Subscribe options

Select your newsletters:

Please enter your email address:

@

Your email address will only be used for the purpose of sending you the ITER Organization publication(s) that you have requested. ITER Organization will not transfer your email address or other personal data to any other party or use it for commercial purposes.

If you change your mind, you can easily unsubscribe by clicking the unsubscribe option at the bottom of an email you've received from ITER Organization.

For more information, see our Privacy policy.

News & Media

Latest ITER Newsline

  • DISCOVERY | DA VINCI'S IMPOSSIBLE "TOKAMAK DRAWING"

    The exploration of the now-digitized Leonardo Da Vinci notebooks continues to amaze the worldwide scientific community. A few weeks ago, engineers at the Califo [...]

    Read more

  • Deputy Director-General | Yutaka Kamada, Science & Technology

    In his late childhood and early teens, Yutaka Kamada developed two passions: one for growing cactus, the other for fusion energy. Half a century later, his [...]

    Read more

  • Images of the week | Yet another magnet feeder from China

    This in-cryostat feeder will supply electrical power and cryogenic fluids to some of the top correction coils of the ITER machine. ITER will rely on 31 mag [...]

    Read more

  • Gyrotrons | India successfully demonstrates ITER power and pulse requirements

    As a part of its in-kind commitments to the project, ITER India will deliver two radio-frequency-based power sources (or 'gyrotrons") with state-of-the-art [...]

    Read more

  • Neutral beam power supply | Lightning-power voltage

    In January 2021, preparatory works began for the construction of two large buildings designed to accommodate a unique set of electrical equipment. A little more [...]

    Read more

Of Interest

See archived entries

Starter pistol for ITER assembly management contract

The responsibility is large and so is the team: the kickoff meeting for the Construction Management-as-Agent (CMA) contract took place on 25 August. Chee Tan, deputy Construction Department Head and CMA project manager, has the microphone. (Click to view larger version...)
The responsibility is large and so is the team: the kickoff meeting for the Construction Management-as-Agent (CMA) contract took place on 25 August. Chee Tan, deputy Construction Department Head and CMA project manager, has the microphone.
On 27 June, the ITER Organization and the MOMENTUM joint venture (led by Amec Foster Wheeler, UK, in partnership with Assystem, France, and KEPCO Engineering and Construction, Korea) signed a EUR 174 million contract for the management of the 10-year ITER assembly and installation phase.

Two months later, on 25 August, it was time to move from negotiations and paperwork to the implementation of the Construction Management-as-Agent (CMA) contract, as the new partnership is officially called. At the kickoff meeting, staff from ITER and the contractor teams met for the first time around the table to voice their expectations, present their plans for the implementation of the contract, and discuss the next steps.

"For such a long term contract, which is critically based upon partnership, this meeting was the occasion for the different technical teams to meet and begin the process of alignment and knowledge transfer," explained Ken Blackler, head of ITER's Construction Management Section/Division. "We are now entering the six-month preparation phase, when the Construction Management-as-Agent and the ITER Organization will prepare all the proper procedures, systems and methodologies for executing the assembly and installation works that start in 2017."

Representatives of the ITER Organization presented the strategy for construction management while the MOMENTUM consortium described its approach to the preparation of work packages, which translate the engineering information prepared by the ITER Organization into construction work packages for execution by the contractors.

For MOMENTUM, the immediate priorities are to ensure that the team is mobilized in line with the project requirements and that it is able to integrate sufficient information on the ITER design, the scope of construction, the schedule, and the cost to collaborate with the ITER Organization on how to optimize the schedule utilizing MOMENTUM's experience in industry.

"The main challenge," explains MOMENTUM Senior Manager Angie Jones, "is getting up to speed quickly on the technical details for a first-of-a-kind technology-driven project in order to add value in the constructability, construction sequence, and construction methods.  We described our focus on ´right-to-left thinking´; in other words, construction and associated testing and commissioning must drive the design sequence, instead of the other way around, which is less efficient and sometimes difficult to construct and commission. We must learn quickly in order to have this critical input."


return to the latest published articles