In a major breakthrough in the field of clean energy, scientists generated more energy from a nuclear fusion reaction than they put into triggering it. This significant accomplishment brings TAE Technologies a step closer to bringing the world carbon-free power.
The company’s p-B11 fuel (hydrogen and boron) offers an alternative to deuterium-tritium with no environmental impact, particulate emissions or radioactivity.
What is TAE Technologies?
TAE Technologies, formerly known as Tri Alpha Energy, is a California-based company working to develop a commercial source of clean nuclear power. The firm’s primary mission is to create a safe, affordable source of electricity through the fusion of hydrogen and boron – two readily available elements. It has raised over $880 million in private capital from a range of investors, including Google, Chevron, Goldman Sachs, Vulcan Capital, Venrock, New Enterprise Associates, and Sumitomo Corporation of Americas. In addition, TAE Technologies has created spinoff companies that leverage innovations developed for its fusion research, such as particle accelerator beam technology and power management solutions.
In 2022, TAE announced a significant breakthrough in its research, which saw scientists finally generate more energy out of a fusion reaction than went into it. This was a major milestone for the company and represented validation of the life’s work of its late co-founder, Norman Rostoker. Following this news, major investors like Chevron and Alphabet stepped in to support TAE Technologies . Together, they have committed to investing up to $3 billion in the company’s development of a fusion reactor capable of producing helium-4 from hydrogen-boron fusion.
What is TAE Technologies’s business model?
TAE Technologies specializes in developing commercial fusion power with the lowest possible environmental impact.This new way of producing clean energy is the quickest and easiest way to add a lot of energy to the power system.
This company has many different inventions that they sell in big markets like energy storage, electric cars, and medicine. The company is headquartered in California and maintains international offices in the UK and Switzerland. Its revolutionary technology has produced 84 patents.
Michl Binderbauer, CEO of TAE Technologies, has positioned the company to accelerate the transition to a cleaner world. The company’s first-of-its-kind system unlocks a complete clean energy ecosystem: more affordable and efficient storage; rapid and safe charging; peak shaving; second-life batteries; and a range of smarter EV powertrain capabilities.
The TAE field-reversed configuration (FRC) machine, named after co-founder Norman Rostoker who died in 2014, has reached a scientific milestone with stable plasma at 50 million degrees Celsius – far hotter than the sun. The breakthrough is an important step toward producing fusion energy, which could be a scalable source of clean energy and a key enabler of grid stability as renewables become a larger portion of the mix.
What is TAE Technologies’s management team?
TAE Technologies multidisciplinary team is driven by the mission of delivering an abundant, clean energy source that is capable of powering the world for centuries. The company’s breakthrough work brings commercial fusion power closer than ever before, with the potential to provide an economic alternative to fossil fuels.
TAE Technologies recently announced the appointment of Michl Binderbauer as its new CEO, replacing Steven Specker who will remain on the board. Michl is a co-inventor of TAE’s technology and has extensive experience in developing and managing large and complex scientific projects.
The company is also bringing a new level of focus to the commercialization of its technology with the creation of a newly formed subsidiary called TAE Power Solutions. The subsidiary will develop, build, and industrialize modular battery systems for electric mobility and grid storage applications.
TAE Technologies Life, a spinoff from TAE Technologies, is in the process of raising Series A funding for its boron neutron capture therapy (BNCT) technique that offers promising noninvasive treatment options for head and neck cancers and recurrent melanoma. BNCT has demonstrated compelling results in early clinical trials.
What is TAE Technologies’s outlook for the future?
With more than $1.2 billion in private capital raised, five generations of National Laboratory-scale devices built and two more under construction, and a team of more than 500 employees, TAE Technologies is on track to deliver commercial fusion power with the lowest environmental profile. The southern California-based company has pushed plasma temperatures to over 75 million degrees Celsius and is demonstrating unmatched real-time control of its fusion reactors.
The company’s newest round of funding includes investments from the philanthropic arm of Chevron, the US’s largest energy producer; Google’s parent, Alphabet; and lithium supplier Albemarle. Google’s investment leverages the pair’s existing collaboration on computational AI and machine learning to optimize TAE’s research reactors, which will help scientists hold plasma at record-breaking temperatures for longer periods of time.
TAE Technologies audacious concept abandons D-T fuel altogether in favor of fusing boron-11 with hydrogen-1 nuclei (protons). It requires temperatures ten times greater than D-T, but has the potential to dramatically reduce maintenance costs and achieve an end goal that is much more sustainable. TAE’s patented technologies created for this unique approach are also being leveraged for adjacent innovations in electric mobility and power management.
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