Fusion startup Zap Energy adds nuclear fission reactors to address near-term energy demand

Fusion startup Zap Energy has announced a partial pivot to develop small nuclear fission reactors alongside its ongoing fusion research, a move driven Zap Energy's new chief executive, Zabrina Johal, told TechCrunch that fission and fusion are "two sides of the same coin" and share many congruent challenges. She pointed to rising energy demand from AI data centers, which is expected to nearly triple While fission, the practice of splitting heavy atoms like uranium to produce power, has been a commercial technology since the 1950s, building new fission reactors cost-effectively remains difficult. Fission startups building small modular reactors are counting on mass manufacturing to bring costs down, though those benefits can take around a decade to materialize. Johal said Zap Energy expects to start generating revenue from the new fission business within a year, drawing on federal programs from the Department of Defense and Department of Energy, as well as milestone payments and reserved production capacity from companies that need large amounts of electricity. The company is modeling its financing partly on the customer co-investment program used