Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Fusion energy start-up Marvel Fusion has raised €113mn in new funding as Germany steps up its efforts to compete in the global race to create zero-carbon power by combining atoms.The Munich-based company has completed a series B funding round with investment from the venture arm of Swedish private equity group EQT, Siemens Energy and the European Innovation Council, according to its founder Moritz von der Linden.The new funding for Marvel’s laser-based technology is one of the largest investments to date in Europe’s nascent fusion industry as the region races to keep pace with the US and China.The promise of fusion — in which hydrogen isotopes are heated to such extreme temperatures that they fuse and release energy — has excited scientists since the 1950s. Unlike fission, the process of splitting atoms that is used by existing nuclear power stations, fusion produces no long-lived nuclear waste. However, despite years of research, many scientists believe fusion power stations are still decades away.Germany’s chancellor-in-waiting Friedrich Merz is an enthusiastic supporter of fusion research, stressing during the campaign for last month’s federal elections that Europe must not leave the field to China. Merz has said that Germany should host the world’s first fusion reactor to be connected to the energy grid.While Germany and the UK have long played leading roles in fusion research, both countries have fewer private sector-start ups seeking to achieve fusion power than the US.Most fusion investment to date has gone into “magnetic confinement” technology. The system remains the most widely studied fusion method. It involves using huge magnets to hold in place two hydrogen isotopes, usually deuterium and tritium, while they are heated to temperatures hotter than the sun. The laser-based technology under development at Marvel Fusion is based on an alternative theory known as inertial confinement, in which the lasers are fired at a tiny capsule of the hydrogen fuel, triggering an implosion. Interest in the approach has increased since scientists at the US government-run National Ignition Facility used the world’s largest laser to achieve a net energy gain in a fusion reaction for the first time in December 2022. Net energy gain means the reaction produced more energy than it consumed.Von der Linden told the Financial Times: “Marvel Fusion with this round is the best funded laser fusion company on the planet.”Siemens Energy said it had made a small investment, adding that it welcomed “the advancement of research by a European company in this field”.Companies pursuing magnetic confinement solutions in the US have raised much larger sums than Marvel Fusion. Commonwealth Fusion Systems raised $1.8bn in December 2021, while Sam Altman-backed Helion raised $425mn in January.Von der Linden said that if they were successful, there would be space in the future for both technologies. But he said that aspects of Marvel Fusion’s design and the type of hydrogen-based fuel that it hoped to use might mean it produced power at a lower cost. The company aims to build a prototype facility by 2032 and a commercial fusion power plant by 2036.Von der Linden said that, for fusion power to be commercially viable, it would need to produce electricity at a cost no higher than five US cents per kilowatt hour.“I do think that our approach is best suited to meet that,” he said.
