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Unlimited Power Is Nuclear Fusion the Path Forward
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00:00So, hello and welcome to Viva Tech. If you've just joined us, I'm Louise Eklund and I'm really, really thrilled
00:06to be your host here today.
00:07Welcome to all of you that have joined us in the room and those of you that are joining us
00:11at a distance.
00:13I have an iPad here. You can send through your questions whenever you like.
00:16Send your name through as well and we will try to get through as many questions as possible this morning
00:21with my guests.
00:21So we're about to start our second session on Race to Net Zero.
00:25So, we're focusing on nuclear fusion this time and we're looking into what nuclear fusion actually is without getting too
00:32technical, of course,
00:33and investigating on how it could become key and a key solution, especially to our energy problems.
00:41And for this session, I'm thrilled to be joined on stage by two global nuclear fusion players.
00:47I have with me Heike Freunde, COO of Marvel Fusion.
00:51It's a nuclear fusion company using laser technology.
00:54How are you Heike? Are you good?
00:56I'm good. Thanks for having me here today.
00:58Well, it's wonderful to have you with us.
01:00And Gianluca Pisanello, you are COO of First Light Fusion, a global leader in fusion energy research using projectile fusion.
01:10Is that correct?
01:11Yeah, that's correct. And thank you for inviting me. It's great to be here.
01:14Wonderful to have you both with us.
01:16So, let's start with the basics maybe, just getting down to the simple side of things to start with.
01:22What is fusion and how is it different from fission?
01:27When we say fission like that?
01:29Okay.
01:29This is all new for me as well, guys, which is apparently, from what I understand, the traditional method of
01:35doing things.
01:36Maybe Heike, you can start.
01:38Yeah, super happy to.
01:40So, when people think about nuclear, I think most people think about fission.
01:44Yeah.
01:45So, tearing basically nuclear apart.
01:48Okay.
01:49So, we, yeah.
01:50Yeah.
01:50Separate.
01:51So, separate them, exactly.
01:53And in fusion, you do exactly the opposite.
01:55So, you fuse to nuclear, to light nuclear.
01:59And what is the main advantage of this is that unlike in fission, you don't have any nuclear chain reaction,
02:08so no safety risk.
02:09You don't produce any long-lived nuclear waste, radioactive waste.
02:14So, it's a clean, CO2-free energy source.
02:18And so, it's exactly the energy source that we need in the future because there's not enough clean electricity out
02:24there.
02:24All right.
02:25Okay.
02:25So, this is a big solution for the future, obviously, for this transition.
02:30Maybe you can give us some examples to illustrate how it can be applied.
02:35Heike.
02:37Sure.
02:38Happy to.
02:38So, I mean, the key application of fusion are power plants.
02:44And given that they don't have any safety risk, that they don't produce the nuclear waste, you can really build
02:49them next to industrial installations, next to cities.
02:53It's a very dense energy source.
02:56So, you could produce like a gigawatt.
02:58That is like kind of what big power plants produce today on the size of a football field or so.
03:03So, very dense energy source.
03:05It's a 24-7 baseload energy source.
03:08So, especially in the mix with renewables, it's super exciting and promising because currently for the energy mix of the
03:16future, if we are looking at renewables, we don't have that baseload source, right?
03:22So, having something that is not dependent on wind, water, the sun would be amazing.
03:28Also, if you think about regions that have monsoon for many months of the year, right?
03:33Like, having a solution that could actually power these mega cities plus industrial applications is amazing.
03:41Yes.
03:41Gianluca.
03:42Yeah, I think what Heike said is absolutely right.
03:45I mean, in the end, a way to put it, a less technical way to put it, is the fusion
03:50is the ultimate source of energy in the universe, right?
03:52In a non-cloudy day, you can see a fusion reactor, there's the sun, and in the evenings, you see
03:59thousands of them.
04:00So, that's the form of energy that powers the stars, and so everything else, really.
04:06And in terms of being in the energy mix, that is absolutely vital.
