Fuel Strategy — Low-Neutron Staged Program
Kronos operates a four-stage low-neutron fuel program on a single reactor platform. Each stage is a gated engineering decision, not a physics gamble: the machine is designed to run the commercial baseline for its economic life, and only advances when validation, licensing, and supply are in hand.
Stage 0 — D–T Commissioning
Initial commissioning and diagnostic calibration run on deuterium–tritium to establish burn control, disruption mitigation, and first-wall response against a well-characterised reference fuel. Neutron loading is bounded and time-limited; the stage exists to prove control, not to sell power.
Stage 1 — Catalysed D-Rich (Commercial Baseline)
Commercial operation runs on a catalysed D-rich mixture (80:20 → 85:15 D:³He), which is the design-point fuel for MetroVolt and AEGIS. Neutron fraction fn ≈ 5.25 percent — an order of magnitude below D–T — enables gentle first-wall loading, minimal activation, and low-neutron economics against the published LCOE ladder (FOAK $84–92 → NOAK $48–84 → fleet $48–56/MWh).
Stage 2 — ³He-Rich D–³He
Once a qualified ³He supply chain is in place, the mixture shifts toward ³He-rich D–³He to further suppress the neutron channel and lift direct-conversion efficiency. This is a later gated stage on the same reactor, not a new machine.
Stage 3 — Gated p–¹¹B Aneutronic Endpoint
The long-term endpoint is a gated proton–boron-11 (p–¹¹B) aneutronic cycle. It is a target, not a promise: it advances only when kinetic drive, confinement, and materials data support it. Until then, the commercial baseline is Stage 1 catalysed D-rich.
HYPERION breeder: A = 2.5, R₀ = 1.2 m, Q = 3.424, 88.7 MW fusion power. Kronos Generator burner: D–³He tandem mirror, 26.49 T peak throat field. Seven falsifiable predictions (P1–P7) gate the program.