Energy Department’s BETHE program provides $32M to 15 winning fusion energy ideas
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) will award $32 million to 15 projects for their ideas to make lower cost fusion energy and increase its performance levels as a means of making it commercially viable.
All projects are part of the Breakthroughs Enabling THermonuclear-fusion Energy (BETHE) program, which operates through three research categories: concept development to advance the performance of fusion concepts, development of component technology that could reduce costs and capability teams that work to improve, adapt and apply existing capabilities to speed development of multiple concepts.
“Fusion energy technology holds great potential to be a safe, clean, reliable energy source, but research and development of fusion technology is often constrained by prohibitive costs,” Under Secretary of Energy Mark Menezes said. “BETHE teams will build on recent progress in fusion research and the growing fusion community to lower costs and further foster viable commercial opportunities for the next generation of fusion technology.”
Winners include the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Zap Energy, University of Maryland Baltimore County, NK Labs LLC, University of Washington, Los Alamos National Lab, Commonwealth Fusion Systems, Princeton Plasma Physics Lab, University of Rochester, Sapientai LLC, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Oak Ridge National Lab. Some won several awards for different projects.
Commercial fusion has long been an energy goal, though years of work have not yet achieved this. The federal government hopes to accomplish this within approximately 20 years to guarantee another means of meeting low-carbon energy demand and deep decarbonization. Lowering the costs of fusion development and accelerated its development are both huge parts of this goal.
“Commercially viable fusion energy can improve our chances of meeting global energy demand and will further establish U.S. technological lead in this crucial area,” Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy Director Lane Genatowski said.
