Helion Energy

Helion Energy, Inc.

Helion Energy, Inc. is an American company in Redmond, WA developing a fusion power technology called The Fusion Engine.[1] This company has a public website and several articles but does not appear to regularly release information on their technology or business development. They are working on the development of a 50 MW scale fusion power system which they hope to have working by 2019.[2][3]

Helion Energy Inc
Private
Industry Nuclear fusion
Founder Dr. David Kirtley, CEO; Dr. John Slough, CSO; Chris Pihl, CTO; Dr. George Votroubek, PI
Headquarters Redmond, WA
Website Helion Energy home page

Company Organization

Helion Energy is a spin-off of a Redmond company, MSNW LLC,[4] which develops space propulsion and fusion energy related technologies. The CEO is Dr. David Kirtley, Chief Science Officer is Dr. John Slough, and CTO is Chris Pihl. The primary fusion technology was developed by Dr. John Slough, also a research professor at the University of Washington with additional technologies generated by Pihl and Kirtley.

Technology

According to published documents, the Fusion Engine technology is based on the Inductive Plasmiod Accelerator (IPA) experiments[5][6] performed at MSNW LLC from 2005 through 2012. This ‘Engine’ operates at 1 Hz, injecting plasma, compressing it to fusion conditions, expanding it, and directly recovering the energy to provide electricity.[7]

Fuel

Helion uses a Deuterium fuel. Helion’s publications have described several Deuterium fusion reactions, it is unclear the configuration of their Fusion Engine. Deuterium-based fusion fuels are much easier to achieve than anetronic fusion fuels, but generate neutrons.

The existing IPA experiments used Deuterium-Deuterium fusion which produces a 2.4 MeV neutron per reaction. Helion and MSNW have published articles describing a Deuterium-Tritium implementation of their Fusion Engine which are the easiest to achieve but generate 14 MeV neutrons. Additionally, they have published articles describing a Deuterium-Helium-3 reaction that would generate a small amount of low energy neutrons but details on this are still limited. While also aneutronic, Helium-3 fusion is generally considered not feasible due to the limited quantities of Helium-3 available.

Injection

In general this fusion approach uses the magnetic compression of an Field Reversed Configuration (FRC) plasmoid to achieve fusion plasma conditions. An FRC is a magnetized plasma configuration notable due to closed field lines, high Beta, and no internal penetrations. To inject the plasmoid into the fusion ‘burn’ chamber two plasmoids are accelerated at high velocity with pulsed magnetic fields and merge into a single FRC plasma. The IPA experiments claimed 300 km/s velocities, Deuterium neutron production, and 2 keV Deuterium ion temperatures.[6]

Compression

The primary focus of their technology is the compression of the merged plasma to high pressure, similar to inertial fusion. Helion calls their device magneto-inertial fusion in which the fusion density and temperature are achieved with a pulse of high pressure compression. Technique include lasers, metal liner, liquid metal shock, and magnetic compression. Their experiments compressed plasmas to 1.5 Tesla and 2 keV plasma temperatures. Published records show plans to compress fusion plasmas to 12 Tesla.[8]

Energy Generation

Helion documents mention Direct energy conversion. Presumably it is similar to that developed by their competitors with Inverse Cyclotron Converter. No detailed information has been published to date.

Funding

Helion Energy appears to have gotten $7 million in funding from NASA, the U.S. Department of Energy and the Department of Defense,[9] then $1.5 million from the private sector in August 2014, through the seed accelerators Y Combinator and Mithril Capital Management.[10]

References

  1. ↑ "helionenergy.com - Helion Energy website".
  2. ↑ "Helion Executive Summary".
  3. ↑ "Cleantech Open Announcement 2013".
  4. ↑ "msnwllc.com - MSNW LLC website".
  5. ↑ Votroubek, G.; Slough, J.; Andreason, S.; Pihl, C. (June 2008). "Formation of a Stable Field Reversed Configuration through Merging". Journal of Fusion Energy (Springer Science+Business Media) 27 (1-2): 123–127. doi:10.1007/s10894-007-9103-4.
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 Slough, John; Votroubek, George; Pihl, Chris (13 April 2011). "Creation of a high-temperature plasma through merging and compression of supersonic field reversed configuration plasmoids". Nuclear Fusion (International Atomic Energy Agency) 51 (5). doi:10.1088/0029-5515/51/5/053008.
  7. ↑ Svoboda, Elizabeth (21 June 2011). "Is Fusion Power Finally For Real?". Popular Mechanics.
  8. ↑ Hambling, David (16 August 2011). "New Scientist Small Fusion Startups Aim for Breakeven". New Scientist.
  9. ↑ Halper, Mark (30 April 2013). "The nearness of fusion: The materials and coolant challenges facing one fusion company mirror fission". The Alvin Weinberg Foundation.
  10. ↑ Russell, Kyle (14 August 2014). "Y Combinator And Mithril Invest In Helion, A Nuclear Fusion Startup". TechCrunch.