The year is launched on the latest SteamPunk reactor
General fusion It announced on Tuesday that it had succeeded in creating plasma, a fourth case of the material required for fusion, within the initial model reactor. The teacher represents the beginning of the 93 -week pursuit to prove that the cosmophunk approach to the integration force is still an applicable competitor.
The reactor, is called Lawson Machine 26 (LM26), is General fusionThe latest repetition in a series of devices that have tested different parts of its unique approach. The company collected LM26 in only 16 months, and hopes to reach “Breakeven” at some point in 2026.
The general fusion is one of the oldest Integration companies She is still working. Founded in 2002, it raised $ 440 million so far, according to Luk. During that time, I witnessed that the competitors rise and fall, and like the book of the Grand Integration Industry, it failed to meet the promises of a tie, including one of them made More than 20 years ago.
In the force of integration, there are two points in which the reaction is said. The person who thinks most people is called a trade tie. This is when the fusion reaction produces more energy than the consumer than the entire elbow, allowing the power plant to put electricity on the network. No one has reached this teacher yet.
The other is known as a scientific tie. In this case, the integration interaction needs to be produced at least the energy that has been delivered directly to the fuel. The scientific tie appears only within the boundaries of the experimental system, ignoring the rest of the facility. However, it is an important landmark of any merger attempt. To date, only the National Energy Ministry of Energy I reached it.
General Fusion in the integration force is very different from other startups. The target fusion is called magnetic (MTF), which is similar in some greetings to self -imprisonment, which is the national ignition facility technique used in Late 2022 To prove that fusion reactions can generate more power than they were required to start.
But when the national ignition facility uses laser pressure to press the fuel Pele, the design of the MTF General Fusion is dependent on steam -dependent pistons. Inside the room, the Treeti diotrium fuel is interrupted with a little electricity to generate a magnetic field, which helps to maintain plasma. Then the piston leads the liquid lithium wall on the plasma, which presses it.
When the fuel is compressed, its temperature rises until it provokes the reaction of fusion. Then the liquid lithium reaction, which the company plans to rotate through a heat exchanger to create steam and rotate a generator.
MTF back In the seventies From the US Naval Research Laboratory, where researchers were developing concepts of compact fusion reactors. These efforts did not bear fruit. GENERAL Fusion says that because the presses that press liquids have not been controlled enough, and that modern computers now provide a better opportunity to implement complex dance design.
Whatever the LM26 is accomplished, General Fusion still has more work. The device does not have a liquid lithium wall, instead depends on the solid meter lithium by electrical magnets. This limits the number of tests that the company can take because it takes longer to reset the device. The company has Progress On the initial model of the liquid wall, do more than 1000 tests to find out how it is suspended over time, but merge everything will remain a huge challenge engineering.
Stiring on the switch on LM26 is an important step for a company that is now preceding to connect the power plant alongside a group of new arrivals with them Deep pocket books And aggressive timelines.
