Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS), the world’s largest private fusion company, has partnered with Nvidia and Siemens to develop a digital twin of its Sparc fusion machine. The digital twin will utilize artificial intelligence (AI) and data management tools to accelerate the development of commercial fusion energy. Fusion power is a proposed form of power generation that uses heat from nuclear fusion reactions to generate electricity. CFS is working to build Sparc, the world’s first fusion device that produces plasmas that generate more energy than they consume, making it a net-energy fusion machine.
The digital twin will be created using Nvidia’s Omniverse libraries and OpenUSD, which will integrate data with classical and AI-powered physics models. This virtual replica of Sparc will allow CFS to run simulations, test hypotheses, and compare experimental results to simulations in a user-friendly way. The partnership aims to compress years of manual experimentation into weeks of virtual optimization, speeding up the development of fusion energy.
CFS is using Siemens’ Xcelerator portfolio of industrial software, including Designcenter NX and Teamcenter product lifecycle management (PLM) tools, to create and manage machine designs and assemblies. These designs can be used in modeling and simulation workflows, including the layering of AI-enabled tools. The company is also using Siemens’ digital tools to improve the efficiency of its manufacturing processes and operations at its magnet factory in Devens, Massachusetts.
The partnership between CFS, Nvidia, and Siemens demonstrates the potential of AI and integrated digital engineering to accelerate progress in the development of fusion energy. By aggregating real manufacturing intelligence, applying AI, and running thousands of scenarios, the companies aim to remove guesswork and accelerate innovation. The collaboration is seen as a significant step towards making fusion energy a commercial reality, with the potential to transform the way fusion machines are built and operated.
According to Bob Mumgaard, co-founder and CEO of CFS, the digital twin will provide a user-friendly way to analyze data and iterate, speeding up the company’s efforts to make fusion energy a commercial reality. Rev Lebaredian, vice president of Omniverse and Simulation Technology at Nvidia, added that the partnership will accelerate the engineering and shorten the timeline to clean power. Del Costy, president and managing director of Siemens Digital Industries Software, stated that the partnership demonstrates the potential of end-to-end digital workflows to transform industrial engineering.