Japanese startup Helical Fusion aims to launch the world’s first steady-state nuclear fusion reactor by 2034, within 10 years. According to the company’s CEO, Takaya Taguchi, the goal is to begin commercial operations in the 2040s.
Despite global efforts to harness fusion, the reaction that takes place inside the Sun, as a carbon-free form of energy, 70 years of research have yet to produce a commercially viable reactor.
“Our goal is to have the world’s first steady-state fusion reactor up and running and generating electricity within the next 10 years,” Helical Fusion’s chief executive told Reuters.
“If successful, Japan, an energy importer, will be able to produce its own energy and even export it, greatly increasing the country’s energy security,” said Taguchi, who worked in banking before founding Helical Fusion with two scientists from Japan’s National Institute for Fusion Science in 2021.
Fusion can be reproduced on Earth by using lasers or magnets to fuse two light atoms into a denser one, releasing energy in the process.
Helical Fusion plans to build the pilot reactor using the helical method, a magnetic approach, with a generating capacity of 50 to 100 megawatts.
“If we operate the pilot reactor from 2034 for a few years (…) we can start building a commercial reactor and put it into operation around 2040 at the earliest,” Taguchi said.
“Japan has already invested about 400 billion yen ($2.8 billion) in research at NIFS and we plan to leverage and commercialize fusion,” he added.
NIFS has one of the largest experimental fusion facilities in the world, which has reached 100 million degrees Celsius and plasma durations exceeding 3,000 seconds.
For decades, scientists have struggled to generate more energy from a fusion reaction than is needed to heat and maintain fuel at more than 100 million degrees Celsius.
Taguchi said significant challenges remain, including raising 1 trillion yen to build the pilot reactor, developing high-temperature superconductivity technology for the coils and establishing safety rules to gain approval to build the equipment.
This content was originally published in Startup wants to launch stationary nuclear fusion reactor in up to 10 years on the CNN Brasil website.
Source: CNN Brasil
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