- 16 hours ago
General Fusion CEO Greg Twinney explains why fusion energy is gaining momentum, how it could power the AI boom, and what comes next for the industry.
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00:00Fusion Energy has long been hailed as the holy grail of clean power.
00:04And with surging AI-driven electricity demand and General Fusion now trading as the first publicly listed peer-play fusion
00:12company,
00:13the industry is entering a pivotal new chapter.
00:16And here, fresh off of this new IPO, is Greg Twinnies, CEO of General Fusion, to break it all down
00:21for us.
00:22Thank you so much for being here, Greg.
00:24Hey, thanks for having me.
00:25It's an exciting time for Fusion.
00:26You're right. Especially exciting time for us at General Fusion.
00:31Yeah, it really is. Yeah, tell us more.
00:34I was going to say, you know, we've spent more than 20 years preparing for this moment.
00:38It doesn't happen overnight.
00:39You know, the world needs fusion.
00:41We believe the markets are ready.
00:43And at General Fusion, we're building the path to commercial fusion on the grid.
00:48So this is one step in the journey, and we're pretty excited.
00:51Yeah, I mean, big congratulations again.
00:53Such an exciting day, and I'm sure, like you mentioned, so much work that went into this moment.
00:58Why was right now the right time to do this?
01:01Tell us what's happening at the company and in the world that this felt like the right time to make
01:04it happen.
01:06Yeah, there's just a massive demand for energy, right?
01:10And that's not news.
01:12AI, electrification, you know, even climate change.
01:16All of these things are, you know, driving a huge demand for clean, baseload energy.
01:21Existing energy technologies are probably not going to be able to satiate that demand.
01:25So enter Fusion.
01:27And from the beginning at General Fusion, we have been, you know, we've had that goal in mind.
01:32Let's bring fusion to the grid.
01:34The world needs this.
01:35And so we've been advancing over the last 20 years.
01:38We're a world leader in fusion.
01:39And so, you know, becoming a leader and moving into the public markets first is only natural.
01:46Yeah, I mean, it definitely makes sense.
01:48And with all of the AI demands and everything else happening right now, again, makes sense that we're here.
01:52But for viewers who are maybe a little bit newer to the space and may only be familiar with energy
01:57sources, solar, wind, nuclear fission, things like that, where does fusion energy really fit into that mix?
02:03What makes it different for people who maybe aren't so familiar with how it really works?
02:07Yeah, fusion is often called the holy grail of energy because it has the promise of, you know,
02:14a clean, incredibly abundant baseload power that is safe.
02:20You can kind of think about it in the terms of fission.
02:23If you're familiar with fission technologies, traditional nuclear, you know, this baseload power that you can depend upon.
02:29But the difference with fusion is that it's safe and the fuel is abundant.
02:34So using, you know, seawater as the main input for the fuel source, and then there's no chance for a
02:43meltdown.
02:43There's no long-term radioactive waste.
02:45It's kind of like all the benefits of traditional nuclear fission without the downsides.
02:50And that creates a huge, huge opportunity and an opportunity to, you know, make a huge dent in the needs
02:58of energy for the world in the future.
03:01Yeah, it does.
03:02I mean, talking about that opportunity, general fusion is now even developing magnetized target fusion technology, right?
03:07So tell us a little bit about your approach to that and why you believe it's really a more practical
03:12path to commercial power.
03:14Yeah.
03:15So fusion, to create fusion on Earth, you kind of have to recreate the conditions of the sun and the
03:21stars inside of a machine.
03:23And there's many ways to do that.
03:25But as you viewers would probably imagine, you know, high temperatures are an important part of that.
03:30And you've got to, you know, you need to put a lot of energy into creating those conditions in the
03:35first place.
03:36And the conditions can be harsh.
03:38And you need to be able to turn those conditions into power that's usable on the grid.
03:42And at General Fusion, from the beginning, we wanted to not just demonstrate fusion conditions, but do it in a
03:48way that can be turned into power plants on the grid all over the world.
03:52And so we take a mechanical approach using kind of compressions.
03:57Think of a diesel engine.
03:59Now you have your fuel and your air mixture and you compress it to increase, you know, the conditions inside
04:05of a diesel engine to get combustion.
04:07In this case, we're starting with our fuel, which is isotope of hydrogen, and we're compressing that to increase the
04:13temperatures to the temperatures equal to and greater than the sun, get a fusion reaction, and then extract all that
04:20energy through our unique and practical process for creating the conditions in the first place.
04:25Yeah, I mean, it just sounds like there's so much technology, so much science that really goes into creating this
04:31process and then being able to harness it, as you're saying, onto the power grid.
04:34So what are some of the biggest scientific and engineering challenges that still need to be overcome before fusion really
04:40can become a commercial reality across the board?
04:44So the science of fusion has been demonstrated in, you know, national labs and academia, and we've done a lot
04:51ourselves as well.
