Bezos-backed fusion startup raises $100M for nuclear demoPublished:
Tuesday, December 17, 2019
A nuclear fusion startup backed by billionaire Jeff Bezos raised more than
$100 million to help design and build a demonstration power plant.
The company lined up $65 million in Series E financing led by Singapore's
Temasek Holdings Pte, and is getting another $38 million from Canada's
Strategic Innovation Fund, General Fusion Inc. said in a statement
yesterday. It's now attracted more than $200 million in financing.
Canada-based General Fusion is one of about two dozen companies seeking to
commercialize nuclear fusion technology. It relies on the same process that
powers stars, generating huge amounts of energy by fusing small atoms into
larger ones. While it holds out the promise of cheap, carbon-free energy,
researchers have been working for decades to overcome significant technical
hurdles.
"The world is pivoting toward fusion as the necessary complement to other
technologies which, collectively, will enable the carbon-free energy future
we all need," Chief Executive Officer Christofer Mowry said in the
statement.
Firms pursuing such designs are hoping they can start generating power
sooner than the 35-nation, $25 billion Tokamak fusion reactor known as
ITER. Collaborators on that facility — the largest research project in
history — have been laboring on a gigantic demonstration reactor in France
since 2010.
Conventional nuclear power plants use a different technology, fission,
which generates energy as a large, unstable nucleus is split into smaller
elements. Unlike fusion systems, they also produce deadly, radioactive
waste.
The financing round was led by Temasek and joined by existing investors
including Bezos Expeditions and Chrysalix Venture Capital. *— Will Wade and
Jonathan Tirone, Bloomberg*
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