Pacific Fusion’s next fusion machine could clear a key hurdle to commercial power
Pacific Fusion has broken ground on a demonstration facility in Albuquerque, New Mexico, aiming to become the first US project to achieve "net facility gain" — generating as much energy as the whole plant consumes, rather than just the fusion reaction itself. The milestone, targeted for 2030, would mark a significant step towards commercial fusion power, which the company hopes to deliver via a full-scale plant in the mid-2030s. No existing device has yet demonstrated net facility gain, making this a closely watched race among well-funded rivals.
The new facility will test Pacific Fusion's approach, which uses coordinated electrical pulses from 156 "pulser modules" to compress a pencil-eraser-sized fuel target until it fuses, initially firing only a handful of shots per day compared with the one-per-second rate a commercial plant would need. Each pulse is expected to generate around 100 megajoules, roughly ten times the output of the US National Ignition Facility, and the site will also host national security-related fusion research. Founded in 2023, Pacific Fusion has raised more than $1 billion in a milestone-based Series A round, giving it runway to plan ahead as it competes with rivals including Commonwealth Fusion Systems, Helion Energy, Proxima Fusion and Inertia Enterprises, all targeting grid-connected fusion power by the mid-2030s.
- Pacific Fusion breaks ground on New Mexico fusion demonstration facility
- Aims for "net facility gain" by 2030, a first for the US
- Company has raised over $1 billion, competes with several rival startups
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Fusion aims to produce energy by joining light atomic nuclei, the process that powers the Sun. Pacific Fusion is a US company pursuing this with powerful electrical pulses: its planned machine will squeeze a tiny fuel target until the nuclei fuse. The company is based in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
A key challenge is making more energy than the entire plant uses, including its equipment, rather than simply getting more energy out of the fusion reaction than reaches the fuel. This is known as net facility gain, and no fusion device has yet achieved it. Even then, a working power station would need to repeat the process far more often and reliably than an experimental machine.
Pacific Fusion is one of several well-funded companies seeking to put fusion electricity on the grid in the mid-2030s, alongside firms such as Commonwealth Fusion Systems and Helion Energy. Progress matters because a fusion plant that produces dependable net energy could become a new source of electricity, though major technical steps remain.
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