# Fusion fuels: Correlation

Prices it moves with, and why

Source page: https://www.materialinsights.org/energy/e_fusion_fuels/correlation/

Fusion fuels are deuterium, taken from water, and tritium, bred from lithium in a reactor blanket. No market exists yet beyond small tritium sales; costs depend on heavy water plants, lithium-6 enrichment and reactor progress.
 No public price Fusion fuels has no public monthly price series: No commercial market; tiny tritium supply from research and reactors.

#### What its price moves with

 Commodity [Li Lithium](https://www.materialinsights.org/commodities/lithium/)Breeding feed

Tritium for fusion would be bred inside the reactor by hitting lithium with neutrons, preferably lithium enriched in lithium-6. Lithium supply is ample, but enrichment capacity is small. Enrichment would need to be scaled up.
 No public price for lithium, so the link is explained in words only.

 Commodity [H₂O Water](https://www.materialinsights.org/commodities/water/)Deuterium source

Deuterium is extracted from ordinary water as heavy water, which India makes for its own heavy water reactors. It is plentiful, so deuterium cost is set by separation energy, not scarcity.
 Not enough overlapping price history to measure.

 Commodity [Be Beryllium](https://www.materialinsights.org/commodities/beryllium/)Blanket material

Breeding blankets in many designs use beryllium to multiply neutrons and breed enough tritium. Beryllium is rare, toxic and costly, so it may limit fusion fuel cycles. Lead-lithium blankets avoid it.
 No public price for beryllium, so the link is explained in words only.

 Energy [NFR Nuclear fission reactors](https://www.materialinsights.org/energy/e_fission/)Current tritium source

Today most tritium comes from heavy water fission reactors, such as Canada's CANDU units. Their limited output and ageing fleet constrain fuel for fusion test machines. Tritium also decays steadily, so stored stocks shrink over time.
 Not enough overlapping price history to measure.

 Energy [Fus Fusion reactors](https://www.materialinsights.org/energy/e_fusion/)Main user

Fusion reactors are the only buyers that would need fuel at scale. Progress in reactor projects, such as ITER and private machines, decides when and whether a fuel market forms.
 No public price for fusion reactors, so the link is explained in words only.

How to read these numbers

**Correlation of monthly changes** (the number in the coloured pill) compares how much each price moved, month by month, since 2006 or the first month both series exist. It runs from −1 to +1: near +1 the two usually rise and fall in the same months, near 0 there is no link, and a negative number means they tend to move in opposite directions. Above 0.7 is strong, 0.4 to 0.7 moderate, 0.2 to 0.4 weak.

**12-month changes** compare year-on-year moves, which shows whether two prices share the same cycles even when the month-to-month noise differs.

**Price function** is a straight-line fit of the two prices on logarithmic scales: price ≈ k × (partner price)^β. β is how much this price moves, in per cent, for a 1% move in the partner over the whole period, and R² is the share of the variation the fit explains. Two prices that both drift up with inflation can fit well without any real link, so read it together with the monthly correlation.

**Lead or lag** checks whether the monthly correlation is clearly higher when one price is shifted by 1 to 6 months.

Correlation is not cause. The reasons on each card explain the economic link; the numbers show how strongly it has shown up in prices. Proxy series are US producer price indexes or related prices and can blur the real link.

Data: World Bank Commodity Price Data (Pink Sheet), October 2026; US Bureau of Labor Statistics producer price indexes, IMF primary commodity prices and US EIA prices via FRED, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, retrieved November 2026. Calculations by this site.

## Other sections

- [Summary](https://www.materialinsights.org/energy/e_fusion_fuels/index.md)
- [Overview](https://www.materialinsights.org/energy/e_fusion_fuels/overview/index.md)
- [How energy resides](https://www.materialinsights.org/energy/e_fusion_fuels/resides/index.md)
- [Abundance](https://www.materialinsights.org/energy/e_fusion_fuels/abundance/index.md)
- [Fluctuation in time](https://www.materialinsights.org/energy/e_fusion_fuels/time/index.md)
- [Across the Earth](https://www.materialinsights.org/energy/e_fusion_fuels/geography/index.md)
- [Impact on nature](https://www.materialinsights.org/energy/e_fusion_fuels/nature/index.md)
- [Relationships](https://www.materialinsights.org/energy/e_fusion_fuels/links/index.md)