Nuclear Fusion Is in Trouble

[00:00] I am very fond of nuclear fusion. I honestly  believe it’s the energy source of the future.   But it’s not looking good. Nuclear fusion  is in deep trouble. Let’s have a look.

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[01:22] of science for just $22.45 per month until  July 4th. And now back to the science news. In the past twelve months,  multiple fusion companies   have silently changed their plans or  moved completion dates into the future.

[01:38] Zap Energy, for example, is a  Seattle-based company that wants   to use what’s called the Z-pinch method  to generate nuclear fusion. For this,   one charges a huge capacitor and then suddenly  releases the energy into the fuel gas.  

[01:52] The electricity turns the gas into a plasma  and creates lightning bolts that contract   until fusion sets in. Theoretically.  In May 2021, they announced almost  

[02:04] 30 million dollars in funding and were, quote  “targeting scientific energy breakeven by 2023.” Well, that didn’t happen, did it?  Then, just a few weeks ago they   announced that they’re pivoting  to nuclear fission. According to  

[02:19] their website “Today Zap is announcing that  we’re building not just a fusion company,   but an integrated nuclear platform that spans  both advanced fission and fusion technologies.”

[02:31] Then there is Marvel Fusion,  a Munich-based company doing   laser-driven fusion with ultra-short femtosecond  pulses. They’ve raised about 160 million euros,  

[02:43] including from Siemens Energy and  the EU Innovation Council. In March,   told investors they plan to sell their  laser technology for defense, medical, and   industrial uses. So not like they are giving up  on fusion, but focusing on more immediate payoffs.

[02:57] They’re also considering relocating to  the US. I can’t blame them. In Germany,   the first step is to fill out Form B-377  for permission to think about sunlight.

[03:12] First Light Fusion, a UK-company, has completely  given up on their original plan. It started out   looking good for them. They successfully  demonstrated nuclear fusion by firing a   projectile at a fuel target. In 2023, they signed  an agreement with the UK Atomic Energy Authority  

[03:28] to build a demonstration facility. But two years later, they published   a “strategic update” that said they were  “discontinuing the proposed development…   to focus on advancing and commercialising  its patented amplifier technology”.

[03:43] Then they put out plans for a new  demonstration machine with a vague   completion timeline sometime in the  2030s, but also announced they will   be selling parts to other companies which  they started doing in April. So you see,  

[03:57] there’s a pattern here, fusion companies  shifting to selling related technology. The same thing happened with the Australian  company HB11 Energy which pursued hydrogen-boron  

[04:10] fusion. When they launched in 2021 they said  their program is, “aimed at the Holy Grail   of fusion energy research — to demonstrate net  energy gain”. But in late 2024, they announced   a shift to selling laser and target technologies.  In their own words because “few private investors  

[04:27] [are] willing to wait decades for a return. ” Then there are the companies that silently move   their dates. Like General Fusion. They’re a  Canadian company. In 2021 they announced they  

[04:41] would build a Fusion Demonstration Plant  in the UK, with construction starting in   2022 and operations by 2025. Then the timeline  slipped to completion in 2027. Then the entire  

[04:53] project just… disappeared. That’s one way to  reach confinement. They then instead built a   smaller demonstration machine in Vancouver and now  aim at a commercial power plant in the mid-2030s.

[05:05] Where does their money come from? In January,  they announced that they plan to put out   stocks by the middle of the year. And they’re  doing this via a SPAC deal with Spring Valley,  

[05:17] that’s the same company that brought NuScale’s  small modular reactors on the stock market! If you don’t know what a SPAC is, I  talked about this in an earlier video   on quantum computing. Basically it’s a way  to circumvent proof of commercial viability. 

[05:33] Then there is Helion Energy, which wants to  generate fusion by shooting plasma rings at   each other and that is, among others backed  by Sam Altman. In 2014, they wrote on their   website that they “aim to have a commercial plant  operational in six years”. Six years later… their  

[05:50] plan was still to do it six years later. In  2021, they raised half a billion dollars and   said they want to generate net electricity from  fusion by 2024. Then they said they are “on   track” to generate energy “by 2028”, and now say  somewhat vaguely “before the end of this decade.”

[06:07] The US-Company Commonwealth Fusion  Systems said in 2021 they want to   demonstrate net energy by 2025. Didn’t  happen! Their webpage now says it will  

[06:19] achieve net energy “in 2027.” Yeah,  hmm, guess we will see about that.  You may have noticed a pattern here, it’s  that all these companies are American,   British or Canadian. This is for one thing because  most startups are located in these countries,  

[06:34] but it’s also because companies elsewhere have  been more careful with making promises. It’s not   that they are actually more successful elsewhere,  it’s just harder to pin them down on it. To top it all off, the authors of a recent  study in nature report that it is likely  

[06:51] that even if nuclear fusion would generate net  energy, it would remain extremely expensive,   even more expensive than nuclear fusion.  For the record, I think this analysis is   too pessimistic because it’s based on the cost  trajectory of nuclear fission which I think went  

[07:08] badly for geopolitical reasons not because of  technological limitations. But fusion companies   have produced something commercially useful:  press releases with extremely high energy density.

[07:22] Thanks for watching. See you tomorrow.