Three hundred fusion researchers have gathered in Snowmass, Colorado, for a two week Fusion Summer Study. The opening kickoff was on Monday, July 11. The workshop is scheduled to end on Friday, July 23.

During the opening, plenary session, Summer Study co-chair Mike Mauel (Columbia University) told the group that we had "come together to develop a scientific and technical basis for consensus on (1) the key issues for plasma science, technology, and energy and environment for fusion energy development, and (2) the opportunities and potential contributions of existing and possible future facilities and programs to reduce fusion development costs and achieve attractive economic and environmental features." He noted that the Study would consist of six Subtopical Discussion Groups, three meeting in the mornings and three in the afternoon, with frequent Breakout subgroups under each. The three morning groups were on the themes Magnetic Fusion Concepts, Inertial Fusion Concepts, and Emerging Fusion Concepts. The three afternoon groups were on Plasma Science Issues, Technology Issues, and Energy Issues.

Mauel said that "by the end of Snowmass, we should be able to explain technically to the general fusion community (1) why these issues are key and important, (2) how resolution of these key issues will advance fusion energy science, and (3) how existing and possibly future facilities and programs can address the key issues." He said the Proceedings will be published on a CD-ROM and the WWW as a collection of papers in PDF format and that the deadline for submission of written materials for the proceedings is September 10, 1999.

Maule's opening remarks were followed by a series of "motivational" talks.

Hermann Grunder, Director of the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Laboratory, gave the opening speech, in a sometimes evangelical style. Grunder said, "This is a time to look at yourself -- a great scientific community at an historic meeting to embark on a process leading to a vision for the future of fusion." He said, "You have to write the book" for this "unprecedented R&D program." He said "Fusion offers challenges in so many parameters that I cannot help but have admiration for its practitioners, and I am happy to give whatever help I can to this community." He st ressed the importance of having a program that will "excite and engage young people to enter the field," saying "If good students stop coming the game is over." He said it was his impression that the fusion program had "low credibility with our sponsors." He said, "At this point, innovation is at a premium," saying "Don't get frozen in your thinking." He said, "You do need a plan. You do need milestones. You do need to deliver on milestones." He said, "You owe your sponsors cost-effectiveness and accountability. He then requested the audience to chant the following mantra over and over again: "Funding will follow from an innovative, integrated plan." He said that "in plasma physics there are no failures per se, exept mediocrity," but "in developing the energy option, certain approaches will fail or yeild results unacceptable for other reasons." In the latter instance, he said, it is "important to remain intellectually honest and cut your losses." He said that "by dealing with occasional failures timely and honestly, the overall effort is enhanced." He said, "Institutional considerations must take a back seat to what is best for the field, and may the best approach win." He said we should ask ourselves the questions: "How can we get there for the minimum development cost?" and "What are the scientifically/technically relevant milestones?" In summary, he said, "Leadership dedicated to the scientific and techncal goals over institutional goals must emerge," and that "Such a huge R&D program requires a plan that is flexible but accountable." He expressed the opinion that the "costs associated with fusion energy R&D are small compared to the costs to society of not trying."

Marshall Rosenbluth (University of Callifornia at San Diego) told the gathering that, in his opinion, "the reasons for fusion's problems" were (1) society's "lack of concern about energy and environment," (2) "tight budgets and discretionary caps, (3) the "high cost of reactor scale facilities and the long time horizon," (4) the "perception that fusion is impractical and too expensive," and (5) the "multiplicity of (fusion) options." He called for "more scientific empowerment" and "more extensive use of new tools, e.g., computation coupled to theory and experiment and modern diagnostics." He said, "Obviously the better we understand the physics, the better reactor we can design." He expressed his views about a wide range of fusion concepts and issues. He closed his remarks with a takeoff on the fusion community's interest in pursuing a burning plasma physics facility, by saying, "We must all burn together or we will all get burned separately," He said this was a paraphrase of Benjamin Franklin's famous remark, but that he also had received a private communication from Ben, saying, "Science is fun too, and even sometimes useful."

Fritz Wagner (Institute for Plasma Physics, Garching, Germany) summarized his view of the European program strategy, saying, "The European Union's fusion program is reactor oriented." He said the mandate from the EU Council of Ministers was "The long-term objective of the fusion activities ... is the joint creation of prototype reactors for power stations." However, he said, the actual activities in Europe were "both reactor oriented and science based." He said, "There is a distinct diversification within the main line and a strong representation of alternatives." He said that "Fusion research is rich in science, but most is applied science." He said, "Fusion research without reactor orientation and application has a shaky fundament." He said, "The large devices, designed about 20 years ago, have fulfilled their mission, and have more or less reached their goals and come to an end. The next step is urgently needed." He said that "In the EU, ITER has the support of the majority and this majority is also the carrier of the technical and scientific knowledge." He said, "ITER is the only credible next step. It has been developed by a large team over many years which has access to the available knowledge in fusion and industry." He said, "ITER has been realized professionally and by political mandate; it is not the product of an unsupported individual and subjective view on how fusion should be continued." He said, "The next step device must provide the basid for DEMO to be realized in a single further step."

