China and the United States are extending their rivalry beyond artificial intelligence and space into fusion energy, widely seen as a virtually limitless, carbon-free power source. Both are racing to build domestic capabilities while securing supply chains for future reactors.
To advance, Washington and Beijing are turning to Europe, whose expertise in superconducting magnets, lasers, robotics and tokamaks is critical to scaling fusion projects from research to deployment. Tokamaks are doughnut-shaped chambers that use magnetic fields to confine superheated plasma.
But experts are divided. Some urge Europe to align with the US to prevent China from securing a potentially limitless power source that could reshape the global order, while others argue that fusion’s complexity requires broad international collaboration including with China.
Laban Coblentz, chief strategic advisor to the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER), is a proponent of international partnerships in developing fusion energy.
“China has the ability to build the Hualong-1 reactor in five years for US$5 billion while the US and Europe build theirs over budget,” Coblentz told Asia Times in an interview in London. “What’s different? It turned out there were 140 French companies embedded in the Chinese supply chain.”
“I hope that when Trump and Xi meet next month, some of the barriers start to come down, and we start to look at how things could be complementary instead of competitive,” he said, referring to the barriers as challenges in a contract negotiation between ITER and American firms.
China began construction of the Hualong-1 fission reactor in Zhangzhou, Fujian, in 2015 and completed it in 2020. It’s the country’s first third-generation fission reactor, offering significantly higher safety levels than a second-generation reactor. The country started building the Hualong-2 reactor in 2024 and is expected to complete it in four years.
US President Donald Trump plans to visit China and meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping on May 13 and 14. Trade issues, geopolitical conflicts and technology export controls are expected to be among the key items on their meeting agenda.
In a speech at the Fusion Fest, organized by the Economist Impact, on April 14, Coblentz described how US Senator Joe Manchin, who has publicly criticized Chinese scientists over alleged intellectual property theft from US labs, expressed strong support for the ITER project after touring its assembly hall in southern France in 2022.
Coblentz cited Manchin as saying he saw, for the first time in years, a “light at the end of the tunnel” and even the possibility of world peace, arguing that many past conflicts were driven by energy access and alliances. Manchin made the remarks in a meeting with 30 US staff members at the ITER.
Coblentz recalled Manchin noting the mix of languages spoken on site, including Mandarin, French, Italian, English and Russian, as evidence that if fusion succeeds, it could fundamentally reshape geopolitics.
From concept to megaproject
The ITER project dates back to 1986, when Euratom, Japan, the Soviet Union and the US agreed to jointly design a large international fusion facility. Work on the concept began in 1988, with members approving the final design in 2001, laying the foundation for one of the world’s most ambitious scientific collaborations.
Construction began in 2013 with a budget of 6 billion euros (US$6.8 billion), but costs have risen sharply. ITER put the total at about 22 billion euros in 2021, while the US Department of Energy expects overall costs could reach $65 billion by 2039 when full fusion operations are targeted.
The European Union is set to fund about 45.6% of the project, while China, India, Japan, South Korea, Russia and the US will each contribute roughly 9.1%.
However, some US fusion experts warn that the West risks falling behind China, which has close ties with US adversaries such as Russia, Iran and North Korea.
Ylli Bajraktari, president and chief executive of the Special Competitive Studies Project (SCSP), a non-partisan US think tank, gave a speech titled “What if China wins the fusion race?” at the same event, warning that the West risks repeating past mistakes in emerging energy industries.
“China didn’t make the scientific breakthroughs that brought the first electric vehicles, solar panels or 5G towers to market. They focused on subsidies and scaling manufacturing, and it paid off,” he said. “China isn’t building solar panels because they want to reach net zero. They’re selling solar panels at a loss to get the world in their debt.”
He said the same situation will happen in the fusion energy sector if the US and the EU don’t move quickly and together.
“China’s recent spending puts our nation to shame. They have spent $6.5 billion on fusion infrastructure since the Lawrence Livermore National Ignition Facility first produced energy three years ago. Less conservative estimates put that number at $10 billion or even $13 billion,” he added.
