Or, perhaps, get away from the "producing electrical power from fusion" thing.
Fusion can be used for lots of other useful stuff, most of which does not require "breakeven". While fooling with the non-breakeven applications, much practical information can be gained about the engineering aspects.
Keep in mind that for large scale applications of high neutron doses, it's really hard to beat a conventional fission reactor. On an industrial basis, if you can handle the neutrons safely, you can also handle the fission.
So, you want small scale uses of fusion: neutron production, element transmutation, etc. where a conventional reactor isn't effective (i.e. production of short half life radioisotopes at user site, neutron activation analysis, etc.)
Created on Monday, December 11, 2000 4:19 PM EDT by James Lux