Late 2015, the ITER Organization created the Beryllium Management Committee to prepare the rules and best-practice guidelines for the safe handling of beryllium, which has been chosen as armour material for the plasma-facing components of the vacuum vessel. Rene Raffray, the ITER Blanket Section Leader and new committee Chairman speaks to Newsline about the scope of the group's work and about beryllium itself. As Chairman of the recently established ITER Beryllium Management Committee, can you tell us more about its scope and responsibilities?The key objective of the committee is to ensure the sound establishment of a beryllium safety program at the ITER Organization in order to deliver the safe working environment demanded by all stakeholders. Representatives from a wide array of ITER units are participating (Legal Affairs, Health & Safety, Operation Management, Assembly, Human Resources, Radiological Monitoring, Buildings), as well as technical responsible officers and the Domestic Agencies that are involved in the procurement of beryllium components. As part of the initial effort, the committee is establishing a full suite of documents to describe how beryllium will be handled safely at ITER, including a communication statement for the general public, a policy for the management of beryllium, legal requirements, a beryllium management program (or code of practice), and a medical monitoring and surveillance program. The work requires interacting with colleagues from the areas of Buildings and Safety to better understand the space requirements required for the storage or the inspection testing of beryllium-bearing components, the building schedule and the associated regulations to help the project make informed decisions on how best to proceed. A mechanism is also under development to identify all the staff positions that will be involved in the management of beryllium components and the specific needs for training or medical surveillance. These actions will take some time to be completed. In the meantime, we are developing an interim set of guidelines for staff members presently visiting facilities where beryllium components are manufactured or handled. Which components of the ITER machine will contain beryllium and what are the particularities of this chemical element? The blanket is the component that will make the most use of beryllium due to the compatibility of this element with the plasma as well as its good thermal and mechanical properties. The 440 first wall panels will be covered with 8-10 mm of beryllium armour, for a total of approximately 12 tonnes of beryllium distributed over a surface area of about 700 m2. Other ITER components will also employ beryllium, albeit on a much lower scale. For example, the Faraday screens of the ion cyclotron heating and current drive system use about 40 kg of beryllium; diagnostics will need a small amount of beryllium for windows and first-wall samples; and the Test Blanket Modules use about 100-200 kg of beryllium inside the modules to act as a neutron multiplier in order to enhance the tritium breeding in the test module. Beryllium oxide is also used as insulation in some components. Rene Raffray, the ITER Blanket Section Leader chairs the committee that was recently established to prepare the rules and best-practice guidelines for the safe handling of beryllium. We are not going to use or implement any components containing beryllium soon. So why is it important to plan for beryllium handling now?It's true that components containing beryllium won't be on site for a number of years. However, the procurement of these components is already underway, including the fabrication and testing of full-scale prototypes at the Domestic Agencies, so we are faced with the possibility of ITER staff members visiting facilities where beryllium components are manufactured or handled. Clear procedures are being established to make sure that this is done safely. Tell us more about beryllium itself. Why does it need to be treated with care? Beryllium is used in industry in three main forms: beryllium metal, beryllium alloys and beryllium oxide. Applications range from the aerospace and nuclear industries to use in electrical control gear and switchboards. Beryllium is classified as a potential carcinogenic. Although in block form the material does not present much risk, the inhalation of beryllium dust can cause severe respiratory problems. Dust can result when microscopic residue surface particles on the beryllium are released into the air due to transport, handling and/or assembly activities. From a licensing point of view, the French regulator has requested that special attention be paid to this toxic material and it is clear that the beryllium issue must be considered by the ITER Organization as one of the highest risks for the workers, the public and the environment. There is an airborne concentration limit above which specific control measures are necessary; thus, all industries manufacturing or employing beryllium components must set up procedures in order to satisfy safety requirements. The closest comparable situation to ITER is the JET tokamak, which has beryllium-armoured walls and a beryllium code of practice that has been developed and improved over many years. We have been interacting closely with the health experts there and have a number of dedicated contracts to benefit as much as possible from their experience and expertise. Beryllium is used in applications ranging from the aerospace and nuclear industries to electrical control gear and switchboards. The closest comparable situation to ITER is the JET tokamak, which has beryllium-armoured walls and a beryllium code of practice that has been developed and improved over many years. Where will we source the beryllium for ITER components?The ITER Organization is procuring its beryllium components from the Domestic Agencies—for example, the blanket first wall will be procured by Europe, Russia and China. It is up to these Domestic Agencies to select material suppliers according to ITER Organization specifications.  At this stage, beryllium materials from the China, Russia and the US have been qualified according to the ITER specifications. What has JET's experience taught us about the behaviour of beryllium in tokamaks? Beryllium's low atomic number makes it compatible with plasma operation because it reduces the radiative effect in case of plasma contamination by armour erosion which—for material with a higher atomic number—could otherwise rapidly cool down and quench the plasma. It also presents relatively good thermal and mechanical properties. Because of these characteristics, it has been used for the protection of internal components in various magnetic fusion devices (most importantly in JET). For a device as large as ITER, however, a number of issues still have to be considered: heat load limits arising from temperature and stress constraints under steady state conditions, armour lifetime (including the effects of sputtering erosion as well as vaporization and loss of melt during disruption events), tritium inventory and permeation, and a potential beryllium/steam reaction. Fabrication is also an important factor in the overall assessment of beryllium as armour for plasma-facing components. For ITER applications key issues have been addressed through analytical studies as well as an R&D program on the manufacturing and testing of small-scale mockups under ITER-relevant conditions. What safety measures will be put in place for the handling of beryllium? Appropriate measures, systems and actions will be implemented to protect workers and prevent any exposure to operators and to the public. The primary measures focus on minimizing work with beryllium wherever possible and on the continuous monitoring of the airborne concentration in beryllium areas. Other protective measures include extensive use of risk assessment, health monitoring, controls (such as warning signs, protective clothing, and respiratory protection), education and training. The effectiveness of the system we put into place will be regularly measured by the Health and Safety Division against key performance indicators. Independent audits by experts in beryllium will ensure compliance and the continuous improvement of the system. 

