What the Singapore Consortium lacked in deep pockets, it made up with sheer numbers.  In its heyday the Consortium boasted more than 150 corporations.  Most of them serviced clients in Southeast Asia and the Indian subcontinent.  Also onboard after slipping their assets offshore were Chinese entrepreneurs who had grown too successful and drawn the envy of the ruling mandarins.  Lastly, the Consortium forged joint ventures with startups in SOAM and Africa, even gained a few sympathizers based in the Middle East.

 

The Consortium divulged its game plan step by step, coinciding with each new phase of activity.  The overall project was absurdly ambitious, and the methods of achieving it were laughable.  Each new revelation inspired a rash of boardroom smirks and water-cooler jokes.

 

The Consortium proposed to use raw materials from near-earth asteroids to build solar sats, which made sense in a way because it avoided the steep costs of lifting so much mass from earth's gracity well.  But they faced enormous problems.  First, they needed reliable space vans to reach the distant rocks.  Second, they needed robotic helpers to process the minerals and then to retreve and assemble precise components in the hostile conditions of high-earth orbit.  They were breaking new ground and were certain to face major setbacks at every stage of the operation.

 

Meanwhile the researchers at ITER realized that commercial tokamaks would never happen without ample feedstocks of helium3—a rare isotope of helium that was difficult to harvest on earth.  However, large amounts of helium3 lay in abundance on the lunar surface.

 

World governments had finally grasped the need to reduce their dependance on fossil fuels, but no one wanted to adopt draconian measures, such as stiffer carbon taxes, more windmills, fewer growth hormones fed to livestock, compulsory hairshirts or diets of bread and water.  The global community siezed on nuclear fusion as the cure-all for climate-driven mayhem.  They formed Space-Faring Enterprise (SFE) to spread the capital costs around.

 

China and USA assumed the leadership roles—China laying out a good chunk of the funding and USA lending the technical expertise.  The dual leaders cited their long-held rivalry and mutual distrust when they resorted to closed-door negotiations.  They emerged with crooked smiles and awarded the best contracts to corporations aligned with their homelands.  Other members of SFE felt snubbed and short-changed.  It wasn't long before the Russians sold the Consortium two-dozen Proton boosters, then Japan offered a cohort of quasi-intelligent robots, and ESA signed on to deliver prefabricated space vans.

 

The media jumped all over the competitive storyline—two daring bids to rid the world of carbon overload.  Webcasters portrayed the Consortium as a kind of NGO that dared to cross swords with the superpowers of the developed world.  Networks ran headlines of the Great Space Race: "David vs. Goliath"—"Solar Collectors vs. Tokamaks"—"Intrepid Explorers vs. Big Science"—"South vs. North."

 

Bookmakers in Vegas gave the consortiun 25-1 odds to produce the first gigawatt of untainted energy.  SFE received 2-3 odds.  Side bets were placed on what year the energy would come onstream.

 

The jaded public became fascinated.  All eyes turned to the sky.  Even launches of robotic supply ships drew crowds of avid viewers.  Glimmers of hope infused those who had gone through storm surges, smog alerts, urban brownouts, food shortages, decades-long droughts, toxic water wells, freak blizzards and destructive tornadoes.

 

Cooler heads remained skeptical of the unfounded optimism.  They urged climatologists to appear online and set things straight.  Reputed spokespersons reminded everyone that atmospheric carbon wouldn't disappear overnight.  Decades would pass before weather patterns normalized and ocean levels ceased to rise.  The encroaching deserts could take longer to become fruitful croplands, and some fish species might never recover.

 

But sober words couldn't dampen the embers of hope that spread like wildfires across sun-baked scrub.  Folks were sick of the gloom and doom that had plagued the start of the 21st-century.  They refused to accept the austere measures proposed by eco evangelists.  They dreaded a future that promised mist-only showers and one toilet-flush per day.  They wanted a noble cause to rally around.  When humans returned to the moon after more the fifty years, cheers echoed across restaurants and hypermalls.  Pedestrians strolled with more spring in their steps.  Hypermalls recorded record sales during the holiday season.  New job openings sprang up across the globe.

 

Even the politicians had gotten caught up the infectious optimism.  They were pleased with the ongoing progress at the lunar base, where robotic skimmers had collected and processed enough helium3 to warrant the 1st-shipment back to earth.  The settlers also processed more cylinders of lox than they'd ever use themselves.  Since oxygen was a versatile component for rocket fuel, SFE suggested using it to refuel spacecraft bound for Mars.

