That's really cool. I took a tour of the Princeton Tokamak back in the 80's and knew one of the electricians who worked on the project. That's where I heard the joke about fusion power always being 50 years away. But it looks like they're getting really close with both the Tokamak (magnetic) kind and what the article calls the inertial (laser) kind.

The thing I've never understood though is how you scale up the inertial kind. I'm guessing you use the lasers to keep the fuel compressed but I don't really have any idea.

Fun fact: fusion, at least the way it occurs in our sun, depends on quantum tunneling to work. The sun doesn't have enough mass for heat and compression alone to do the job.

edit: I thought this quote was funny - "I think a lot of people are jazzed." Man, I thought I was old. LOL.