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News & Media

Latest ITER Newsline

  • Busbar installation | Navigating an obstacle course

    What is simple and commonplace in the ordinary world, like connecting an electrical device to a power source, often takes on extraordinary dimension at ITER. Wh [...]

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  • Vacuum vessel assembly | Back in the starting blocks

    Close to two years have passed since vacuum vessel assembly was halted when defects were identified in the ITER tokamak's vacuum vessel sectors and thermal shie [...]

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  • Ride 4 Fusion | Scientific outreach on two wheels

    A group of fusion researchers has left Padua, Italy, for an 800-kilometre bike trip to the ITER site. Their goal? To share information about fusion energy resea [...]

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  • 11th ITER Games | Good fun under the Provencal sun

    A yearly tradition in the ITER community for more than a decade now, the ITER Games offer a pleasant way to reconnect among colleagues and neighbours after the [...]

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  • Manufacturing | Recent milestones in Russia

    Russia continues to deliver in-kind components to the ITER project according to procurement arrangements signed with the ITER Organization. Some recent manufact [...]

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Of Interest

See archived entries

ITER NEWSLINE -

Cryoplant

Filled from floor to ceiling

The ITER cryoplant used to be a vast echoey chamber with 5,400 m² of interior space divided into two areas; now, it is filled from floor to ceiling with industrial equipment. Three parties are sharing responsibility for the plant's procurement: the ITER Organization, responsible for the liquid helium plants; Europe, in charge of the liquid nitrogen plant and auxiliary systems as well as the construction of the cryoplant infrastructure on site; and India, whose contractors are procuring the cryolines and cryodistribution components.

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The installation of helium compressor skids on concrete pads was completed earlier this year. Aligned in three rows, each one linked to a helium cold box, the compressors will supply the cold boxes with gaseous helium at 21.8 bars and eventually provide the necessary gas flow for the supercritical helium cooling needs of the Tokamak. Team members can be seen standing on the pads in this picture, four metres above ground level. As a final installation step, a special grouting—part cement, part resin—will be poured to federate the pad and the skid into a mechanically homogeneous structure.

(Click to view larger version...)
Most of the planned components are now installed in the Compressor Building, drastically reducing the space for circulation. Here, a corridor has been created between the huge oil removal system skids of two rows of the liquid helium plant compression station.

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For the nitrogen plant, the first phase of centrifugal compressor installation was achieved this month. These compressors (which, at 4.5 MW, are the biggest of the cryoplant) are also housed in the Compressor Building, next to the 18 compressors that will be required for the operation of the helium refrigerators. This month, the compressors were pre-aligned with their motors and after-coolers/associated piping were installed.

(Click to view larger version...)
Close coordination is required of the different teams that are active in the cryoplant. Co-activity issues are addressed and resolved in dedicated coordination meetings, or in more informal meetings on site. In this picture, representatives of various stakeholders (the ITER Organization, the European Domestic Agency, equipment manufacturer Air Liquide, mechanical installation contractors, and ITER's Construction Management-as-Agent) are assessing potential difficulties in co-activity related to the installation of helium storage gasbags up near the roof at the same time as some HVAC (ventilation) equipment.

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