04:12We advocate that we should be deploying as many and as much renewable energy as possible right now because that's
04:21available now.
04:22But we know there's so many studies showing that that won't be enough because the energy demand will increase.
04:30The demand for electrification of current energy or of current applications will increase.
04:36So, that clean energy gap can only widen.
04:39And the great thing of fusion is that it's clean, the fuel is virtually inexhaustible,
04:46and has or will have a much wider social acceptance because of the zero risk of meltdown
04:54and the low level of waste, which are also short-lived.
05:02Fantastic.
05:03So, let's now focus on the solutions that you are both developing.
05:07Gianluca, in April, First Light Fusion announced that it had achieved the world's first fusion result
05:14using its unique projectile approach.
05:17I mean, how is this approach different from other fusion methods?
05:22Yeah, maybe if I take a step back, just to very quickly go through the fusion,
05:29at least a couple of the mainstream fusion technologies.
05:32So, as Heike said, in fusion, you combine light nuclei to make us slightly heavier nucleus
05:42and quite a lot of energy, in fact.
05:46To achieve that, you need extremely high temperatures,
05:50and therefore, you need a way to confine this plasma,
05:55and that is a soup you cannot put in a pot, right?
05:58It's so hot there's no container that can actually hold it.
06:02Okay.
06:03So, which gives way to two main approaches.
06:06One is called magnetic fusion.
06:08You use, basically, a so-called magnetic bottle to hold this thing.
06:13And the other one is called inertial fusion,
06:15where you don't actually use anything actively,
06:18but you use the inertial, the fuel itself,
06:21to make sure that you trigger the fusion event before that has time to relax.
06:27Actually, both Heike's company and my company are in this branch,
06:32although with different flavors.
06:33We trigger the fusion process with a shockwave generated by a high-velocity projector.
06:43It's a new approach, so we had to basically prove that the concept would work,
06:50and we've been very, very, very glad that that approach proved to work.
06:56We announced that in April.
06:58This is amazing, the reason why we really like it,
07:01is we think that the pathway to a commercial reactor,
07:06once the final technological challenges are overcome,
07:09will be much quicker and much simpler.
07:13Okay.
07:14So, Heike, I'm going to ask you a question about your technique now as well,
07:19so you can go into a little bit of detail on it.
07:21It's quantum-enhanced fusion pioneered by Marvel Fusion uses,
07:26from what I understand, a different approach, which is laser-driven.
07:30This is just my basic understanding, so I'll let you go into detail.
07:34What are the advantages of this unique method?
07:38Yeah, happy to explain a bit more.
07:40So, I mean, both Gianluca and me don't follow the traditional approaches of using magnets,
07:46and what we are using is very short-pulse, high-intense lasers,
07:52and we are shooting with these lasers on particularly structured fuel pellets.
07:58And that has only become available now,
08:01because the laser technology that we need for that is only being available now.
08:05There was a physics Nobel Prize for a Frenchman, Gerard Mourou, in 2018,
08:09and that kind of laser technology really paved the path
08:13to create these very short-pulse, very intense laser pulses,
08:18with which we believe we can trigger that fusion reaction.
08:21So, there's also a pretty new approach to fusion,
08:24and other than the more traditional approaches.
08:27And one key advantage that we believe that we have
08:30is that on the one side we can utilize different kinds of fuels with it,
08:34and on the other side, it's laser technology,
08:37is something where we have seen quite some advancements
08:40in the past couple of years.
08:42Industry is pushing this a lot,
08:44because those lasers can also be applied in medtech and other areas.
08:48So, we see quite some advancements happening there,
08:52also outside of the fusion space.
08:54And there are quite some of these high-intense laser facilities in the world
08:58that we can currently utilize to do experiments.
09:01So, so far, we didn't have to invest into our own laser.
09:04We will have to eventually.
09:06Yes.
09:06But currently, and given that, I mean, it's deep tech topics,
09:10they are quite capital intense,
09:11and currently we can utilize some of these existing laser facilities,
09:15and that's definitely an advantage.
