Gauss Fusion says it will cost €15-18bn to bring first-of-a-kind reactor online by mid-2040s
A Berlin-based company has unveiled what it claims to be Europe’s first full design for a commercial nuclear fusion power plant, marking what it called “the shift from research to reality”.
Gauss Fusion introduced its conceptual design report (CDR) – a comprehensive conceptual blueprint for its commercial fusion power plant, Giga.
The company, founded in 2022 by an alliance of five private companies from Germany, Italy, Spain and France, said the CDR, developed with partners across five countries, embodies plans for a pan-European alliance to deliver fusion power at scale.
The release of the CDR coincided with Germany’s €2bn ($2.3bn) Fusion Action Plan announcement last week. Gauss Fusion said the CDR will be delivered to the German government and places the company “at the centre of Europe’s race to deliver fusion power”.
The action plan followed chancellor Friedrich Merz’s coalition agreement in May 2025, setting out his government’s ambition for Germany to build the world’s first fusion power plant.
Developed over three years with support from industrial partners from across Europe, Gauss Fusion’s CDR comprises over 1,000 pages of technical detail.
The report addresses all critical systems required to build the first fusion power plant – from overall architecture, design basis and design concept, to safety framework, qualification strategy, system engineering, lifecycle operations and radioactive waste considerations, among others.
Gauss Fusion calculates that it will cost €15-18bn to bring the first-of-a-kind commercial fusion reactor by mid-2040s.
The report also crystalises Gauss Fusion’s vision of a “Eurofighter for Fusion” – a pan-European programme that combines industrial know-how, national investments and supply-chain capacity to deliver energy sovereignty for Europe. The company said it is already working with agencies and companies in Italy, France and Spain.
A Credible And Practical Concept Design
Gauss Fusion chief executive officer Milena Roveda said: “Our Conceptual Design Report is the culmination of three years of work to turn the promise of fusion into Giga – a credible and practical, concept-level power plant design.
“It demonstrates that Europe’s industry has the capabilities needed to move from vision to engineering reality.”
Roveda said the CDR brings together the know-how of hundreds of specialists across Europe and proves that the technologies, materials and supply chains required for fusion are within reach.
“The next step is to advance from concept to detailed engineering – turning this design into an industrial blueprint for Europe’s first generation of fusion power plants.”
Gauss Fusion’s strategy is to develop a nuclear fusion plant based on high-field magnetic confinement fusion, an approach that uses very strong magnetic fields to contain and compress a superheated plasma, enabling fusion reactions.
This approach is distinct from other magnetic confinement methods by relying on higher magnetic field strengths, often achieved with high-temperature superconducting magnets, to create a more compact and powerful fusion device.
Nuclear fusion is a process where two light atomic nuclei combine to form a single, heavier nucleus, releasing a large amount of energy. It is the opposite of nuclear fission, where a heavy atom is split apart.
Fusion is the same reaction that powers stars like our Sun. Scientists are working to replicate it on Earth to provide a clean and potentially limitless energy source.
The largest fusion project is the €20bn International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (Iter) in southern France.
