California-based TAE Technologies, the world’s biggest fusion energy company, has raised $280 million in funding.

The additional funding is a result of the Google-backed organisation achieving a new scientific milestone. The company has generated stable plasma at 50M+ degrees Celsius in a compact reactor design that can be scaled to competitive fusion-generated power.

Some of the capital will be used to develop a demonstration facility that will operate in excess of 100 million degrees Celsius.

The money will also be spend on rapid commercialisation of the company’s power management technology.

Funding has come from new and existing investors.

Company shareholders include, Google, Vulcan, Venrock, NEA, Wellcome Trust, and the Kuwait. (is this the country?)

“This is an incredibly rewarding milestone and an apt tribute to the vision of my late mentor, Norman Rostoker,” said TAE chief executive Michl Binderbauer. “Norman and I wrote a paper in the 1990s theorising that a certain plasma dominated by highly energetic particles should become increasingly better confined and stable as temperatures increase.

He added: "We have now been able to demonstrate this plasma behaviour with overwhelming evidence. It is a powerful validation of our work over the last three decades, and a very critical milestone for TAE that proves the laws of physics are on our side.”

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