09:17Okay.
09:18So, from what I understand,
09:20it seems to be a remarkable way of creating clean energy.
09:24Today, what are the industrial and regulatory challenges
09:28ahead for you guys in the fusion industry
09:31before it can actually really take off, take flight?
09:36Well, I think most companies have a series of,
09:40all companies, in fact, a series of hurdles to overcome.
09:44The first one for everyone will be to demonstrate gain,
09:48like I said before.
09:48So, being able to demonstrate they can extract more energy from the process
09:54than the energy they put into the process, right?
09:56So, that's a big problem that puts everybody sort of on that level.
10:01and some companies will have advantages and some companies will have disadvantages
10:05with their technologies.
10:08From the regulatory point of view,
10:11well, the base thing is that there isn't a regulatory framework for fusion.
10:17and some countries are ahead compared to others.
10:21The U.S. is working a lot on it.
10:24The U.K. luckily has been working a lot to developing regulations for fusion.
10:31One department of government has a fusion team that engages a lot with companies.
10:36All right.
10:36They have published a green paper already and asked for consultation.
10:41And this is going to become a white paper pretty soon.
10:44The important thing when I follow these conversations about regulations
10:48is that pretty much everybody agrees that fusion should never be regulated
10:54in the same way as fission because the risk profile is immensely lower.
11:01Maybe just building on the industrial point of it,
11:06as I said, I truly believe we need fusion and we need fusion fast.
11:09And that is why I also truly believe that we need to start building up
11:13industrial partnerships early on in the process
11:16because no company can solve this whole problem by themselves.
11:20So we've been quite active in building partnerships,
11:24for example, with Siemens Energy on the power plant side.
11:27So already now developing concepts for the power plant,
11:30working with laser companies, both in Germany and also with Thales here in France,
11:36because I strongly believe that we need to build these partnerships.
11:39I don't want to hire 1,000 power plant engineers right now,
11:43but I want to do things in parallel.
11:46I want to now already start working on power plant concepts
11:49because I think we really need to do that in parallel and not in an iterative way
11:54because otherwise we won't have fusion in the next, I don't know, 20, 30 years.
11:58I can see that Gianluca is nodding here.
12:00Yes, of course.
12:02I mean, I fully agree with Heike.
12:04Every serious company that works in fusion is working into partnerships.
12:09Our model, in fact, is not even to build power plants in the future.
12:13We see ourselves as fuel providers in the form of our targets,
12:17as they're called in Inertial Fusion.
12:20And I also agree that the development of the power plant needs to run in parallel
12:25with solving the physics problem, right?
12:28And, yeah, this is what First Light and others are already doing.
12:32We've been doing partnering and work with external companies
12:36to de-risk, as we say, the technological challenges of the power plant itself.
12:42We started to touch on this question, but I'd like to go into a little bit more detail.
12:46Are the governments, the powers that be, are they pushing forward on this energy transition?
12:54Are they encouraging the development, should we say?
12:57Is Europe present as well?
12:59So I would say on the positive side, they are starting to wake up.
13:03And within Europe, especially the UK, is taking a leading role.
13:06And maybe Gianluca can share a bit more on that later.
13:10But if we look at the global landscape, there are a bit more than,
13:15maybe around like 35 private fusion companies these days.
13:19And nearly 30 of them are in the US.
13:21So the US is definitely taking the lead here.
13:24China is doing a lot, obviously less visible for us to see.
13:28And Europe only has a handful of fusion companies.
13:31And of that, also the majority being in the UK.
13:34And, I mean, that is also reflected in, if you look at like initiatives,
13:38both on the private and the public side.
13:41So on the public side, the White House just held a fusion day in March,
13:45inviting all the US fusion companies to the White House,
13:49giving a lot of political attention to the topic.
13:52Biden dedicated more than 800 million US dollar in the Build Back Better program on fusion.
14:00So there's quite some public attention and also public funding programs in the US.
