Helion Energy Will Provide Microsoft With Fusion Power Starting in 2028
Helion Energy will provide Microsoft with fusion power starting in 2028:
Helion, the clean energy company with its eye firmly on the fusion prize, announced a couple of years ago that it had secured $2.2 billion of funding to help it develop cleaner, safer energy at a commercial scale in November 2021. Today, it is starting to reap the fruits of its labor, announcing an agreement to provide Microsoft with electricity from its first fusion power plant, with Constellation serving as the power marketer and managing the transmission for the project.
Fusion has been the energy goal for over 60 years, as it produces next to no waste or radioactivity while processing and is far less risky than fission. But achieving the same process that occurs in stars has proved mighty difficult to contain, with it taking more energy to keep the reaction under control than it can generate. Progress has been slow and steady, with the potential rewards keeping companies such as Helion focused on the reaction. Helion has been working on its fusion technology for over a decade. To date, it has built six working prototypes and it expects its seventh prototype to demonstrate the ability to produce energy in 2024.
With this in mind, Helion's plant is expected to be online by 2028 and has a power generation target of 50MW, or greater, with a one-year ramp-up period. While that might seem a long way into the future still, it's significantly sooner than the projections had suggested.
"This collaboration represents a significant milestone for Helion and the fusion industry as a whole," said David Kirtley, CEO at Helion, in a statement to TechCrunch. "We are grateful for the support of a visionary company like Microsoft. We still have a lot of work to do, but we are confident in our ability to deliver the world's first fusion power facility."
This Startup Says its First Fusion Plant is Five Years Away. Experts Doubt It.
Helion, backed by OpenAI's Sam Altman, has already lined up Microsoft as its first customer:
A startup backed by Sam Altman says it's on track to flip on the world's first fusion power plant in five years, dramatically shortening the timeline to a carbon-free energy source that's eluded scientists for three-quarters of a century.
Helion Energy's announcement that it's on the verge of commercializing the process that powers the sun is an astounding claim—and a questionable one, according to several nuclear experts. That's mainly because the company hasn't said and won't comment on whether it's passed the first big test for fusion: getting more energy out of the process than it takes to drive it.
[...] Nevertheless, the 10-year-old company, which is based in Everett, Washington, has already lined up its first customer for the planned commercial facility, striking a power purchase agreement with the software giant Microsoft. Helion expects that the plant will be built somewhere in the state of Washington, go online in 2028, and reach its full generating capacity of at least 50 megawatts within a year.
[...] Other fusion startups are aiming to begin operating power plants in the early 2030s, and plenty of observers think even those timelines are overly optimistic.
Unless Helion has made some major advances that most organizations would have trumpeted, the company still faces a series of very difficult technical tasks, says Jessica Lovering, executive director of Good Energy Collective, a policy research group that advocates for the use of nuclear energy.
[...] "The truth is fusion is hard, and new power plants are hard, and first-of-a-kind anythings are also hard," he says. "It's one reason we're trying to get out in front and trying to solve all those problems today."
(Score: 4, Funny) by bzipitidoo on Friday May 12, @06:46AM (2 children)
I sure wouldn't trust a tech startup. Most are pie-in-the-sky dreaming, blurring the line between wild optimism and outright lying. How long now has useful quantum computers been in the works? Yeah.
So why'd MS go for this one? Maybe they carefully vetted the claims and really believe Helion. I think more likely they're gambling because they're MS and have piles of cash to throw around.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by canopic jug on Friday May 12, @07:08AM
M$ is a specialist in vaporware going back to the OS/2 days. So it would fit.
As vaporware, the goal is not really the one stated up front but usually a distraction from something else such as a lack of money. M$ does not have piles of cash. That lack of cash is indicated by the many rounds of layoffs, including multiple rounds in the Seattle area. One factor which probably contributes to the layoffs is the blocking of the Activision Blizzard acquisition, which has preventred m$ from loading their debt onto yet another buyout like they seem to have been doing for survival for a long time.
