UK Aims to Build Prototype Fusion Plant for Near-Limitless Power

The British government plans to build a prototype nuclear fusion plant by 2040 as part of its move toward net-zero emissions.

(Bloomberg) — The British government plans to build a prototype nuclear fusion plant by 2040 as part of its move toward net-zero emissions.

UK Industrial Fusion Solutions Ltd. will build the plant on a former coal site in West Burton, Nottinghamshire, in a bid to provide the power grid with fusion energy, according to a statement from the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. 

“The UK is the world-leader in fusion science and technology, and now we are moving to turn fusion from cutting edge science into a billion-pound clean energy industry to create thousands of UK jobs,” said Science and Innovation Minister George Freeman.

A breakthrough in nuclear fusion technology came in December when the US Department of Energy said scientists in California had managed to generate more energy from a fusion reaction than they needed to trigger it. Still, a large-scale feasibility or commercial development to produce carbon-free electricity generated by the same process that powers the sun remains a long way off.

The UK’s plan centers on spherical tokamak, a type of fusion power that mixes two forms of hydrogen and heats them to a temperature ten times hotter than the sun’s core. That creates helium in a reaction that produces large amounts of energy which can generate power.

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