14:07There's also a lot more private VC money for deep tech companies in general in the US.
14:12So I would say if we are very honest, we have to admit that the US is leading here currently.
14:17Europe is starting to wake up more.
14:21So it's getting on the agenda of politicians here.
14:25We also just closed the financing round end of last year with early bird being our lead investor in that
14:32round.
14:32So getting like the first, early bird being like a very reputated deep tech VC investor,
14:38like going into that space.
14:39So these are good signs, but at a small scale.
14:42And we need a lot more acceleration.
14:44Otherwise, this will be again a technology where Europe is falling behind.
14:48And I can say that last year here at Viva Tech, we didn't have this discussion.
14:52So this is great that, you know, we're moving forward anyway.
14:55Gianluca.
14:56Yeah, I wanted to give an optimistic side to this.
15:00I think fusion has moved out of being a niche, right?
15:05So we are here, like you say.
15:06Yeah.
15:06It's an important event and fusion features into this.
15:10Governments talk about it.
15:11Governments take actions.
15:14But it's absolutely right.
15:15Well, like I said, right, governments need to step in if they want to be leaders into this new technology.
15:23And there's also access to capital in the States is fundamentally different from what it is in Europe, including the
15:31UK.
15:32Yeah, sure.
15:35So moving on here, Marvel Fusion is a small, relatively small player in the business.
15:43Can private companies thrive in this sector without gaining financial support from the government?
15:52Yeah, so compared to the other fusion companies, we are still a very young company.
15:56So we've been founded less than three years ago.
15:59So one of the newer fusion companies out there and also compared to some of the others, especially US companies,
16:07still a lot smaller.
16:08So far, we are also only privately financed.
16:11And I do believe that if we now want to go into bigger funding rounds and actually really building up
16:19hardware here in Europe, then there needs to be some public commitment also to fusion, to wanting fusion in Europe
16:26and to supporting fusion in Europe.
16:29Okay.
16:29If I can add something to that, I think at some point, first of all, fusion is also pretty much
16:36completely privately funded.
16:39But at some point, there will be the need for an intervention from public funding, from governments.
16:47At the latest stage, it will be for the first of a kind.
16:50But obviously, the sooner that happens, the more the acceleration can be, the higher the acceleration can be.
16:55Of course.
16:56Yeah, so I do believe money at the end is the key factor to accelerate things because it allows you
17:02to run things in parallel.
17:03It allows you to take risks.
17:05It allows you to develop tech and so on.
17:07So that is a key accelerator.
17:09And I think that is obviously a role that governments can play.
17:13I mean, part of the issue as well is to getting financial support is to communicate, isn't it?
17:21I mean, what we're doing here is extremely important.
17:24I mean, are people inviting you more regularly to events to talk about what you're doing?
17:32Heike?
17:33Most definitely.
17:35I mean, as you said, like, fusion was not part of VivaTech last year.
17:39It is this year.
17:40Most of the, I would say there's no clean tech or tech conference these days that doesn't have fusion on
17:47the radar.
17:48So it's definitely, and I think there's a, in general, a great momentum, right?
17:52And that is fueled by so many things.
17:53In the last year, there's been a super important experiment and breakthrough at the National Technician Facility in the U
18:01.S. for laser approaches.
18:02Then there's been a chat in the U.K. for the magnetic side, like an experiment that was a major
18:08breakthrough there.
18:09The new announcements in April.
18:11So, like, the past 12 months, we have seen so many, I would say, breakthroughs in the different technologies.
18:17Then there was more funding that went into fusion last year than, I think, accumulated over the past 10 years
18:23before that.
18:23So, over 4 billion, I believe, were invested in total into fusion privately last year.
18:29So, there is a true momentum now, and that can only be good for our industry.
18:35And momentum creates momentum.
18:37I mean, like, of course, by innovating, you're going to bring more attention to the subject, aren't you?
18:43Yes, exactly.
