Commonwealth Fusion Systems said Thursday that it will sell high-temperature superconducting magnets Realta Fusionthe second in a series of deals that suggest the company will rely heavily on its magnet technology in the coming years to bring in much-needed revenue.
“It’s the largest deal of its kind to date for CFS,” Rick Needham, the company’s chief commercial officer, told reporters.
Commonwealth Fusion Systems, or CFS, previously sold magnets to the WHAM experiment at the University of Wisconsin, with which fusion startup Realta works closely. The physics behind WHAM underpins Realta’s approach to fusion power, known as a magnetic mirror reactor.
In a magnetic mirror, the plasma is confined to a shape that looks like two 2-liter soda bottles attached at the base. At each end, powerful magnets pierce the plasma and force it back toward the center. Weaker magnets surround the middle of the bottle shape.
To make a more powerful reactor, Khosla-backed Realta would only need to expand the middle section, and because these magnets are less powerful, they are cheaper. The cost per kilowatt-hour should decrease as Realta’s reactors increase in size.
CFS is pursuing another form of magnetic confinement fusion called a tokamak. In a tokamak, D-shaped magnets cast strong fields to keep the plasma circulating in a donut shape inside. Over the years, the company has refined its magnets in an effort to put electrons into the grid from Arc, its future commercial-scale reactor to be built in Virginia.
The existence of both CFS and Realta stems from the magnets themselves. CFS was founded in 2018 after scientists at MIT realized that a new class of commercially available high-temperature superconductors could support a viable tokamak design. Realta was founded a few years later when physicists at the University of Wisconsin “saw that there was a new, game-changing technology that would allow us to return to [magnetic] reflects and benefits from these engineering advantages that the concept has,” said co-founder and CEO Kieran Furlong.
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In addition to the Realta and WHAM deals, CFS has also licensed its high-temperature superconducting magnet technology to Type One Fusion, which is working on a third type of reactor design known as a stellarator. While the latest deal doesn’t include making actual CFS magnets for the company, it could lead to that one day, Christine Dunn, CFS’ head of external communications, told TechCrunch.
The deals will help CFS pay back its investment in magnet manufacturing. The startup spent seven years and hundreds of millions of dollars building a factory capable of producing high-temperature superconducting magnets designed to fusion power specifications. So far, that has gone toward building Sparc, the company’s demonstration reactor, which won’t be turned on until later this year.
“With Sparc now 70% complete, it was great timing to start supporting Realta with our magnet manufacturing,” said Needham.
Because Realta and Type One are pursuing different reactor designs, CFS apparently does not see them as direct competitors at this time. In the market, Realta and CFS are even further apart, with the former initially focusing on industrial applications that need large amounts of heat.
To date, CFS has raised nearly $3 billion—a large chunk of all venture capital raised by fusion startups. This puts the company in an enviable position, giving it the means to build key facilities such as its magnet factory before competitors can. The startup presents these deals as a service to the wider fusion industry, making available technologies that would cost many millions to replicate. That’s certainly true, but it also gives him access to even more venture investments, even if they’re cyclical.
Update 1:45 p.m. ET: The CFS production facility makes HTS magnets, not tape, and will not be idle, but will make additional magnets for Sparc. The article also misstated Rick Needham’s role as COO. is CCO.