Although seen at a distance of some 85 kilometres, the Seuil de Blieux gap—tucked between the Mont Chiran (alt 1,905 m) and Mourre de Chanier (alt 1,930 m)—seems to tower above the ITER site like an invitation for a hike or a skiing trip.   Taken from the road leading to Bridge of Mirabeau with a powerful telephoto lens, the view centres on the 60-metre-high ITER Assembly Hall, whose south-facing facade is now half-covered with mirror cladding. The other buildings are all part of CEA Cadarache, the largest research centre of the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission. 

Scientists developing fusion energy experiments have solved a puzzle of why their million-degree heating beams sometimes fail, and instead destabilize the fusion experiments before energy is generated. The solution used a new theory based on fluid flow and will help scientists in the quest to create gases with temperatures over a hundred million degrees and harness them to create clean, endless, carbon-free energy with nuclear fusion. "There was a strange wave mode which bounced the heating beams out of the experiment," said Zhisong Qu, from the Australian National University (ANU), lead author of the research paper published in Physical Review Letters. "This new way of looking at burning plasma physics allowed us to understand this previously impenetrable problem," said Mr Qu, a theoretical physicist in ANU's Research School of Physics and Engineering. Hot plasma is extremely turbulent and can behave in surprising ways that baffle scientists, at times becoming unstable and dissipating before any fusion reactions can take place. Mr Qu developed a simpler theory for plasma behaviour based on fluid flow and was able to explain an unstable wave mode that had been observed in the largest US fusion experiment, DIII-D. Collaborator Dr Michael Fitzgerald, from the Culham Centre for Fusion Energy in the UK, said the new method made much more sense than previous brute-force theories that had treated plasma as individual atoms. "When we looked at the plasma as a fluid we got the same answer, but everything made perfect sense," said Dr Fitzgerald."We could start using our intuition again in explaining what we saw, which is very powerful." Leader of the research group, Associate Professor Matthew Hole, from ANU's Research School of Physics and Engineering said the theory's success with the DIII-D wave puzzle was just the beginning. "It will open the door to understanding a whole lot more about fusion plasmas and contribute to the development of a long-term energy solution for the planet." Associate Professor Hole said that, for him, the quest for fusion energy went beyond a sustainable planet. "I'm a bit of a Star Trek fan—the only way you are going to travel to another star system is with a fusion reactor," he said. Read the original media release at ANU. 

