Oxfordshire fusion companies head to London for conference

By Nicky Godding

18 October 2022

Share

The Business Magazine article image for: Oxfordshire fusion companies head to London for conference

This week the Oxfordshire Local Enterprise Partnership, alongside a host of other Oxfordshire-based organisations, will be heading to London to take part in Fusion 22 – a major event that aims to bring greater awareness as to the potential of fusion energy, and there’s good reason as to why the county will be represented so heavily in the capital.

Held at the world-famous Science Museum, event organisers aim to bring together the ‘whole fusion industry’ to demonstrate the sector’s incredible potential and how it can be the cornerstone of clean future, as well as highlighting the need for further, innovative collaboration.

The reason for such a presence at a major fusion conference is that Oxfordshire-based companies and experiments are already showing the considerable potential of fusion as a clean, energy source. New, unparalleled successes in its evolvement are happening more-and-more regularly.

Just at the start of this year, the acceleration of fusion became further apparent through results recorded at the Culham Science Centre’s Joint European Torus (JET) facility. It announced that 59 megajoules of sustained fusion energy was achieved over a five-second period, with JET saying that this level more than doubled previous records dating back to 1997 – the previous high being 22 megajoules.

In addition – with companies such as Tokamak Energy and First Light Fusion already calling Oxfordshire ‘home’ – it’s no surprise that the Canadian-based industry leader, General Fusion has taken notice of these strengths and last summer announced it will build its Fusion Demonstration Plant (FDP) at Culham, further adding to Oxfordshire’s depth and reputation as a ‘powerhouse’ in the development of fusion energy.

By Nicky Godding

Nicky Godding is editor of The Business Magazine. Before her journalism career, she worked mainly in public relations moving into writing when she was invited to launch Retail Watch, a publication covering retail and real estate across Europe.

After some years of constant travelling, she tucked away her passport and concentrated on business writing, co-founding a successful regional business magazine. She has interviewed some of the UK’s most successful entrepreneurs who have built multi-million-pound businesses and reported on many science and technology firsts.

She reports on the region’s thriving business economy from start-ups, family businesses and multi-million-pound corporations, to the professionals that support their growth and the institutions that educate the next generation of business leaders.