Trump administration backs nuclear fusion - as -2-

From Washington to Wall Street, Trump has built an expectation that the federal government will spend serious money on fusion, with the TMTG-TAE entity as a big winner, according to analysts at investment bank Wedbush Securities. TAE will "clearly have major political support from President Trump in our view, and this importantly will create a major nuclear-fusion U.S. energy domestic bet over the coming years," said the Wedbush analysts, led by Dan Ives, in a note to clients.

Rep. Don Beyer, a Virginia Democrat who co-chairs the House Fusion Energy Caucus, noted there are at least 28 fusion companies in the U.S. He said that the key area where he'd have concerns about conflicts of interest involving TAE is if the federal government started providing more money to the fusion industry. He cited one bipartisan study that has called for a $10 billion investment over the next three years.

"I don't want the Department of Energy to be putting its thumb on the scale for any one company," Beyer said, adding that government officials can feel "just the subtle pressure of knowing that the president is interested in this one company."

One former member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, appointed during the Carter administration, told MarketWatch that he can't think of an instance in decades with this type of potential for conflicts of interest.

"I've never seen anything remotely comparable to this, in which either the president or the governor of the state had these kinds of interests in, on the one hand, a commercial entity, and on the other hand, control over the regulatory and purchasing bodies that that entity might deal with," said Peter Bradford, the former NRC member, who also has served as the chair of utility commissions for Maine and New York and taught regulatory law.

There should be at least "a rigorous blind-trust kind of arrangement" for Trump's business interests, Bradford said. While Trump uses a revocable trust, other recent presidents have relied on blind trusts, divestments or investments in vanilla assets. The current commander-in-chief's approach is possible in large part because presidents are exempt from conflict-of-interest rules that prohibit federal officials from having a role in government matters where they have a financial stake.

Bradford said he's a fusion skeptic and, for him, the bigger worry is the possible harm to investors in the combined TMTG-TAE entity who are expecting meaningful progress with the underlying technology.

"Fusion still faces huge technical challenges between where it is now and the producing of commercially competitive electricity in large quantities," Bradford said. "Sustaining and containing a fusion reaction in a useful way has been a goal in that industry for my entire professional lifetime, which stretches back to the 1960s, and it's always said to be 10 or 20 years away."

A 'light touch' to fusion regulation

Later this month, the 90-day public comment period on a new federal regulatory framework for fusion technology will come to a close. Some industry experts have described the NRC approach as "less prescriptive" than other rulemakings, and expect the regulations will be published in the Federal Register around November. The regulations could become effective by the end of 2026.

Some proponents of fusion wave away any ethical worry tied to the NRC's rulemaking. Beyer, the Virginia Democratic congressman, said he has "virtually no concerns" on that front, even as he said the president shouldn't be investing in a fusion company. Beyer said the regulatory development has broad bipartisan support and has been in the works for years, including during the first Trump administration and the Biden administration.

"There's really strong bipartisan support for regulation on fusion power plants that does not mirror what's done on fission power plants," Beyer said. "The dangers are so much different. Instead of an explosion, it just turns off. There's no radioactive waste. So this light touch is exactly what the Congress overwhelmingly ... wanted the NRC to do."

The NRC declined to comment.

Levin, the California Democratic congressman, said he's concerned that Trump's stake in the industry will act as a brake on real progress. "I just hope that the whole fusion industry is not undermined by the potential conflicts of Trump Media and its investors - that the industry can continue to develop in a transparent and serious way, consistent with decades of work by very established companies," Levin said.

The industry celebrated "fusion ignition" in December 2022, when an experiment at a DOE-funded national lab produced more energy than was needed to drive it. That may have been a "Kitty Hawk moment," said Brunner, the fusion analyst, referring to the Wright brothers' first powered flight in Kitty Hawk, N.C.

Meanwhile, U.S. demand for electricity looks likely to grow by 25% by 2030 due to the data centers needed for artificial intelligence, as well as building electrification, industrial reshoring and greater use of electric vehicles, according to one consultancy's forecast. That could bring major opportunities for the fusion industry broadly, and TMTG specifically, if they get the science right.

The lobbying group for the industry says "fusion power is the answer," while promising that it "can bring clean, safe, affordable energy to the whole world in the next decade" as long as it gets "continued partnerships, policy and investment."

Actual power from nuclear fusion "has seemingly always been 10 to 20 years away," Levin said. But the lawmaker said he believes "the scientists and engineers when they tell me that we're closer than we've ever been."

-Victor Reklaitis

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05-18-26 1001ET