The UK government is awarding £410 million (US$499 million) to support the rapid development of the UK fusion energy sector over 2025 to 2026 with investment in the skills needed for scientists, engineers, welders and program managers to enter the cutting-edge industry. Fusion already supports thousands of jobs in the UK, with thousands more to follow as the technology advances.

Industry leaders have been shortlisted by UK Industrial Fusion Solutions (UKIFS) to help construct a world-leading fusion power plant in Nottinghamshire. Five construction and engineering bids have progressed to the next round of the UKIFS competition to deliver the prototype fusion energy plant by 2040, driving progress towards the commercialization of fusion in the UK.

The prototype fusion energy plant is set at the site of a former coal power plant in Nottinghamshire.

Earlier the government also proposed plans for the UK’s first AI Growth Zone to be at the UKAEA’s fusion energy campus at Culham, Oxfordshire, which will utilize the advancements of AI to leverage computing power for fusion research and benefit the UK’s wider national AI infrastructure and the local area.

The multi-stage procurement process to deliver a fusion plant, known as STEP (Spherical Tokamak for Energy Production), is led by UK Industrial Fusion Solutions (UKIFS), a wholly owned subsidiary of the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) Group.

The shortlisted companies will undertake detailed discussions with UKIFS, with one successful engineering and one successful construction partner set to be awarded contracts, worth an initial combined value of hundreds of millions of pounds, in late 2025 / early 2026.

The £410-million investment of R&D funding will fund the UK fusion program in 2025 to 2026. This includes:

• STEP (a world-leading prototype powerplant)

• Fusion Futures (a suite of measures aimed at building fusion capability, including skills development and LIBRTI, a new fusion fuel R&D facility)

• repurposing JET (the old fusion machine at Culham)

• supporting the UK Atomic Energy Authority’s existing research, innovation and facilities

This follows the announcement at Autumn Budget 2024 of “significant support in 2025-26 for UK fusion energy research”.

The following construction partners have been chosen by the UKIFS for the next stage of the procurement process, bidding to help build STEP:

• Inovus Infrastructure, consisting of Balfour Beatty Civil Engineering as the lead member and Vinci Construction, AtkinsRealis, Mott Macdonald and WSP as other members

• ILIOS, consisting of Kier Infrastructure and Overseas as the lead member and Bam Nuttal, Nuvia Limited, AECOM Ltd, Turner and Townsend Infrastructure Ltd and Amanda Levete Architects Ltd as other members

• Ferrovial Mace JV, consisting of Ferrovial Construction UK Ltd as the lead member and Mace Consult Ltd as the other member

The following engineering partners have been chosen for the next stage of the process:

• Celestial JV, consisting of Eni UK Limited as the lead member and AtkinsRealis, Jacobs Clean Energy (now Amentum), Westinghouse and Tokamak Energy as other members

• Phoenix (UK) Fusion Limited, consisting of Cavendish Nuclear Ltd as the lead member, KBR Ltd and Assystem Energy and Infrastructure Ltd as other members