Genesis Mission second round: DOE selects 12 Phase II awards
From the Energy digest for 2026-10-21
What happened: On October 21 (~10:28 AM ET), the Department of Energy announced a second round of Genesis Mission selections: 12 new Phase II awards and six new Phase I awards, with projects including fusion energy and high-radiation environments work. In July, DOE announced 278 projects under the program, most of them Phase I. Phase II awards are intended to scale up and expand projects that have already demonstrated potential for transformative scientific capability through multi-year funding.
What's genuinely new: This is a debut storyline on the record — the Genesis Mission award pipeline, including July's 278-project first round, has not previously been captured here. The movement in this piece is programmatic: first-round projects graduating into multi-year Phase II support, with fusion among the subject areas named.
Watch: Funding figures attached to the Phase II awards, the fusion-energy share of the selections, whether a third round follows at pace, and any overlap with reactor-development programs already on file.