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  • Statement on ITER Progress

    The ITER project in November 2017 has reached a significant milestone: the completion of 50 percent of the total construction work scope through First[...]

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  • United States

    Domestic Agency: U.S. Department of Energy, Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, USA (US ITER) Central solenoid: In Poway, Californi[...]

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  • China

    Domestic Agency: ITER China Office (ITER China) in Beijing, China Magnet feeders: ITER's magnet feeders will relay electrical power, cryogenic fluids [...]

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  • Russia

    Domestic Agency: Project Center ITER (ITER Russia) in Moscow, Russia Poloidal field coil #1 Six ring-shaped poloidal field coil magnets will encircle[...]

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  • Korea

    Domestic Agency: ITER Korea in Daejeon , Korea Vacuum vessel fabrication The ITER vacuum vessel, a donut-shaped stainless steel chamber heavier than t[...]

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  • India

    Domestic Agency: ITER India in Gandhinagar, India Cryostat assembly underway The 3,800-ton ITER cryostat will be the largest stainless steel vacuum ch[...]

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  • Japan

    Domestic Agency: ITER Japan in Naka, Japan Toroidal field coil magnets and cases Japan has the responsibility for making 9 of ITER's 19 toroidal field[...]

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Special issue 7

Europe

(Click to view larger version...)
Domestic Agency: Fusion for Energy(F4E) in Barcelona, Spain

On-site construction:

As part of its 45.6 percent contribution to ITER, Europe is constructing all the buildings of the ITER scientific installation. Today, the European Domestic Agency has completed 42 percent of work on site and signed 74 percent of work contracts.

Spectacular work is underway on the concrete-and-steel "bioshield" that will surround the ITER Tokamak.

  • See more information here and here.
  • See the collection of Tokamak Complex construction photos here.
  • See all ITER construction photos here.
First cryopump:

ITER's six cryopumps will maintain an ultra-high vacuum in the 1,400 cubic meter vacuum vessel where fusion takes place. The cryopumps will trap particles on charcoal-coated panels and extract helium ash from the fusion reaction. Each cryopump will weigh 8 tons and stand 3.4 meters tall.

Two additional cryopumps will maintain a lighter vacuum in the cryostat, the 8,500 cubic meter chamber that will house the entire tokamak.

After 10 years of intensive R&D in Europe involving 15 hi-tech companies (see more here)—plus four years of fabrication by Germany's Research Instruments and France'sAlsyom (more on fabrication here)—the first cryopump was delivered to ITER for testing on 22 August 2017.

After mechanical testing at ITER and cryogenic testing at Germany's Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, fabrication of the additional cryopumps will follow.

Cryogenic tanks:

The ITER cryoplant will be the largest single-platform cryogenics facility ever built. Nearly 25tons of liquid helium—at minus 269 °C—will circulate through a five-kilometer network of pipes, pumps and valves to cool the superconducting magnets, thermal shield, vacuum cryopumps and diagnostics.

Europe, India and the ITER Organization are all contributing components. Manufacturers have finalized most of the components of the liquid helium and liquid nitrogen plants and shipped 1,500 tons of material. Installation has started in the cryoplant building on site.

Europe is responsible for the liquid nitrogen plant plus auxiliaries. In October it delivered the last of eleven tanks for helium and nitrogen storage

  • See more on the ITER cryoplant here, with photos and graphics.
  • See more on recent tank arrivals hereand here, with photos.
  • Additional photos here.
Negative ion beam source:

Three systems will be used to heat the hydrogen plasma to 150 million °C, the temperature needed for fusion. The "neutral beam" system will provide more than half the heating for the plasma by injecting two high-energy particle beams of 16.5 MW each (33 MW total) into the tokamak vacuum vessel.

The circumference of each particle beam is about 2.5 meters, greatly exceeding the size of previous beams, which had circumference of a dinner plate and a fraction of the power. The size of ITER requires thicker particle beams and faster individual particles in order to penetrate the plasma deeply enough to contribute to its heating.

In addition, new high-energy negative ion source technology must be used, instead of the positive ion source technology used in past machines. Years of research have gone into the optimization of these ion sources (for more details, see this article).

Last month, Europe successfully delivered a negative ion source to the SPIDER test bed of the Neutral Beam Test Facility in Padua, Italy. Here the critical components of the system will be tested in advance, before transfer and installation at ITER. Europe, Japan and India are all contributing components.

  • More on the Neutral Beam Test Facility here.
  • Photos of the SPIDER negative ion beam source here.
 

First toroidal field magnet core:

ITER will control the fusion reaction using magnetic confinement. Inside the metal torus or donut-shaped vacuum vessel of the ITER Tokamak will be a second, invisible cage created by magnetic fields. These powerful electromagnets will keep the heated plasma in circulation away from the walls.

Eighteen of these magnets, called toroidal field magnets, will be integrated around the vacuum vessel. These magnets are being manufactured both in Europe and Japan. The first of Europe's toroidal field magnet cores, called a "winding pack" and weighing 110 tons, was completed by the ASG consortium in May 2017 in La Spezia, Italy (see more about that here).

The magnet core has now been delivered to Italy's SIMIC, the company that will complete cold tests and insert the magnet core into its final case (see more about the Japanese-manufactured coil cases here). The completed magnet will then be delivered to the ITERsite.

  • See more about ITER magnets here.
  • See pictures of the first European toroidal field winding pack here.