Japan Firm To Build Country's First Nuke Fusion Plant

A western Japan venture plans to build the first experimental plant in the country to generate power through nuclear fusion, the company said, as the technology is drawing attention as a new way of producing energy without emitting carbon dioxide, Mainichi Japan reported.

Photo Insert: Kyoto Fusioneering develops equipment for nuclear fusion reactors, including a key device that effectively collects heat with a temperature of over 100 million Celsius generated in a reactor.

Kyoto Fusioneering Ltd., a startup based in Uji, Kyoto Prefecture, is aiming to start operation of the plant in the next five years, having already procured some of the funds and started designing the plant, CEO Taka Nagao told Kyodo News in a recent interview.

The experimental plant will be equipped with a heat exchanger and turbine in addition to a reactor that generates thermal energy to produce a small amount of electricity, with the generation capacity expected to be several dozen kilowatts, the company said.

Though experimental reactors to prove the feasibility of nuclear fusion reaction exist in Japan and abroad, "a plant that actually generates power is rare even on a global basis," Nagao said.

The venture partly funded by an investment firm set up by Kyoto University, was launched in 2019 led by Nagao and Satoshi Konishi, a professor at the Institute of Advanced Energy of Kyoto University.

The company develops equipment for nuclear fusion reactors, including a key device that effectively collects heat with a temperature of over 100 million Celsius generated in a reactor. It plans to use the plant to collect data for its development of devices.

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