The International Atomic Energy Agency and Italy – the current Group of Seven (G7) presidency – will co-host the inaugural ministerial meeting of the World Fusion Energy Group
(WFEG) later this year to inject further momentum into intensifying global efforts to develop a “potentially clean, safe and limitless source of energy”, the IAEA said.
Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni and IAEA director-general Rafael Grossi will together chair the 6 November meeting in Rome, which will see governments, scientists, executives and investors join forces in paving the way for fusion technology to provide the abundant low-carbon energy the world needs to meet its growing development needs.
The IAEA said in a statement that increased political and economic interest in fusion energy – which has seen key scientific breakthroughs in recent years – was highlighted at the 13-15 June summit of the G7 leading industrialised nations in Italy’s southern Apulia region, where the leaders said it “has the potential to provide a lasting solution to the global challenges of climate change and energy security”.
Pledging to promote international collaboration “to accelerate the development and demonstration” of fusion, the G7 summit communique also welcomed Italy’s and the IAEA’s decision to hold the first WFEG meeting in the Italian capital.
This high-level endorsement follows several technological milestones, including the historic achievement of a net energy gain, as well as a significant expansion of private sector investments and activities in the quest for fusion energy, the IAEA noted.
Grossi announced the establishment of the WFEG when he opened the IAEA’s 29th International Fusion Energy Conference in London last October, saying “big science needs collaboration, and it doesn’t get much bigger than fusion energy”.
The IAEA said the WFEG will work to accelerate research, development, demonstration and deployment of fusion energy.
Italy is reconsidering its position on nuclear energy with recent reports saying Meloni’s government is planning to introduce legislation that will allow investment in small modular reactors.
In May 2023, the country’s parliament backed the government’s plan to include nuclear in the country’s energy mix as part of its decarbonisation efforts.
Italy banned nuclear energy after it was rejected in a national referendum following the Chernobyl disaster in 1987 and another in 2011 following the Fukushima-Daiichi accident. It shut down its last commercial reactors, Caorso and Enrico Fermi, in 1990.