 

A Mars mission made perfect sense at the time.  SFE partners saw it as excellent PR.  Exploration of the red planet would galvanize the public's attention.  It would transform SFE's image from "Ominous Goliath" to "Jolly Green Giant" and deflect the public's sympathies away from the underdog Consortium.

 

SFE scientists appeared on newscasts where they sniffed at the drawbacks of beamersats, which would aim their microwaves as straight down as possible to minimized atmospheric bleed-off, so the receptor complexes would be located at or near the equator.  The scientists declared that microwave beams would prove harmful since they'd carry enough juice to power the electric grids of whole nations.  Passengers in jumbo jets or airships would experience blistered skin and scrambled brains if they strayed too long within the beam radii.  Even though many receptors would be located atop mountain ranges, air travelers would have to detour around every microwave hazard.

 

On the other hand, scientists declared that tokamak reactors were totally harmless by comparison.  Nuclear fusion created no dangerous byproducts, such as plutonium or other radioactive isotopes.  The process emitted only small numbers of neutrons which were captured inside the metal containment vessels.  A person could stand 25 meters away from an active tokamak for a month of Sundays without receiving an overdose of radiation.  Tokamaks were safer than mothers' milk.

 

Meanwhile the Consortium was struggling to assemble its first beamersat.  Robotic glitches forced more human EVAs than anticipated.  As well, there were costly delays as construction crews awaited materials to be shuttled from the NEA to the construction platform in L5.

 

SFE managers greeted these developments with ravenous grins.  Their project was on schedule with regular shipments of helium3 delivered to earth.  Both politicians and transnats envied the Consortium's assets.  They knew the Consortium lacked government funding.  Only Kenya and Ecuador, which stood to be primary hosts for the receptor complexes, had agreed to underwrite a portion of the Consortium's debts.  As soon as commercial tokamaks came onstream, the partners of SFE planned to cannibalize the Consortium's assets for a song.

 

Back at the ITER complex, scientists had split into bickering groups along national lines.  They argued over the best design for commercial tokamaks and where 1st-reactor should be erected.  Although the ITER prototype emitted sufficient energy to power a fair-sized grid, its fusion cycle didn't operate continuously.  Even with the helium3, scientists couldn't get the duty cycle to last more than 35 minutes before compulsory shutdown and restart.  This quirk would cause problems for commercial reactors, which were expected to produce 24/7.  Serious arguments emerged on how best to extend the duty cycle.

 

Chinese scientists were first to abandon ITER.  They formed an unlikely partnership with their Indian counterparts.  Both demanded a portion of the helium3, so they could pursue their own tokamak designs on Asian soil.  Then Japan, Korea and Russia formed a joint venture for the same purpose.  Not to be outdone, USA collared Canada and México and made a similar call on helium3.  Euroland scientists, who had been the founders and sponsors of ITER, found themselves alone at the table.  They squawked and threatened to sue for breach of promise, but eventually they agreed to a four-way split of the helium3 supply.      

 

Observers were surprised at the speed in which new tokamak sites were chosen in Szechwan, Hokkaido, Arizona and Belgium.  Cynics opined that the four-way split had been planned all along.  Whatever the case, each group announced they would begin operations within two years, and project officials signed preliminary agreements with electrical utilities.

 

A few months later, a notorious webcaster claimed that a shipment of helium3 had somehow gotten lost.  The rumor was never confirmed, but journalists noted increased activity among the Coalition dedicated to thwarting terrorists.

 

Then the unthinkable happened.  A clandestine research facility in Mogadishu triggered a thermonuclear fireball that flattened the whole city.  Investigators speculated that terrorists were attempting to build a potent suitcase bomb by adding stolen helium3 to the hydrogen core, and the device went off prematurely.  Whatever the intent, the humans killed or maimed numbered in the hundreds of thousands.  News of the calamity came as a horrific shock, even for the media-jaded folk of the 21st-century.

 

Within a week, popular enthusiasm for tokamaks turned to disgust and fear.  No matter how many scientists came online to dismiss the Mogadishu group as foolhardy tyros, the public continued to equate the tragedy with tokamak technology.  Demonstrators took to the streets in dozens of cities.  They protested the use of nuclear fusion of any kind.

 

"Why were commercial tokamaks sited away the from urban centers?" the protesters asked, before answering their own question, "Because they're unproven and unsafe."

 

Governments issued press releases stating that bomb making and tokamak technology are totally different endeavors.  But the public wasn't buying.  Rational arguments blew away like radioactive dust against the storm surges of popular protest.  Molehills became mountains; errant neutrons became precursors of Armageddon.  Folks didn't want a tokamak in their backyard.

 

Meanwhile the Singapore Consortium became the last great hope for a carbon-neutral future.