M. Kikuchi (Japan Atomic Energy Research Institute) reminded the group that, on the timescale of human history, we are in the midst of "a very short Fossil Energy Era." He noted estimates that if global warming comes about, a 1 meter rise in sea level would put much of Tokyo under water. He further noted that Japan's climate was such that solar energy in Japan will be a minor contributor, mostly used "to cut peak power demand." He said that "Fusion still has some advantages over other sources" and that the "low cost ITER is worth the investment."

Bob Conn (University of California at San Diego) told the assembly that he was not in complete agreement with Grunder's admonition that "funding will follow from an innovative, integrated plan." In his view, "Major enhancements in fusion funding have been caused by external events." He cited his view that the large fusion funding increased of the mid-1970's were due to "the 1973 oil shock." He cited other external events that influenced fusion funding, such as the 1985 Reagan-Gorbachev summit that led to the ITER effort, and the 1994 takeover of Congress by the Republican Party and the resulting frenzy to cut government spending. He attributed the funding for the National Ignition Facility to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. He opined that the next major external event that might affect fusion could be a recognition of the Climate Change threat. He recommended that the fusion program be prepared to take advantage of an external event when it occured. But, he cautioned, "You cannot come up with a viable fusion power plant design if you only do plasma physics."

Dmitri Ryutov (Distinguished Russian scientist, now at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory), echoed Conn's last admonition, saying, "Plasma physics is necessary but not sufficient for fusion." He said that "fusion research is much bigger than plasma physics." He described a number of possible higher risk paths to fusion for the community to consider, including "much stronger emphasis on fusion technology development," and "aggressive intrusion into the almost unexplored domain of the parameter space of a high density magnetized plasma," while "maintaining a high level of fusion plasma experimentation on the existing medium-to-large size facilities."

David Baldwin (General Atomics) told the group, "We need to focus our attention on a limited subset of the wider range of issues we might otherwise discuss; we cannot afford the luxury of reviewing and discussing the entire program." He said that while "we must develop a shared vision for the program and a consensus that has widespread community buy-in, ... it need not, and probalby cannot be unanimous, but it must be wide and deep." He called for the evolution of a system of "governance," saying, "Consensus cannot be implemented without a means for decision making and execution, and governance cannot succeed without the consent of the governed." He said, "We do need a management or governing mechanism for decisions which move us toward our goal." He said, "There were valid reasons why the tokamak raced ahead of its competitors," but that "we need to determine, in the light of today's increased understanding, whether these advantages were peculiar to the tokamak or whether they could be made to apply as well to another configuration having more desirable power plant attributes." He suggested that, rather than describing the program in terms of "tokamaks and non-tokamaks or about six or seven alternates," we describe the program "as seeking to answer two fundamental questions: (1) What is the optimal configuration having a strong toroidal field, and (2) what is the optimum configuration having weak toroidal field." He said, "If we were to structure our program around these two questions, it would be seen outside as having much greater coherence." He made reference to a "Community Plan for fusion at a recommended level of $300 M/yr" which he said "contains four essential elements: (1) it would make good scientific use of our existing facilities, (2) it would broaden and fill gaps in our magnetic fusion energy portfolio, (3) it would embrace inertial fusion energy as an important fusion energy option, and (4) it would target 2004 to assess our readiness for one or more major initiatives in fusion research."

Mike Campbell (Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory) also told the group that "Fusion energy is not just plasma physics." He said that "In order to rebuild and sustain support, fusion must (1) result in affordable energy (competitive with advanced fossil, fission , or renewable energy production, (2) deal with public concerns about nuclear energy, (3) have affordable development costs with clear milestones and objectives, and (4) have scientific/technical accomplishments and spinoffs that will continually reming the public and government of the quality and value of the program." He said that "Inertial Fusion Energy has the potential to meet these demanding requirements." He described the inertial fusion energy program strategy in some detail.

Rob Goldston (Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory) described the magnetic fusion program in some detail, saying, "There are exciting near-term opportunities for science and innovation." He said that "broadening the fusion program" would "stablize the base of fusion." He said that we should "investigate alternative that resolve tokamak issues and/or lead to more attractive development paths and products." He said that we should "prepare for a major decision to move forward more aggressively in 2003-4, when the climate may have changed."