Money is not free speech. Elections should not be auctions.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Friday May 12, @02:09PM
Fusion has been only 10 to 20 years away for the last 20 to 50 years or so. Quantum computing is the new kid on the block as far as this marketing campaign is concerned. Fusion is the definition of pie-in-they-sky dreaming. Just gotta make a mini-sun-in-a-bottle and harness that energy. Even if they had the science worked out, all that would be left is the marketing/implementation, that's easy, right?
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 5, Touché) by Opportunist on Friday May 12, @07:21AM (7 children)
For the past 50 years, it was 10 years away, but for the next 50 years, it will only be 5 years away!
(Score: 5, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 12, @10:04AM (2 children)
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Friday May 12, @03:20PM (1 child)
That only counts, if you can harness it, instead of being obliterated by it.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 4, Funny) by Thexalon on Friday May 12, @05:49PM
The good news is that we've been harnessing power from that fusion reactor for roughly 4 billion years. We have access to the technology, it's called the chloroplast, and it's been around for an incredibly long time.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by VLM on Friday May 12, @11:49AM (1 child)
Scalable downward.
Back in the 50s we could have built a simple linear solenoid magnet fusion plant, but the engineering scaling issues mean it would have been visible from space, likely have cost about 100x the GNP, generated more power than the planet has copper to make wiring to use, dumped enough thermal energy to melt the ice caps, etc.
Its really REALLY easy to make a giant fusion reactor, just get trillions of Kg of hydrogen in one place. A little easier to make an uncontrolled terawatt source, just make a nuclear bomb and set it off. Its easy to make a giant simple dumb reactor that is too large for humans to realistically mfgr, like larger than planetary scale. Its hard to make a tiny little reactor that only generates a couple GW in a realistically constructable small building.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Friday May 12, @03:24PM
"So, you're telling me there's a chance?" https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/so-youre-telling-me-theres-a-chance [knowyourmeme.com]
SpaceX, will be the first to create a Fusion Reactor, in Space!
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday May 12, @02:00PM
If they get this working successfully by 2028, then humanity will finally have achieved fusion power only twenty years from twenty years ago.
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Friday May 12, @03:28PM
According to the chart, just the easy stuff is left, then: https://xkcd.com/678/ [xkcd.com]
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by looorg on Friday May 12, @08:50AM (1 child)
Sweet! My Delorean needs a new power upgrade. I have been stuck in the 2020's for far to long. I'm coming Doc!
Still they are breaking the pattern, useful new super tech is at least always perpetually 10 years away. So if it's only five years away now they must be really onto something ...
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 12, @08:59AM
SpaceX founded March 14, 2002. First successful launch 28 September 2008.
That's a bit more than five years. I guess fusion power is easier because it ain't rocket science? 😉
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Gaaark on Friday May 12, @11:42AM
I smell a snake-oil salesman.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 5, Insightful) by VLM on Friday May 12, @11:44AM
Here's an interesting business model idea:
For more than a generation, ethanol has been a thing. So instead of burning one barrel of crude oil as diesel or gas etc, burn two barrels of crude oil to tediously and expensively mfgr the ethanol energy equivalent of one barrel of crude and sell it using greenwashing and government corruption. Using ethanol as a fuel causes twice the environmental damage of not using ethanol, but no one cares as long as its marketed as "green" and they pay off the govt officials to require it.
So.... why not try this business model with fusion? Sure, we can't break even, but looking at ethanol, plenty of people make money off not breaking even with ethanol... Make a giant building. Pump in 100 MW of electricity on one side. "Greenwashing magic happens" inside. Pump out 10 MW on the other side. Sell the 10 MW as "green fusion holier than thou power" for 20 times the KWh cost of real electricity (which means a 200% profit...).
Everyone benefits. Well, except the environment, but everyone knows nothing is more destructive to the environment than corporate greenwashing so who cares, made money?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by anotherblackhat on Friday May 12, @01:05PM (1 child)
Microsoft agreed to either buy electricity at market rates, or failing that, get paid?
