Visible progress in ITER, but still important issues to be resolved

From 17 to 18 June 2015, the ITER Council, the governing body of the ITER Organization, convened in St Paul-lez-Durance, France. The meeting brought together senior representatives from all seven ITER Members—China, the European Union, India, Japan, Korea, Russia and the United States under the chairmanship of Robert Iotti (US). 

The Members took note of the actions implemented by the new Director-General Bernard Bigot to achieve a project-oriented organization, one characterized by the profound integration of the ITER Organization Central Team and the Domestic Agencies with the creation of an Executive Project Board. 

Work is progressing towards an updated project plan, which recognizes the serious accumulated delays, and which integrates the scope, cost and schedule for the Project going forward. This updated project plan includes a resource-loaded schedule, and will be discussed at the next Council meeting in November 2015. The Council requested that this resource-loaded schedule be optimized for the earliest possible First Plasma. To recover as much as possible past delays, the ITER Organization will take advantage of any available time while working towards First Plasma to install additional available components that will accelerate the commencement of full operations. 

The Council requested that the ITER Organization and the Domestic Agencies, as well as the Members, continue to work closely to stop schedule slippage of critical/super-critical components by giving top priority to those components on the critical path as well as to freezing of the design. 

The Council Members visited the site and saw first-hand the progress of construction including the recently delivered first heavy components, such as high voltage transformers and two giant drain tanks, which arrived on site earlier this year.

A contract was signed to carry out the 2015 ITER Management Assessment with Professor Jianmin Sun (China). 

BACKGROUND TO THE PRESS RELEASE

ITER—designed to demonstrate the scientific and technological feasibility of fusion power—will be the world's largest experimental fusion facility. Fusion is the process that powers the sun and the stars: when light atomic nuclei fuse together to form heavier ones, a large amount of energy is released. Fusion research is aimed at developing a safe, abundant and environmentally responsible energy source. 

ITER is also a first-of-a-kind global collaboration that brings together seven Members (China, Europe, India, Japan, the Republic of Korea, the Russian Federation and the USA) representing half the world’s population and 85 percent of the planet’s industrial product. Nine-tenths of Member contributions are delivered “in-kind” in the form of buildings and components for the ITER installation. The ITER Project is under construction in Saint-Paul-lez-Durance, in the south of France. 

The photo gallery from the Sixteenth ITER Council can be viewed here. 

More information on the ITER Project can be found at: http://www.iter.org/

CONTACT

Michel Claessens 
michel.claessens@iter.org 
+33 6 14 16 41 75, @M_Claessens