18:45If you Google fusion or nuclear fusion, now you will find lots and lots of articles in mainstream media, whereas
18:54just a few years ago, you wouldn't have, right?
18:57And as you said, every good piece of news about fusion increases that momentum.
19:03The important thing is that there is a long game as well here, where the public sort of needs to
19:10be educated, because at some point, governments will have to make these important decisions.
19:17And the public needs to be behind that, of course, because otherwise no politician will say, yeah, we do this,
19:23right?
19:23And it's important that people know that fusion is not efficient.
19:27The fusion is really a very, very, very important contributor, future contributor for the energy mix.
19:34Do you think the general public are still confusing things and finding it difficult to understand things at the moment?
19:43I think much less, but I still hear a lot of people that maybe they don't confuse you with fission
19:52much,
19:53but maybe a lot of people still don't know a lot about fusion.
19:58So there is a lot still, a lot of communication needs to be done.
20:01Of course.
20:01Fully agree.
20:02So I think the general public does not have like kind of a deep understanding of fusion, the benefits, the
20:10technologies and so on.
20:12And I think that's why we are here today.
20:14We have a new technology.
20:16There is no lobby for our technology yet.
20:19There is no kind of or there is an association in the US, but like here in Europe, the activities
20:25are very limited so far.
20:27So it's also us who now need to communicate a lot more about fusion and especially the benefits and the
20:33potential of fusion.
20:34Yeah, I'm asking the question because I hear you and I understand that you need to encourage mass media to
20:43talk about your subject.
20:45I don't have shares in fusion, but I believe that it's an important subject and we need to push forward
20:52on it.
20:52We've had a couple of questions from people in the audience and I'm going to move forward with them now.
20:58We've got about seven and a half minutes left together.
21:01So I think it's great to start with this question and answer session.
21:04If you have a question, don't hesitate to send it through.
21:06It's on the application.
21:07I think there's a man that's got a problem law in the audience.
21:10I think the man next to me has got a problem sending through his question.
21:13So if you want to send through a question, we'll explain to you how to do it.
21:15No worries.
21:16I have a question here from Nicola.
21:19How far are we from industrial fusion energy production?
21:23And is it not going to be too late?
21:31I will say the old joke.
21:34So nobody says it in one of the questions.
21:36So the old joke went to the fusion is 30 years away and always will be.
21:41The fact is that it's not.
21:43So that clock has started ticking for a while now.
21:47As Heike said, there's over 30 companies in the world, private companies which have the advantage of being agile.
21:54They can take more risks.
21:55They can be much faster and the more I talk to every fusion player, the more there seems to be
22:01a convergence that there will be a power plant in the 30s.
22:06It will not single-handedly solve the 2050 targets that many countries have, but it can be an important contributor
22:14to that.
22:15Heike?
22:16Yeah, Gianluca is totally right.
22:18I mean, I'm super convinced that within the 2030s we will have the first fusion power plants.
22:24But I'm also convinced that if we don't start investing a lot more into fusion now, we won't have it
22:30in 10 years.
22:31So then we will be exactly at the same situation in 10 years as we are now.
22:35And maybe if we had invested more into fusion 10 years ago, we might be at a different situation now.
22:41So for me, it's really all these timelines are always a function of available resources.
22:45And there are great approaches out there.
22:48I guess Gianluca and myself are both very convinced that our approach will be the most promising one.
22:54But I think there are so many approaches out there that I'm super convinced that one of them will work
23:00out.
23:01And as a society, we have to look into this.
23:05We can leave no stone unturned here.
23:07Of course.
23:07Well, thank goodness you're both convinced of your own technologies.
23:10I mean, you wouldn't be there if you weren't, right?
23:13I have a message now from Paul here that sent a question through.
23:17He says, Eater Project, I-T-E-R, has been running for quite a few years now with no significant
23:25results so far.
23:26What's the key to success for this major research and development project, research and development project?
23:34Ha-ha.
23:35Okay, I take the risk.
23:37Okay.
23:38I'm just joking.
