It's the science news of the week. A group of scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Livermore Laboratory succeeded in producing a nuclear fusion reaction that generated more energy than it consumed. This is the same reaction that occurs in stars and has the advantage of not producing radioactive waste, unlike current nuclear power plants, which use a nuclear fission reaction in which atoms are split. Nuclear fusion could be a game-changing technology for the energy sector.

Scientists have been working for decades on nuclear fusion experiments, which require large amounts of energy. But generating more energy than is consumed in the process has been an elusive goal.

Despite this, research into nuclear fusion is attracting increasing amounts of private-sector investment. According to a report by the consulting firm McKinsey, in 2021 there were 25 companies working on this research, compared to just one in the early 2000s. Private funding for this research has also increased, rising from a few tens of thousands of dollars 20 years ago to about US$4.4 billion in 2021, and is directed toward laboratories with a commercial—not just scientific—vision. Some of these laboratories have been established by startups created specifically for this purpose, while others are programs spun off from university or government research centers.

The emergence of new technologies, such as 3D printing, which allows for the rapid, low-cost production of the complex geometric profiles of the components that make up the walls of melting furnaces, as well as the increased computing power available today, are some of the factors that have made it possible to reduce costs and revitalize developments in the field of nuclear fusion.

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