Madison Gas and Electric Plans State’s First Fusion Power Plant

This is a rendering of “The Realta Forge,” the company’s planned research and development facility in Madison. At OM Station, the former Oscar Mayer plant and headquarters, it will host Realta Fusion’s prototype magnetic mirror fusion machine. Photo courtesy of Realta Fusion

A Wisconsin utility company and a Madison startup announced a partnership Wednesday that could bring one of the nation’s first large-scale fusion power plants to the Badger State.

Madison Gas and Electric, or MGE, and Realta Fusion will work together to explore the development of a 200-megawatt fusion energy power plant able to power around 150,000 homes. The companies will work together on the siting, permitting and financing for the plant.

Fusion generates power by fusing atoms together to convert a small amount of mass into a large amount of energy. But the technology is not yet commercially viable at utility scale.

Realta Fusion CEO Kieran Furlong said the company views the “mid-2030s” as a reasonable target for a fusion power plant in Wisconsin.

He said the company is hoping to commercialize its technology by the early 2030s, describing a utility-scale power plant connected to the grid as a “longer-term proposition” that requires the company to start laying the groundwork now.

“We can’t wait until we have a commercial-ready technology,” he said. “We need to start right now and do that in parallel with our continued technology development as well.”

If all goes according to plan, Furlong said the plant would be among the first utility-scale fusion power plants in the country.

Beyond working toward developing the plant, MGE also made a direct equity investment in Realta, with the utility company becoming a shareholder in the fusion startup, Furlong said.

The financial terms of that investment were not made available by the companies. But Furlong called it a “meaningful” investment for both sides.

“We think that really helps with alignment for the long-term to make sure that we’ll be working on this side by side for the years to come,” he said.

Madison Gas and Electric will be serving Realta’s planned research and development facility at the former Oscar Mayer site in Madison.

While the company says fusion energy will eventually add power to the grid, Furlong said Realta will be a major energy-user while it works to develop the technology.

MGE is also helping Realta with equipment, engineering and technical support for that project, said Brad Alexejun, economic development manager at MGE.

“We build power plants, we operate the grid and those are areas where they don’t have expertise, so we’re partnering with them in those specific aspects as well,” he said.

Alexejun said the development timeline for a fusion power plant will depend on when Realta has the technology ready.

He said a nuclear power siting study that state regulators and the University of Wisconsin-Madison are working on will inform where in Wisconsin a plant would be located, but MGE and Realta would take other factors into account as well.

Alexejun said nuclear power, including fusion, has the potential to replace fossil fuel plants that use coal or natural gas. He said fusion could provide a carbon-free baseload, or always-on, energy source that isn’t dependent on the sun shining or the wind blowing.

Madison Gas and Electric shares ownership of power generation resources — including a coal plant in Columbia County and several renewable energy projects — with other utilities, including We Energies, Wisconsin Public Service and Alliant Energy.

Furlong said the partnership between Realta and MGE could help pave the way for other utilities to invest in the plant, saying 200 megawatts is the minimum size the company would target for the project.

Madison utility, Realta Fusion partnering to bring fusion power plant to Wisconsin was originally published by Wisconsin Public Radio.