Five years ago a massive earthquake, one of the four largest in recorded history, hit the northeast coast of Japan generating tsunami waves in excess of 40 metres and causing the loss of some 16,000 lives.   The event on 11 March 2011 had another dire consequence: as the tsunami waves swept ashore, they disabled both the primary power supply and the diesel backups of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant causing a "loss of coolant accident" that resulted in the partial meltdown of three reactor cores and the release of radioactive material into the atmosphere.   In the wake of the accident, nuclear safety authorities around the world set out to analyze its causes and dynamics. One of the consequences was that in France the Autorité de Sûreté Nucléaire (ASN) requested a "complementary safety assessment" of the 150 nuclear facilities located on French territory.   For ITER, the first fusion reactor to undergo full nuclear licensing, this meant looking into the resistance of the facility in the face of extreme situations—whatever their probability.   Like every nuclear installation, ITER has been designed with substantial safety margins. In the post-Fukushima context however, the question became ... are the margins wide enough to protect the installation and the neighbouring populations in case of an event even more damaging than those upon which the calculations were based?   To answer this question "unimaginable" events were postulated, their consequences combined, and their effect on the installation cumulated. What would happen, for instance, if a mega-earthquake hit the Durance river valley and destroyed all the dams upstream precisely when, due to previous flood-size rains, the level of the aquifer had risen dramatically?   The answer, regarding the ITER installation, is: not much. "Thanks to the dimensioning margins of the installation, we have demonstrated that ITER would resist such an improbable event," says Joëlle Elbez-Uzan, head of the ITER Environmental Protection & Nuclear Safety Division. Both buildings and penetration systems would resist the loads that such an event would liberate."   As for isolation valves or fire suppression systems, it appears "unnecessary to modify their design," says Joëlle. "They will undergo qualifying procedures under the harsher conditions dictated by the post-Fukushima context—either through physical means (vibrating tables) or, for the larger components or systems, through calculations and modellization."   Safety, however, is not only about the resistance of buildings and components. Crisis management procedures need to be streamlined and the responsibility of different actors during and after the event clearly defined.   Fukushima was a hard lesson learned. The accident triggered a renewed approach to safety that not only takes into consideration the "improbable" but also the "unthinkable."

The Highly Exceptional Load (HEL) that will reach ITER this week will be one of the most spectacular to date. A 67-metre-long convoy—weighing 300 tonnes and powered by two trailers—will start its slow and careful way along the ITER Itinerary tonight, and take a total of four nights to cover the 104 km to the ITER site. The massive convoy is delivering the first of four 47-metre steel girders that will span the width of the Assembly Hall in order to support the overhead cranes and their heavy charges of up to 1,250 tonnes.   Manufactured in Aviles, Spain, for the European Domestic Agency, the first pair of girders reached the Marseille industrial harbour of Fos-sur-Mer on 8 March. Girder #1 was transferred the next day to a specially designed barge for a four-hour voyage across the inland sea Etang de Berre.   After travelling the length of the Itinerary it will reach the ITER site early on Friday 18 March. Girder #2 is expected on site on 25 March, followed by the delivery of the second pair of girders in May.   View photo gallery below  

ITER will use extensive cryogenic technology to create and maintain low-temperature conditions for the magnet, thermal shielding and vacuum pumping systems. The ITER cryoplant will be the largest concentrated cryogenic system in the world (one plant location) and second only to CERN in terms of total cooling power. On the ITER platform, work is progressing on the foundations of the plant building while—following successive design phases—the procurement of cryoplant components is now underway by Europe (liquid nitrogen plant and auxiliary systems), the ITER Organization (helium plant) and India (cryolines and cryodistribution components). In February, as part of Europe's procurement package, a 23-metre-long storage tank for liquid helium successfully passed leak detection tests. Responsible for keeping liquid helium at a steady -269 °C, the stainless-steel inner tank has multi-layer insulation to minimize thermal losses and will be assembled with exterior thermal shielding. The examination of 500 metres of linear welds was successfully performed by the manufacturer, opening the way to the delivery of the equipment at ITER before the end of the year. The storage tank was manufactured by CryoAB (Sweden) as part of the contract signed between the European Domestic Agency and Air Liquide Global and EC Solutions and Fusion for Energy. Read the original news item on the European Domestic Agency website. -- Part of ITER's cryoplant, the 190 m³ stainless-steel tank will store liquid helium at -269 °C.

The path to creating sustainable fusion energy as a clean, abundant and affordable source of electric energy has been filled with "aha moments" that have led to a point in history when the ITER fusion experiment is poised to produce more fusion energy than it uses when it is completed in 15 to 20 years, said Ed Synakowski, associate director of Science for Fusion Energy Sciences at the US Department of Energy (DOE). Synakowski spoke as part of the Ronald E. Hatcher "Science on Saturday" lecture series at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL). Read the full report on the PPPL website. -- Ed Synakowski is pictured at the Monaco-ITER International Fusion Energy Days (2013).