It is a special moment when the doors of one of the world’s largest laser-fusion fuel laboratories swing open: scientists slip on blue full-body protective suits, mechanics tinker with precision milling machines, and laboratory technicians peer through high-powered microscopes at fuel pellets just four millimetres in size.
We are in Darmstadt, an industrial city in the western German state of Hesse. Here, at the headquarters of the start-up Focused Energy, an international team of highly motivated specialists aims to develop laser fusion to the point where it is ready for industrial application. The company’s goal is to have its first commercial laser-fusion power plant operating in 15 years at the earliest.
