Type One CEO says Tennessee Valley Authority to harness its fusion technology

By Pooja Menon and Sumit Saha

Sept 19 (Reuters) - Type One Energy CEO Christofer Mowry said on Friday U.S. government-owned utility Tennessee Valley Authority plans to use its technology at the retired coal-fired Bull Run plant, which will be the site of a commercial fusion plant.

Nuclear power has been making a comeback in the U.S. after decades of stagnation, driven by record electricity demand from AI data centers as well as the electrification of industries such as transportation and manufacturing.

Type One Energy said it will provide stellarator technology, which is a more advanced version of the tokamak reactor and is the only fusion technology shown to operate in a stable and steady state manner, making it appropriate for use in a power generation application.

Existing nuclear plants rely on nuclear fission, where larger atoms are split into smaller ones, whereas nuclear fusion joins two or more small atoms into a larger one, offering greater energy production without generating large amounts of radioactive waste.

Fusion is still at an experimental stage as developers have yet to achieve net energy gain in a commercially viable way, but investment has been boosted by a flurry of interest from Big Tech groups that have entered the sector alongside investors such as energy giants such as Chevron CVX.N, Shell SHEL.L and Siemens SIEGn.DE.

"What's really exciting about fusion energy is it has a very light regulatory structure to it...so the timeline and the cost of permitting and licensing is a small fraction of what you traditionally see in a nuclear project," Mowry said in an interview with Reuters.

Type One expects the construction of the power plant to begin as early as 2028, but did not disclose the exact value of the contracts signed with TVA.

Axios had reported earlier today TVA would use Type One technology at the plant.