US firm validates 1.1-GW nuclear fusion plant design to deliver 400 MW electricity
(interestingengineering.com)
Ah I was wondering this and my cursory search result was that :
- Their design (ARC) is sound for its physics.
- their design would produce more energy if nothing goes wrong with the hardware.
- The hardware is designed but not built yet.
Basically it's really promising because on paper it should really work as expected. But at the same time without building it, there will be obstacles along the way. The materials could last too little time for it to be commercially viable.
So they seem to be at the very last theoretical step of fusion energy but there is still a huge challenge in actually building the thing and most importantly, it to be viable commercially.