"The beginning of a new era"

Upon his arrival at ITER, on Thursday 11 October, ITER Director-General Osamu Motojima was greeted by the assembled staff at the entrance of the new Headquarters building.

 

Director-General Motojima, who was accompanied by his wife Kaoru, had been attending the 24th Fusion Energy Conference in San Diego (USA) and this was his first official contact with the new building.

 

Having missed the thrill of the move on Monday, the ITER Director-General was eager to discover his new office and the spectacular worksite view it commands. Rather than the bucolic view of the rolling hills of Haute-Provence, he had chosen the "platform side" in order to follow the daily progress of construction.

 

One could have stayed a long time just enjoying the view and imagining the huge Tokamak Complex rising 55 metres high, but the ITER machine was rolling and a Project Board Meeting (PBM)—the first to be held in the new building—was scheduled to begin.

 

Addressing the PBM participants and the personnel who had briefly joined them for the occasion, DG Motojima stressed the symbolic importance of the moment. "What we are witnessing today," he said, "is the beginning of a new era. ITER is now 'at home' in this new building and I wish to express my appreciation to all who have made this moment possible: France and Europe, who have contributed this building to the ITER Project, and also our colleagues in Building and Site Infrastructure (BSI) and in IT, who have successfully managed the moving operations and will continue to do so in the weeks to come."

 

ITER Deputy Director-General Rem Haange and Head of the Directorate for General Administration Jiu Jin, also addressed the audience, conveying the same message: as staff and machine will soon stand face-to-face, moving into the new Headquarters building is indeed a turning point in the long history of the ITER Project.