And this is supposed to be good news for Helion?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by stormreaver on Friday May 12, @01:27PM
I don't think Microsoft will ever get paid. In five years, we'll read a story about Helion's bankruptcy.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by SingularityPhoenix on Friday May 12, @03:14PM
1) Science proven. 2) Technology proven. 3) Demonstration plant. 4) Commercial plant.
They can sign contracts for commercial plants all they want, and gamble on where things will be in 5 years. The science is proven, we know fusing atoms is possible. We don't have the technology to do it (kiloton yields don't make good power plants). After the research reactor is able to prove the technology, they will build a demonstration plant (maybe that is what the contract is for), that is not full scale, but to find any issues with scaling it up (you don't invest the money in a full scale plant without being sure it will work).
So tell me about how we're signing contracts for #3, and I'll point to how #2 isn't done yet, and say wake me up when they do #2 and I'll believe your time frames for #3.
Its like that EM reactionless drive. If you really are able fundamentally break the laws of physics as we know them, the story will be about that. Not some space engine (proving the technology). 1) Science proven. 2) Technology proven. 3) Demonstration engine. 4) Commercial engines.
(Score: 2) by SomeRandomGeek on Friday May 12, @04:12PM
Whenever we talk about fusion, it inevitably gets pointed out that it is the same thing that goes on in the sun. But in important ways it is not. Fusion in the sun is really not a very intense process. A compost pile produces more energy per square meter than the sun does. But the sun is so big that all that low intensity energy release adds up. A fusion reactor must be much more intense than the sun in order to produce useful amounts of energy.
https://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2012/04/17/3478276.htm [abc.net.au]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by ElizabethGreene on Friday May 12, @05:08PM (1 child)
I've spent more than a decade now tracking Tesla and SpaceX, and I think the math used for Elon time is applicable here. Elon is infamous for saying something is X1 time away, and then after X1 time says it's X2 time away. That process repeats until Xn approaches zero or the project is canceled. The key to understanding when something will actually happen is the second derivative of time, the amount each interval changes compared to the last.
Commercial fusion was 30 years away for many decades, then 10 years, and now 5. 0%/0%/0%/0%/66%/50% is a small data to plot for the decay function, but best guess the real number is ~ 8 years.
HTH.
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Saturday May 13, @03:40PM
I like to talk about dt/dt on these projects (derivative of estimated time with respect to real time). I worked for many years on a project where dt/dt was about 1. We did get there in the end, but it was painful.
(Score: 2, Funny) by squeedles on Friday May 12, @06:36PM
Don't want to get pedantic with the naysayers, but it would be plasmaware rather than vaporware.
But seriously, I wish them well. It looks like they are working on their seventh test article, which is the sort of thing I'd expect from someone who is actually trying to build a thing, rather than just shake down VCs.
(Score: 2) by jb on Saturday May 13, @05:33AM
I had my doubts about this until I saw the name of their first customer.
If any organisation in the world deserves to disappear in a massive fireball, it's got to be Microsoft.
(Score: 2) by srobert on Saturday May 13, @02:01PM
I've been so worried about climate change. Now that we know that fusion reactors are only 5 years down the road, we can just forget about that, and focus on one of the many other existential threats to our world.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14, @06:23AM
TFA suggests they think they will do this by fusing deuterium and helium-3. Yes, do tell us more about your business case where you are going to use unobtainium fuel worth multiple orders of magnitude more than its weight in gold in order to run a viable commercial power plant selling electrical energy which is worth some pocket change per MWh. Like who the fuck actually thinks this is a commercially viable business plan and invests actual money into it?
Helium-3 is practically nonexistent on Earth, making up something like 1 part per million of all the world's helium. Basically all the He-3 that we do have exists only because we produce it in nuclear reactors (pretty much exclusively as a side effect of producing tritium to make hydrogen bombs). Street price of He-3 is on the order of 10000 USD per gram (not as insane as proposing to use tritium for a commercial power plant at least).
A power plant that runs by literally burning money is almost certainly more cost effective, and also you don't have to worry about exhausting the entire world's fuel supply as long as the the money printer keeps going brrrrrrrrr. That is probably a more sensible use of investor dollars if the goal is commercial power generation.