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A nuclear fusion startup backed by OpenAI founder Sam Altman has raised nearly half a billion dollars to build what it hopes to be the world’s first power plant using the next-generation energy source.
US-based Helion Energy recently unveiled its latest prototype in Everett, Washington, before announcing a $425 million funding round this week.
Among the investors was Mr Altman, who has previously said that future artificial intelligence will require vast amounts of power that can only be produced by nuclear fusion.
The ChatGPT boss said last year that “energy is the hardest part” in creating artificial general intelligence (AGI) that match or surpass human intelligence.
Nuclear fusion has been hailed as the “holy grail of clean energy” due to its potential to mimic the Sun’s natural processes to generate near-limitless power without leaving behind hazardous waste.
The next-generation energy source still requires significant breakthroughs before it can be realised on a commercial scale, with some scientists believing it may still be decades away.
Despite the challenges, Helion claims it will build the world’s first nuclear fusion power plant by 2028 and has already secured a purchase agreement from Microsoft.
The US tech giant made the deal in 2023 in the belief that Helion Energy will be able to build a 50MW nuclear fusion power plant and supercharge the transition towards clean energy.
Helion Energy’s latest funding round, which puts its valuation at $5.2 billion, will help the firm accelerate development of the technology, according to the company’s chief executive David Kirtley.
“We will be radically scaling up our manufacturing in the US – enabling us to build capacitors, magnets, and semiconductors much faster than we have been able to before,” Mr Kirtley said.
“There’s still a lot of work to do, and our team is excited to keep pushing to do what no one has done before.”