Bajraktari highlighted four major projects underpinning China’s fusion push:
- Chinese Fusion Engineering Testing Reactor (CRAFT) and Burning Plasma Experimental Superconducting Tokamak (BEST) in Hefei, Anhui, a large integrated research campus and next-generation tokamak designed to move from component testing to demonstrating net fusion power and electricity generation this decade.
- Xinghuo (meaning spark in Chinese) in Nanchang, Jiangxi, a fission-fusion hybrid reactor targeting about 100 megawatts of output in the early 2030s.
- Shengguang-IV in Mianyang, Sichuan, a large-scale laser fusion facility, estimated to be significantly bigger than the US National Ignition Facility and aimed at advancing inertial confinement fusion.
- Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST) in Hefei, Anhui, a long-running experimental tokamak that continues to set global records and anchor China’s fusion research program.
He said China is also investing heavily across the supply chain, scaling production of high-temperature superconductors for fusion magnets, tightening control over critical materials such as gallium and germanium, securing access to copper and other resources through overseas investments, and building capabilities in precision manufacturing and advanced components.
“Control of the supply chain is an existential threat to the West’s energy future,” he said. “We’re not going to out-China China. For the West to win, we need to collaborate.”
He said Western allies could combine their strengths to compete more effectively, with the United Kingdom leading in magnetic confinement and radiation-resistant robotics; the US in inertial confinement, beryllium supply and venture-backed innovation; Germany in laser technologies; and Japan in high-quality superconductors.
“The time is over for treating fusion energy like a science project. It’s no longer a curiosity. We need to take it as seriously as China does. It’s a matter of national infrastructure that we just need to build,” he said.
Self-sufficiency
Broadly, fusion research is advancing along two main pathways: magnetic confinement fusion (MCF) and inertial confinement fusion (ICF).
MCF, the more established approach, includes designs such as tokamaks, which use powerful magnetic fields in a doughnut-shaped chamber to confine and heat plasma, and stellarators, which rely on complex twisted coils to achieve greater plasma stability.
ICF, by contrast, uses high-energy lasers or particle beams to compress and heat fuel pellets to trigger fusion, an approach pursued in facilities such as the US National Ignition Facility.
China’s state-owned enterprises are pursuing a broad portfolio across these approaches, with projects spanning tokamaks, stellarators and ICF-type systems.
Among its projects the EAST project in Hefei, often dubbed the “artificial sun,” has drawn the most attention after sustaining plasma at 100 million degrees Celsius for 1,066 seconds in January 2025. The program broadly mirrors work in France’s WEST (Tungsten Environment in Steady-state Tokamak), which focuses on testing tungsten components and plasma conditions to support ITER.
Through the ITER project, China not only absorbs European tokamak technology but is also emerging as a key supplier to the program. In April 2025, China shipped key super-large components for the ITER tokamak’s magnet feeder system to southern France.
In contrast, the US Department of Energy is backing a more market-driven model, funding private firms such as Commonwealth Fusion Systems for tokamak development, Type One Energy Group for stellarators and Xcimer Energy for laser-based fusion.
Jennifer Arrigo, senior adviser for fusion energy sciences at the US Department of Energy, said China is a major player but stressed that the West’s strength lies in public‑private collaboration.
“China is one of the big players in the room. But if you look at the US and what’s happening across Europe, the private sector partnering with governments is just as powerful,” she said. “It’s critical that we support our industry and lead on international collaboration. That’s how we win the fusion race, by ensuring it remains a global endeavor with the US at the center of that effort.”
In a question-and-answer session, Arrigo told Asia Times that a key element of the US Fusion Science and Technology Roadmap, launched last October, is to build a domestic and allied supply chain. She said the Department of Energy is working with companies in fusion-related industries, supporting spin-outs and industrial capacity, with the aim of reducing reliance on Chinese parts, components and services and ensuring alternative sources across the US and its partners.
Last month, Duan Xuru, chief scientist for fusion energy at China National Nuclear Corporation, said global fusion commercialization is accelerating. Based on China’s current technological trajectory, he said the country aims to complete its first engineering test reactor around 2035 and a commercial demonstration reactor by about 2045, reflecting what he described as a phased and pragmatic strategy to reduce technical risks and steadily advance toward commercialization.
Read: China aims for world’s first fusion-fission reactor by 2031
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