04:52So the science portion of it is well understood.
04:56And at General Fusion, we've been at this for over two decades and done a lot of fusion ourselves.
05:01We've published peer-reviewed papers, which in the fusion industry is a big deal, to, you know, share those results,
05:07validate those results, and establish the science.
05:09And we've now commissioned a new machine.
05:13It's called LM26.
05:15It's a machine that's a 50% power plant scale sort of plasmas, the fuel of the center of this
05:22machine.
05:22And that machine is designed to achieve industry-first milestones in a way that can be commercialized.
05:29And 10 million degrees, 100 million degrees, and ultimately conditions that need to exist inside of a fusion power plant
05:36of the future.
05:38Yeah, I mean, thinking about those temperatures, just so high, and thinking about all of the research and time and
05:43science that's taken to be able to create all of these conditions to create this fusion,
05:47what's the timeline looking like for General Fusion to really begin producing electricity?
05:52And what key milestones, as you're kind of pointing out, should investors really be watching at this point?
05:57Yeah, the key near-term milestones for us are the industry-accepted ones around the science, which is 1 KEV,
06:04which is that 10 million degree mark, 100 million degrees, which is 10 KEV,
06:09and ultimately Lawson, which are these break-even conditions, you know, that amount of energy that you put in, you
06:16know,
06:16you create the conditions that you could get equal amount of energy out of that reaction.
06:19And so those are the near-term milestones that are funded with our pipe capital that we're raising as part
06:25of this transaction.
06:26And that will happen between now and 2028.
06:29And then on the other side of that, it's repeatability, engineering, integration, and building out our power plant designed for
06:37a first-of-a-kind power plant in 2035.
06:40Wow, that's actually not even that far away from now, thinking about how soon this could really become a reality
06:46that people could be seeing all over the place.
06:49Thinking about the capital that you now have, the company's public, you just mentioned where some of it will be
06:54going.
06:54How do you plan to deploy the rest of that capital to really accelerate growth, development, commercialization?
07:00What's the plan for that?
07:02Yeah, so up until this time, we've been raising capital privately and through VCs, high net worth, sovereign wealth funds,
07:11et cetera.
07:12And so that's got us to this stage.
07:14We raised about $400 million to establish, you know, the point of which where we are and that, you know,
07:21building a machine, having it ready to go.
07:23And this LM26 machine that I was referring to is now operating, compressing plasmas and achieving, you know, making progress
07:32towards our milestones.
07:33And so this capital is going to allow us to continue to run that program out through 2028 and achieve
07:39the milestones.
07:40And it was critically important that we secure the capital as we move into the public markets to achieve those
07:46milestones over the next couple of years.
07:48So that was the goal of the transaction and the pipe capital got us there.
07:54Yeah, I mean, it seems like you have so many different places right now where that capital is going to
07:59get to all of those goals.
08:00Thinking about investors who are now hearing about fusion in kind of a different way.
08:05They've been hearing about it for years, but really now it's becoming more of a reality.
08:08What makes this moment so different and why should they be kind of paying closer attention now maybe than they
08:13have in the past where it's been, you know, one day we'll have this.
08:16Now that we actually have some real attainable goals here, why is it more important right now for them to
08:21be paying attention more?
08:23Yeah, the baton for advancing fusion has moved from academia and national labs to the private industry.
08:32And we at General Fusion, being a world leader in that regard, are moving it much faster.
08:38Fusion is accelerating much, much faster in the hands of private companies.
08:42And so we had a two decade head start on this because we started the company in 2002.
08:48And so we have advanced our technology, which is designed to be, you know, incorporated into a commercial power plant
08:55with that in mind right from the beginning.
08:59And so the capital that we get here is going to allow us to prove out the science at a
09:0350 percent power plant scale, which is going to be a big, big deal in the next couple of years.
09:09Yeah, I mean, it's really exciting thinking about where this could all go.
09:12And again, you have that 2035 kind of goal out there.
09:16So tell us when you look to the future, where do you see this in 10 years with General Fusion
09:20and Fusion being used overall in general?
09:24Where do you see all of this? Where do you think it'll be in the next 10 years?
09:27Yeah, so our first of a kind is slated for 2035.
09:31So it's in that time frame.
09:32And then on the other side of that, you can imagine General Fusion power plants being deployed all around the
09:39world.
09:39And we're starting to establish commercial relationships in ways that's going to enable that, create the pathway.
09:45So as we advance the technology, we're creating the market in parallel.
09:48And in 10 years time, hopefully we're at a trajectory, we're starting to deploy General Fusion power plants everywhere.
09:57Well, we have a lot to look forward to there.
09:59And we really appreciate you being here today to break it all down for us.
10:02Greg Twine, CEO of General Fusion.
10:04Congratulations again on the IPO.
10:07And thank you so much.
10:08We appreciate it.
10:09Thanks very much.
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