Isabelle Boemeke

And yet we're somehow able to tap into that energy and use it to power our lives.

So in the case of fission, you can think of a heavier atomic nuclei.

So the nucleus of an atom that's bigger and you shoot it with neutrons and it splits apart.

And once it splits apart, you get energy that come out of it.

And that is in the form of heat.

Now with fusion, it's the opposite.

You then imagine two smaller atomic nuclei coming together and smashing with such force that they fuse together.

And that process also releases energy.

So both are nuclear energy.

We've only been able to do fission so far.

So every single nuclear reactor in the world is a fission reactor.

Now, fusion, like you said, is the Holy Grail.

This is what the sun does in its core.

But if you have noticed, the sun needs a lot of energy to make fusion happen, right?

So that's one of the biggest problems here on Earth is how do we actually create the conditions necessary for fusion to happen?

And that means it just needs a lot, very, very high temperatures.

You just need to recreate the conditions of the sun, basically.

So that requires a lot of energy.

That's all.

Well, but the biggest thing is really that it just takes too much energy to get a tiny amount of energy out.