The 21st International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Fusion Energy Conference kicked off in Chengdu, capital of China's Sichuan Province on Monday.

Over 800 scientists from around the world are attending the six-day event, which is being hosted by a developing country for the first time.

"China was selected to host the conference because its nuclear research institutes have achieved some outstanding experimental results in the field of controlled nuclear fusion," said Pan Chuanhong, director of the Southwestern Institute of Physics (SWIP).

Controlled nuclear fusion replicates the energy generation process of the sun and is nicknamed 'artificial sun'.

China started research into 'artificial sun' in 1965 and the Chengdu-based SWIP, the country's largest institute specializing in controlled nuclear fusion and plasma physics studies, has since built three nuclear fusion research devices.

"Deuterium and tritium extracted from one liter of sea water would produce energy equivalent to 300 liters of gasoline after nuclear fusion," Zhou Caipin, deputy director of Center for Fusion Science of Southwestern Institute of Physics (SWIP), said. "It's unlimited energy will solve the dearth of fossil fuels such as oil and coal and it is much cleaner than fission."

(For more biz stories, please visit Industry Updates)