Inevitable Inside the Race for Net Facility Gain with Pacific Fusion
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Dec 9, 2025 Carrie von Muench, COO and co-founder of Pacific Fusion, discusses her journey from skepticism to driving innovation in fusion energy. She highlights recent breakthroughs, such as the National Ignition Facility's ignition, that shifted fusion from theory to a tangible engineering challenge. Carrie explains the unique financing model for fusion, details their modular pulsed-magnetic system, and outlines the ambitious goal of achieving net facility gain by 2030. She also shares insights on the strategic global race in fusion development and the significance of their New Mexico facility.
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2022 Changed Fusion From Science To Engineering
- 2022 breakthroughs shifted fusion from a scientific moonshot to an engineering challenge.
- Those results enabled companies to design pragmatic, buildable fusion systems.
Three Milestones Define Fusion Progress
- Fusion progress has three key milestones: fuel ignition, net facility gain, and cost-effective power production.
- Pacific Fusion focuses next on net facility gain as the essential step toward commercial plants.
Founding Team United After 2022 Breakthroughs
- Founders came together in 2023 after 2022 breakthroughs convinced them fusion was an engineering problem.
- Eric Lander, Will Regan, Keith, Leland, and Carrie formed the core team that launched Pacific Fusion.
