The physics and engineering of the Gauss Fusion GIGA power plant
Institutskolloquium
- Datum: 28.02.2025
- Uhrzeit: 10:30 - 12:00
- Vortragender: Dr. Richard Kembleton and Dr. Samuel Lazerson
- Dr. Richard Kembleton has been working in fusion physics for over 20 years, starting with a PhD in fusion materials at Cambridge University. He then joined UKAEA (UK Atomic Energy Authority) where he was a member of the Power Plant Technology Group and worked on DEMO, power plant designs, and fusion economics. Dr. Kembleton joined EUROfusion in Garching in 2018 to manage the Prospective R&D programme aimed at realising technology for commercialisation, and then joined Gauss Fusion in 2023 where he now acts as the CSO. --- Dr. Samuel Lazerson has a B.S. in Engineering Physics from Emby-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach Florida, and a Ph.D. in Space Physics from the University of Alaska, Fairbanks. He has worked on stellarator physics for 15 years as a researcher at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory and the Max-Planck Institute for Plasma Physics in Greifswald. He's conducted research on the Large Helical Device, HSX, CNT, DIII-D, NSTX, ITER, and W7-X. In May of last year Samuel joined Gauss Fusion as the stellarator physics lead.
- Ort: IPP Garching
- Raum: Arnulf-Schlüter Lecture Hall in Building D2 and Zoom
- Gastgeber: IPP
- Kontakt: stefan.possanner@ipp.mpg.de
Gauss Fusion intends to build the first-of-a-kind commercial fusion power plant based around a QI stellarator, and have it operational by the early 2040s. This requires a strict down-selection of physics scenarios and technology choices in order to arrive at a design point that has a good chance of successful engineering, procurement, deployment, and operation as a power plant. This talk will review the design philosophy behind the Gauss Fusion GIGA power plant, the technology choices and development path, and the physics basis underpinning it, and end with a discussion of the roadmap to deployment.
About Gauss Fusion:
The company was founded in 2022, backed by private industrial companies from Germany, France, Italy, and Spain, all of whom have acted as suppliers to ITER and know the fusion research industry. Our mission is to accelerate the industrialization of fusion energy and make it scalable, with the ultimate goal of building the first European fusion power plant by the early 2040s.