MIT-Linked Company Says It Will Build ‘World’s First Grid’ Worldwide Nuclear Fusion Power Plant

Commonwealth Fusion Systems, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology research project, announced plans this week to build what it calls “the world’s first grid-connected power plants.” The plant is expected to come online sometime in the early 2030s, according to the companywill be built in Chesterfield County, Virginia.

The plan is very ambitious, starting with how the power will be created. Nuclear fusion is a complex process that involves the fusion of two lighter atomic nuclei into one heavier one, resulting in the release of large amounts of energy – and it is said to produce four times as much energy such as nuclear fission reactions. The way the nucleus behaves is similar to the way the sun behaves.

It is not difficult to imagine why one would want to use solar energy. It’s hard to, you know, do that. Until now, fusion of nuclear weapons is not possible, especially in a way that would increase the power of use. In 2022, scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California reached nuclear fusion “combustion” for the first time, meaning they extracted more energy from the process. Before that, what happened since they were changedit took more energy to make it happen than the energy it came from.

Commonwealth Fusion Systems has not yet achieved the goal of generating more energy, on Futurism. In fact, the company did not complete the construction small reactor which was designed as a proof of concept for a future larger plant. The work will continue, but it seems that the founders have decided to start working on the assumption that everything will go well instead of checking the boxes first.

The company is promise that when the giant system goes online in Virginia, it will produce 400 megawatts of electricity—enough to power about 150,000 homes. That would be great! It also seems a little ambitious considering the 0 megawatts that have been generated from the process.

There is a reason nuclear fusion has proven impossible so far, but perhaps now that the seal has been lifted on the ignition, the action in the air will come fast and steady. With $2 billion in funding already committed, Commonwealth Fusion Systems has as good a picture as anyone can tell. And if it can’t, maybe it can think of a way to use energy from fire through all that money.