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Pacific Fusion Starts Building New Mexico Fusion Research Center

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Pacific Fusion has started construction of a $1 billion research and manufacturing facility in Albuquerque, New Mexico, which will test nuclear fusion power to advance it towards commerciality, the company said in a statement on Tuesday.

The site will house a demonstration system that aims to achieve "net facility gain" by 2030, whereby it produces more energy from fusion than is needed to create the reaction, something it said has so far not been achieved.

Pacific Fusion said the system will also "produce burses of high-energy fusion" above 100 megajoules at what is currently the only "high-yield" fusion facility in construction in the country which has applications in national security.

That will help meet a defense need the US identified more than 30 years ago, enabling maintenance of the nuclear stockpile without explosive testing, the statement said.

Pacific Fusion has entered into a public-private partnership with the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration through which they will seek to collaborate on high-yield fusion.

Pacific Fusion, founded in 2023, said the US is in a race with China, which is investing billions in next-generation fusion for both energy and national security purposes and said its laboratory will keep the country one step ahead in this pursuit.

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