UKAEA commits £8m to UK firms for shielding and fusion fuel tech

Scale-up funding to advance fusion fuel technology to commercialisation stage

Contracts awarded through UKAEA’s Fusion Industry Programme

The United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) has awarded contracts worth £8.1 million in total from its Fusion Industry Programme to 14 organisations to develop shielding and fusion fuel technologies for future fusion power plants.

Eleven organisations have secured contracts to develop sustainable shielding solutions for fusion environments, while three others have received funding to scale-up projects – initiated in 2023 – that address key challenges in fusion fuel technology.

Shielding contracts

Fusion machines must withstand extreme conditions: temperatures exceeding 100 million degrees Celsius in the plasma core, intense flux of high-energy neutrons and powerful magnetic fields essential for plasma confinement.

Effective shielding – both inside the vessel (to protect components from direct plasma and neutron bombardment) and outside (to safeguard sensitive systems like superconducting magnets) – is critical for plant safety and reliability.

Thirteen contracts worth a total of £3 million have been awarded to 11 organisations, including a mix of private companies and one university. These organisations will undertake technical feasibility studies to advance their technologies and materials to ‘proof of concept’ stage.

Scale-up fusion fuel contracts

In fusion, energy is released when two forms of hydrogen are heated to form a plasma at extreme temperatures. Handling these hydrogen isotopes throughout the entire fuel cycle – from supply to recovery and recycling – presents one of fusion’s core engineering challenges.

Three organisations have secured contracts totalling £5 million to scale up their advanced production and handling technologies for hydrogen isotopes.

The scale-up projects will build on expertise developed during initial phase 1 feasibility studies and phase 2 prototyping projects. Prototype technology will be tested, with data gathered in operationally relevant environments, bringing the technology closer to commercialisation.

Novel shielding materials and technologies are a cornerstone for viable future fusion energy power plants, as well as other aligned industries. The response to this competition demonstrated the impressive breadth of research being done within the UK that could help solve this challenge. The Fusion Industry Programme is delighted to support 13 feasibility studies and see what progress is made in this interesting area of research, development and innovation (RDI).

Excellent progress has been made by all suppliers involved in the development of a wide range of hydrogen isotope technologies in recent years. Now with this additional funding, we can provide vital follow-on contracts and technical opportunities to three promising solutions focusing on analytical methods to measure and control operations of a continuous fusion fuel cycle, and the core components for recovering tritium. Their work in the coming months, supported by experts and capabilities at UKAEA, will continue to strengthen the UK private sector in this important technical challenge.

Lyndsey Mooring, Head of the Fusion Industry Programme, UKAEA

Shielding is a critical safety requirement for any system involving the production of ionising radiation, including the neutrons and gamma fields expected in fusion systems. It is important to develop shielding solutions for both in-vessel, where space is constrained, and ex-vessel, that are robust, economically viable, and have minimised environmental impact. This challenge is asking UK industry to explore novel solutions for the different shielding applications in fusion.

Mark Gilbert, Head of Programme for Neutron Materials Interactions, UKAEA

The full list of organisations awarded contracts:

Shielding

Organisation

Project title

Kyoto Fusioneering UK Ltd

Composite Shielding for Modular and Innovative Confinement (COSMIC)

Composite Materials for Precision Absorption in Spectrum-specific Systems (COMPASS)

Aegis Fibretech Ltd

APEX – Advanced Panels for Extreme eXposure: Ultra-light multifunctional metamaterials for fusion shielding

Oxford Sigma Ltd

Shielding by Hydride Engineering for Lightweight Deployment (SHyELD)

Shaping TUngsten By Bonding It, part II (STUBBI II)

Tokamak Energy Ltd

CAST: Cermet Advancement for Shielding in Tokamaks

TWI Ltd

Deposition of novel graded-Z shielding materials for fusion using cold spray additive manufacturing (ColdShield)

Glass Technology Services Ltd

Glass and glass ceramics for fusion reactor shielding applications

First Light Fusion Ltd

Natural lithium shielding

Materials Nexus Ltd

SHINE – Superior High-performance Intermetallics for Neutronic Evaluation

Monolith Performance Ltd

ALRAD Shield – Advanced Layered Radiation Shield

Amentum Clean Energy Ltd

Reduced activation options for in-vessel shielding

University of Warwick

Shielding solutions for fusion power plants inside and outside the plasma chamber

Hydrogen isotope technology

Organisation

Project title

IS-Instruments Ltd

Gas Raman Detection of Tritium (GRADE)

AqSorption Ltd

Prototyping and validation of AqSorption’s electrolyser and Pd-Graphene membrane cassette assembly to efficiently and effectively manage and separate hydrogen isotopes for fusion

Gencoa Ltd

A remote real-time isotopic exhaust gas analyser for fusion devices

The Fusion Industry Programme will complete delivery of all current challenge projects across key technical areas of fusion, and the Programme will come to a close once current projects are complete this year.

Tritium Fuel Cycle facility at UKAEA’s Culham Campus – Image Credit United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority

Source Link: https://www.ukaea.org/news/ukaea-commits-8m-to-uk-firms-for-shielding-and-fusion-fuel-tech/