A huge new apparatus was just unveiled in Germany, and it could change humanity’s energy future, if all goes well. It is being called the world’s largest artificial sun, and it was construction out of 149 film project spotlights in the town of Julich, about 20 miles west of Cologne.

This huge “sun” produces 10,000 times the intensity of natural sunlight observed here on Earth because the lamps all concentrate their light on one spot, which heats up to an astonishing 3,500 degrees Celsius. That’s far hotter than what you would find inside a blast furnace.

This artificial light source is not just some experiment for curiosity’s sake. It could help us find a way to concentrate sunlight in a way that would result in hydrogen fuel, which would certainly be a groundbreaking discovery. Today’s solar power stations use mirrors to focus sunlight on water, producing steam, but this would go far beyond that to create a clean and efficient energy source.

The statement reads: “The world’s largest artificial Sun started shining in Jülich on 23 March 2017. Johannes Remmel, the North Rhine-Westphalia Minister for Climate Protection, Environment, Agriculture, Nature Conservation and Consumer Protection, joined Georg Menzen of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (Bundesministerium für Wirtschaft und Energie; BMWi) and Karsten Lemmer, Executive Board Member for Energy and Transportation at the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR), to inaugurate the new research facility Synlight. Among other things, the facility is intended to develop production processes for solar fuels, including hydrogen.”