The Grid Of 2036: A Design-Stage Scenario

A commercial burner is targeted around 2036; this page sketches the grid role it is designed for, and what must be true first.

What the roadmap targets

The breeder (Hyperion) begins construction in Q2 2027 with first-of-a-kind first tritium around 2030. A burner test unit follows around 2032, and a commercial burner around 2036. Only after that can a firm burner fleet begin to contribute to the grid. Everything in this category describes the role such a fleet is designed to play from the later 2030s onward.

In that scenario, water-light burners (MetroVolt) sit near data-center clusters and cities, firming renewable-heavy grids, relieving transmission, and providing local resilience, while the breeder-bred and lunar helium-3 pathways supply their fuel.

What must be true first

This scenario is contingent on all four gates closing: the plug coil buildable at 26.49 T without 3-3.9x overstress, the operating regime reached and held despite being 166-830x beyond experiment, helium-3 available at roughly 400x today's supply through breeding and lunar sources, and availability improved from 0.86-0.995 toward what critical loads need, via redundant fleets.

Honest framing

This is a design-stage scenario, not a forecast. No burner has produced net power. The value of stating the scenario is to make the sequence and its conditions explicit, so the grid role is understood as a goal with named prerequisites rather than a promise.