23:39Obviously, I cannot really comment on Eater.
23:41Eater is, for people who don't know, is an enormous project, multi-multinational project, public project,
23:51which has been going on for quite a while.
23:53It's here in France.
23:54It's in Cadarache.
23:57They plan to actually start running in a few years.
24:04And they will have the...
24:06It's a game experiment.
24:08So they are trying with this device to extract more energy than the energy they put in.
24:13But the actual proper run, I think, is planned for 2035.
24:17So it's a bit later than the private enterprises.
24:21But let's not forget that these big multinational experiments were very well publicly funded.
24:27They also generate a lot of science that we all also rely on.
24:33So that's the importance of that too, right?
24:35Yeah, and maybe just adding to that.
24:38So what Gianluca explained at the beginning, Eater is part of this very traditional approach.
24:43So this traditional approach to make fusion work with big magnets, high temperatures, long times.
24:50And that has been around for quite some time.
24:53Then obviously they have the upside and the downside of being a public institution.
24:57I think we have seen in many other industries that it can help to have private companies out there as
25:03well.
25:04For example, space industries and so on.
25:05So we are the private companies.
25:07We bring new approaches.
25:09But at the end, I think we all benefit from each other and we should.
25:14Of course, yeah.
25:15I have a last question that's come through here and I'm going to read it out to you.
25:19What is the time frame of your technology to have a net output producing more energy than it needs to
25:25produce energy?
25:26When will it become mainstream?
25:32Well, what we always said is, I mean, our target is to have an impact in 2050 plans.
25:39So if we work backwards from there, we need to have multiple power plants in the 40s, which means to
25:46have a pilot next decade and have the solution to the physics this decade.
25:52Okay, Heike?
25:53So for us, and I think that is true for quite some fusion companies, I think within the next two
26:01to five years, we need to see major science breakthroughs.
26:04And the most relevant breakthrough is obviously proving net energy gain, so getting out more energy than you put in.
26:11And then we truly need like first power plant, prototypes, whatever, beginning of the 2030s.
26:19Okay, so we have a little time to wrap up together now.
26:25What are you most excited about?
26:28I mean, this is a new journey and, well, not so new for you guys, but it's a new journey
26:33for a lot of people that are listening to us here.
26:35What's the most exciting thing about this journey, Heike?
26:39I think most exciting is really, I always feel the impact that fusion can have on the world is truly
26:47amazing.
26:48I mean, we've been talking a lot about electricity now, and I think it needs to be in the electricity
26:54mix of the future.
26:55But if you just start to imagine that you would have abandoned clean energy, you can also desold water in
27:01areas where you don't have water.
27:04Like another major problem that we currently have, you can do a lot of carbon capturing with abandoned clean energy.
27:12So that big vision and the impact that fusion has is definitely exciting me every day, combined with the kind
27:20of great people I have the pleasure of working with every day.
27:24Like working with physicists, laser engineers, and so on, is a huge privilege.
27:32Jan-Nuka, you have the last word?
27:34For me, the thing that excites me the most is what I don't know about yet.
27:39What I mean with that is that fusion now is a necessity to close the clean power gap.
27:46But let's not forget that every time humankind has discovered a new source of energy, magic things happen, right?
27:53You know, all this, right?
27:55So I don't know what very clever, inventive people will manage to find when there will be this source of
28:05inexhaustible clean energy.
28:07So this is what really excites me.
28:09Fantastic.
28:09Thank you so much to both of you for this very rich and interesting discussion.
28:14And we'll see you again next year, of course.
28:17Of course.
28:17Thank you for having us.
28:18Yes, thanks for having us.
28:19And thanks for giving Fusion that platform.
28:21Wonderful.
28:22Ladies and gentlemen, in a few minutes, our third session on the Race to Net Zero will be starting.
28:27It's going to be a focus on clean tech and the need to transition to the circular economy.
28:33We'll be back in five minutes.
28:34Thanks.
28:36Thanks.
28:36Thanks.
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