Zap Energy is turning up the pressure in its latest fusion device

Zap Energy unveiled its latest fusion device Tuesday at a research meeting in Long Beach, Calif., the latest in a series of devices the company has built in its quest to bring fusion energy to market.

The startup is competing with several other startups that are all trying to build fusion power plants capable of delivering electricity to the grid in the early 2030s.

Zap’s Fuze-3 device fires pulses of plasma at the company’s headquarters near Seattle, and the results of those experiments will ultimately inform the design of the company’s future pilot plants.

The Fuze-3 device was able to compress a soup of charged particles — also known as plasma — to more than 232,000 psi (1.6 gigapascals) and heat them to more than 21 million degrees Fahrenheit (11.7 million degrees Celsius).

The pressure data represents a record for the type of fusion ZAP seeks to achieve, known as discrete Z-pinch and stable flow. The ZAP reactor uses electrodes to send electricity through the plasma, causing the plasma to generate a magnetic field. If the magnetic field is strong enough, it will heat and compress the plasma to the point where the molecules in the plasma fuse.

These numbers are useful to Zap as it pursues its goal of commercial fusion energy. Although it is worth noting that it cannot be directly compared with the results of other merger startups since other companies use different methods.

Obtaining high-pressure plasma is vital for any future fusion power plant. In order to generate more energy than they consume, fusion reactions must provide what is known as the triple product, a number that describes the temperature, pressure and duration of the plasma inside the fusion reactor. In other words, get a plasma hot enough and dense enough for long enough, and you’ll be able to generate power.

By Zapp’s own calculations, the company still has to increase plasma pressure by at least tenfold before it reaches scientific break-even, a feat reached with only one other fusion experiment. The company said it is close to achieving a third major milestone proposed by Bob Mumgaard, co-founder and CEO of Commonwealth Fusion Systems, a competitor to Zap.

Zap was able to break the plasma pressure record by modifying its reactor design to add a third electrode. In previous designs, two electrodes were able to heat the plasma sufficiently, but the company was unable to reach the pressure numbers it wanted.

The company did not reveal details of the new design in response to TechCrunch’s questions. But company spokesman Andy Freeborn said it allows the company to use two power banks, giving it more control over how the plasma changes inside the reactor.

“The plasma chamber itself doesn’t look much different, but it works very differently because there are two pulses of input power instead of one,” he said.

Zap said it is working on a new generation of Fuze devices, which it says will be available online this winter.