What the hell is this cynicism? Seems completely inappropriate.
Helion isn’t vaporware.
Helion isn’t vaporware.
Their seventh will start up in 2024, and is supposed to demonstrate net electricity from D-He3.
Their eighth is supposed to be the commercial reactor. If they don't achieve that, they will have to pay penalties to Microsoft.
I don't have anything near the expertise to evaluate Helions approach, but I know enough about fusion to say that just because you have a design that can achieve fusion conditions does not mean the approach could even theoretically lead to a power plant. e.g. electrostatic fusors
https://www.llnl.gov/news/lawrence-livermore-national-labora...
Lasers are really inefficient (poor at transforming electrical energy into light energy). They got more energy out than they put into the pellet, but nowhere near as much energy as they put into the lasers. Which means that turning that experiment into commercial fusion is... "not straightforward".
They seem to scale well, too. In their big shot they increased the laser power by 8% and output went up 230%.
That said, compared to Helion it'd still be a lot harder to make a practical reactor with NIF's approach.