The Race for Fusion: understanding the changing global picture
By Thomas Rainford, Fusion Advisory Services (FAS)
Fusion Advisory Services Ltd., a partner company to Fusion Energy Insights, provides deep technical dives on topics in nuclear fusion to investors and other decision makers.
In recent years, the buzz around nuclear fusion has picked up steam—often making headlines as the next big breakthrough in clean energy. But here’s something you might not know: fusion already powers about 25% of our renewable energy—just not in the way you'd expect. It’s through sunlight. Our sun is essentially a giant fusion reactor, constantly smashing hydrogen nuclei together to form helium and releasing an enormous stream of light in the process. We only capture a sliver of this energy with solar panels here on Earth, but imagine if we could recreate that reaction ourselves, on demand, and right here on the ground?
That’s exactly what scientists and engineers have been working on for decades: building a controlled fusion reaction that could produce massive amounts of energy from just tiny amounts of hydrogen fuel (specifically, deuterium and tritium). And while the dream of a commercial fusion reactor has long seemed perpetually 30 years away, things are starting to shift. With global energy demand expected to surge—and new technologies accelerating progress—the fusion finish line is finally starting to come into view.
What Does It Take to Make Fusion Happen?
To get atoms to fuse, three key ingredients have to be just right: temperature, density, and confinement time. This is called the triple product, and a fusion reactor must push all three beyond a critical threshold to succeed. There are two main fusion approaches:
- Magnetic Confinement Fusion (MCF), which keeps a hot plasma contained for longer using powerful magnetic fields.
- Inertial Confinement Fusion (ICF), which compresses fuel to extreme conditions in very short bursts.
The story of fusion development mirrors that of nuclear fission. The first man-made fusion reaction wasn’t in a lab, but in the 1952 test of a hydrogen bomb—an ICF device. It wasn’t until 1958, at a UN conference on atomic energy, that peaceful fusion research was officially shared with the world. This opened the door to global collaboration and the creation of early experimental reactors like the Z-pinch, Stellarator, and eventually the Tokamak—a donut-shaped magnetic fusion device that became the global favourite.
The Rise and Fall (and Rise Again) of Fusion Funding
During the energy crises of the 1970s and '80s, governments poured funding into fusion. International projects like JET (Joint European Torus) and ITER (International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor) took centre stage. In fact, the US fusion research budget jumped 7-fold during this time (see Figure 1). But as oil prices stabilised, so did enthusiasm. The US Department of Energy (DOE) pivoted to international cost-sharing, particularly with ITER, and funding for homegrown fusion efforts flatlined in the mid-1990s.
Figure 1: A graph displaying the change in fusion funding in the USA over time. ©Margraf 2021: A Brief History of US Funding for Fusion Energy. A Brief History of U.S. Funding of Fusion Energy
This led to a quieter era in fusion R&D, focused more on understanding the science than building working reactors. One major exception? ICF research, which received a boost with the creation of the National Ignition Facility (NIF)—a massive laser complex completed in 2009, designed to compress tiny fuel capsules to fusion conditions. NIF also supports data collection relevant to nuclear weapons, which helped justify the investment. Around this time, the DOE’s call for Innovative Confinement Concept (ICC) designs sparked a wave of smaller, more experimental reactor ideas—planting the seeds for today’s fusion diversity.
Where We Are Now? Records, Milestones and a Fusion Gold Rush
Fast forward to today, and many of those large government-led projects have notched major wins. JET (UK) and EAST (China) have set multiple performance records, and in 2022, NIF achieved breakeven: where the energy produced by the fusion reaction matched the energy delivered to the fuel (excluding laser losses).
We’re also getting closer to putting fusion power on the grid. ITER plans to run full deuterium-tritium (D-T) fusion operations by 2039, while the UK’s STEP project, announced in 2019, aims to deliver electricity by 2040. So maybe not quite 30 years away anymore.
Enter the Private Sector (and China)
Since 2000, the number of private fusion startups has skyrocketed—doubling since 2018 to more than 45 companies. Many of these are spin-offs from university or national lab programs, including ICC projects, and they’re exploring a wide range of reactor designs, from conventional to completely new.
Some of the biggest names in tech and investment are backing fusion’s future. Google, Microsoft, Jeff Bezos and OpenAI are investing in companies like Commonwealth Fusion, TAE Technologies and Helion Energy. Figure 2 shows the rapid rise in private investment.
Figure 2: equity investment in private fusion companies from 2001 to 2024. The graph shows the rapid rise in private investment in the past 4 years. ©FusionX.
These firms are moving fast:
- SPARC, Commonwealth Fusion’s reactor, aims to hit breakeven by 2027—over a decade ahead of ITER.
- Both Commonwealth Fusion Systems and TAE Technologies are targeting commercial energy production by the early 2030s.
- Helion Energy is even more ambitious, pledging to deliver fusion power to Microsoft by 2028.
There’s a catch: all this progress hinges on funding. So far, private capital has powered these companies forward, but fusion is a high-risk, high-reward game. If the breakthroughs don’t come quickly enough—or if investors lose patience—it could stall the entire industry.
That’s where governments still play a crucial role. China, for one, is taking fusion seriously. DOE estimates suggest China is now spending twice as much as the US, and more than the rest of the world combined. China are building major fusion infrastructure, including:
- A 100-acre fusion campus (CRAFT)
- A new tokamak (BEST) by 2027
- A near-term fission-fusion hybrid plant (Xinghuo)
China is also producing 10 times more fusion-related PhDs than the US and maintains a strong edge in supply chains for advanced materials, semiconductors and capacitors—key advantages noted by Shanghai-based Energy Singularity.
Fusion's Future: A Global Race With Global Stakes
We’re no longer asking if fusion will work—we’re asking where it will happen first and who will benefit. With competition heating up between private companies and nations, the race to commercial fusion isn’t just about science—it’s about shaping the future of global energy.
Fusion offers a tantalising promise: abundant, safe and equitable energy that could serve humanity for centuries. The question now is: will the world’s major economies work together to ensure that promise is shared or will it become the next great geopolitical battleground?