General Fusion appears to be one step closer to making Canada a major player in fusion reactors.
Fusion power has been widely seen as a potential leap forward in zero-emissions energy.
The Richmond, BC-based experimental energy development company says its Lawson Machine 26 (LM26) demonstrator has created the first magnetized plasma contained in its target chamber. Fusion reactors use extreme heat and pressure to fuse atomic nuclei and release energy. These reactions take place within the fourth state of matter, called plasma, under immense heat and pressure.
In other words, General Fusion claims to have made a vital ingredient it needs to move forward with fusion reactors.
The achievement comes 16 months after General Fusion built LM26. The machine is now creating plasmas “daily” while the team turns its attention to compression, according to the firm. Compressions have also produced fusion neutrons, the company claimed in a statement.
The firm hopes to make fusion reactors more practical. Other approaches rely on high-powered lasers (known as Inertial Confinement Fusion) or superconducting magnets, which are used in machines called Tokamak reactors, to create fusion conditions. General Fusion’s Magnetized Target Fusion instead uses mechanical compression to produce fusion in pulses at a lower cost. The invention creates its own fuel and has a built-in way to collect the resulting energy, the company says.
The aim is to commercialize magnetized target fusion within the next decade. The company hopes a single plant will generate 300 megawatts electrical (MWe), or enough energy to continuously power about 150,000 Canadian homes, while staying competitive with alternatives. General Fusion claims electricity providers can repurpose existing facilities, and that they can place reactors close to where they’re in demand.
The milestone helps in “de-risking LM26 and preparing [the company] for the new chapter” in its work, founder Michel Laberge said in a statement.
General Fusion has received several rounds of public and private funding since its inception in 2002. The company has raised $440 million to date, including $69 million from the federal government through the Strategic Innovation Fund. Natural resources minister Jonathan Wilkinson believes the company is backing Canada’s reputation as a “powerful innovator” in nuclear science thanks to its plasma breakthrough.
Fusion power has been widely seen as a potential leap forward in zero-emissions energy. In addition to providing power on a large scale, it doesn’t carry the radiation risks associated with nuclear fission reactors. The technology could help address rising electricity demands ranging from electric vehicles through to AI computing.
Fusion reactors have been in development for decades, however, and it’s not yet clear that they’ll be ready for real-world deployment in the near future. In 2024, South Korea’s KSTAR (Korea Superconducting Tokamak Advanced Research) team only maintained plasma in its device for 48 seconds, or well short of the five-minute target set for 2026—let alone the long durations needed for steady-state reactors based on that technology.
General Fusion’s reliance on burst operation helps it avoid that problem. However, it still has a number of progress markers ahead before it has production-ready tech. LM26 has yet to reach the three temperature levels that will be required to bring the technology online: 10 million degrees Celsius, 100 million degrees Celsius, and the “scientific breakeven equivalent” level where the energy released is equal to the heating power required. That also doesn’t include the transition from demonstrators like LM26 to full power plants.
Feature image courtesy of General Fusion.