long-term radioactive waste associated with conventional fission power stations. More importantly, within the next 20 years large-scale fusion power production is planned to be demonstrated by the multinational experiment ITER, and a proposed `fast track' to fusion envisages a time-scale of roughly 30 years for a prototype power plant PROTO to be built.