Alerts
-
3 minutes, 47 seconds
Helion has received a three-year, $175 million award from the Department of Commerce under the CHIPS Act to research, develop, and manufacture advanced semiconductors and power electronics for its fusion plants. The funding will support automated capacity for semiconductor modules, packaging, and testing, as well as research and development in Washington State.
Efficiency is central to the investment. The power electronics Helion uses currently lose about 5% to 10% of the electricity passing through them. Those losses can compound across a complex system, the company says. Helion co-founder and CEO David Kirtley told TechCrunch that cutting the loss in half could mean twice the fusion system’s power output.
The new Washington State production line will support Orion, Helion’s first power plant, which is under construction. However, the award-funded research and development will not make it into Orion in time for launch. Helion says the work could instead improve the efficiency of later plants, helping them compete in electricity markets. The three-year award is intended to build U.S. semiconductor research and manufacturing capacity, while supplying technology that Helion says is important to increasing the output of its power plants.
The three-year award, made by the Department of Commerce under the CHIPS Act, comes alongside an additional $50 million private investment whose investor Helion has not disclosed. Helion has raised more than $3.2 billion in total, making it the second-best-funded fusion startup.
More than $100 million of the federal award is planned for semiconductor and advanced packaging research and development in Washington State. The new production line will build automated module, packaging, and testing capacity for a semiconductor class that, according to CEO David Kirtley, currently has no U.S. manufacturers.
About $80 million is planned for work in Vermont with GlobalFoundries, focused on advanced semiconductor tooling, design, and process development. Separately, GlobalFoundries has received more than $80 million in federal support to advance gallium-nitride semiconductor manufacturing. Gallium-nitride semiconductors are widely used in power electronics.
The award-funded research will not reach Helion’s Orion plant in time for its launch, Kirtley said, but could improve the efficiency of later plants. Federal contracts can take months to negotiate, he added.
Helion is developing a reactor called a field-reversed configuration, designed to capture electricity directly from fusion reactions rather than using the reaction’s heat to make steam and spin a turbine. Deuterium and helium-3 fuel enters both ends of an hourglass-like chamber, where it is heated into plasma. Magnetic fields accelerate the two plasmas toward each other. When they collide, another magnetic field compresses the plasma, raising its temperature above 100 million degrees Celsius.
At those temperatures and pressures, atoms in the fuel begin to fuse and release energy, pushing the plasma outward. As the expanding plasma presses against the magnetic field, the resulting energy is captured by magnets and capacitors and converted into electricity. Helion compares the process to a hybrid car or electric vehicle recharging its battery as electric motors slow it down.
Efficient power electronics are essential to this direct energy conversion: they help deliver electricity to the fusion process and recover it quickly and efficiently. Helion says improving these devices’ efficiency could help future plants produce more power than they consume to operate—a necessary milestone for commercial viability.
Helion is racing to complete its first power plant, Orion, in time to meet its 2028 commitment to provide Microsoft with electricity from the grid. The federally funded research and development will not reach Orion in time for launch, but Helion says it could improve the efficiency and competitiveness of later plants in electricity markets.
The Washington State production line will make advanced, high-voltage, pulsed semiconductors, a class used in fusion power and other applications. Potential uses include manufacturing, wastewater treatment, medicine, and defense. Advanced power electronics could also support grid transmission and energy generation; electric vehicles are currently their broadest use, and consumer electronics could benefit too, though their size and power demands are lower than Helion’s.
Defense applications may attract interest, including energy weapons, but Helion says its priority is putting power on the grid. Kirtley described the company’s main focus as domestic energy supply, national security through energy dominance, and energy security. The award is also intended to build U.S. capacity for advanced semiconductors, as Helion says there are currently no U.S. manufacturers producing this class.
Comment