Caring for tritium
25 Jul 2016
Tritium, one of the two heavy isotopes of hydrogen, is as rare as it is precious. In the present state of technology, it is one of the indispensable ingredients to achieving fusion energy.
Tritium is a radioactive isotope of hydrogen and, as such, demands to be treated with extreme care and precaution. In the ITER installation, an entire building is devoted to its storage, handling and processing.
Following the installation earlier this year of six water detritiation tanks on the lower basement level (B2) of the Tritium Building (part of the Tokamak Complex), work is now underway on the floor slab of the B1 basement level.
Workers are carefully positioning hundreds of embedded plates into the dense rebar lattice before concrete pouring operations. Embedded plates offer extremely robust anchorage for the installation of equipment.