MIT spinout Commonwealth Fusion Systems unveils plans for the world’s first fusion power plant – The company has announced that it will build the first grid-scale fusion power plant in Chesterfield County, Virginia.
https://news.mit.edu/2024/commonwealth-fusion-systems-unveils-worlds-first-fusion-power-plant-1217
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From the article
>The plant will be built at the James River Industrial Park outside of Richmond through a nonfinancial collaboration with Dominion Energy Virginia, which will provide development and technical expertise along with leasing rights for the site. CFS will independently finance, build, own, and operate the power plant.
Also from the article
>CFS is currently completing development of its fusion demonstration machine, SPARC, at its headquarters in Devens, Massachusetts. SPARC is expected to produce its first plasma in 2026 and net fusion energy shortly after, demonstrating for the first time a commercially relevant design that will produce more power than it consumes. SPARC will pave the way for ARC, which is expected to deliver power to the grid in the early 2030s.
For more context please visit [their youtube video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHCFraq1SKQ)
But nobody knows how to build a practical fusion plant. So this must just be another experiment, in a long line of experiments.
No mention of the cost of the plant or its output. There are 2 sciences at work here, physics and economics. Fusion powers all the stars in the universe so we know the physics works. For the economics to work a fusion power plant needs to be cheaper than renewables and battery storage. That requirement is totally ignored.