The last batch of Russian-produced superconducting strands for the ITER magnet system was shipped for cabling from the Chepetsk Mechanical Plant (Udmurtia) to JSC VNIIKP (Podolsk) on 3 December.   In the last six years, the Chepetsk Mechanical Plant has manufactured approximately 100 tonnes of niobium-tin (Nb3Sn) strand for ITER's toroidal field conductor and 125 tonnes of niobium-titanium (NbTi) strand for the poloidal field conductor.   A press release released for the event by the Russian Domestic Agency celebrated the "revival of the country's industrial capacity" in the production of superconducting strands due to participation in ITER. Superconducting strands for ITER are unique composite items consisting of more than 10,000 fine (2-6 microns) superconducting filaments (for reference, the thickness of a human hair is 40 to 110 microns). The superconductor manufacturing line in Udmurtia was created and equipped almost from scratch. In the course of developing the production process, the Chepetsk Mechanical Plant solved many technological and organizational issues.   Manufacturing superconducting strand for ITER involves a series of complex operations (assembly, pressing, drawing, rolling, outgassing, purification, etc.) that require absolute accuracy and compliance with technological requirements. From raw materials to the final product, the overall process lasts about nine months.   Read the press release from the Russian Domestic Agency in English and Russian.

After two years of relying on technology installed at the neighbouring CEA Institute for Magnetic Fusion Research (IRFM), followed by another year of operating out of a prefabricated building, the ITER Organization is now equipped with its own permanent virtual reality room on the ground floor of the new Headquarters extension.   Thanks to the installed visualization software, Techviz, ITER's design engineers can literally "walk through" the ITER machine and the surrounding Tokamak Complex. The 2.5 x 4 m screen makes cooling water piping, vessel supports and any other plant system or component appear true-to-size. Rather than watching 3D animations—which can also be done—the technology is used for checking the design of the ITER machine and the integration of its many components ... large and small.

At the heart of the ITER tokamak is the world's most powerful pulsed superconducting electromagnet—the central solenoid.The US ITER Project Office at Oak Ridge National Laboratory has begun fabrication of the magnet modules with vendor General Atomics. At its facility in Poway, California, General Atomics will produce six superconducting modules for the central solenoid plus a spare. In August, General Atomics began winding a mockup central solenoid coil from non-superconducting material; the mockup is being used to confirm the readiness of the tooling stations required to fabricate a superconducting module. After the de-spooler, the conductor passes to the winding station shown above. Photo: US ITER The conductor arrives spooled at the facility and has to be separated by a de-spooler and fed to a winding station. The winding station forms the conductor into a spiral-wound coil composed of "pancake" layers. The mockup coil is now at the stage where the first six-layer set of wound coil, or hexapancake, is formed; the full mockup coil will comprise two hexapancakes and one four-layer quadpancake.The winding station was designed and built by Tauring S.p.A. (Italy). After winding is completed and evaluated in late December, the mockup coil will move to other work stations for final qualification of the manufacturing process"The approach is to qualify the fabrication process by station," says David Everitt, the central solenoid system manager at US ITER. "This begins with factory acceptance testing of workstation components, followed by assembly and commissioning, and finally production of the mockup module." The reaction heat treatment furnace is shown opened up; the upper portion will descend when a module is inside. Photo: US ITER Eleven tooling stations will ultimately be installed at the vendor. While some stations support basic manufacturing tasks such as welding or stacking, others enable more complex processes such as heat treatment, wrapped turn insulation, injection of resin around the coils and cold testing.The reaction heat treatment furnace station will make the electromagnet material superconducting by heating the niobium-tin and copper conductor to temperatures of 650 degrees Celsius. The furnace—which is 12 metres tall when opened, with a diameter of 5.5 metres—can hold one module at a time. The modules, weighing about 110 metric tons each, are moved in and out of the furnace with an air-bearing transport tool. Seco Warwick (Pennsylvania) received the subcontract from General Atomics and fabricated the furnace station at its facility in Poland.Following heat treatment, the conductor passes to the turn insulation station, which wraps a combination of fiberglass and Kapton® tape around the conductor bars. The insulation on the conductor ensures that electrical shorts do not occur between turns and layers. The previously heat treated module needs to be un-sprung like a Slinky without overstraining the conductor, which is now strain-sensitive due to heat treatment. Once the module is un-sprung, the turn insulation machine heads (designed and built by Ridgway Machines, UK) can wrap the insulation around the conductor and then reassemble it exactly as it was before. Turn insulation heads fabricated by Ridgeway have been delivered and are awaiting installation at General Atomics. Photo: US ITER Following turn insulation and then ground insulation, the central solenoid modules will move to the vacuum pressure impregnation station. This station injects epoxy resin to saturate the dry turn and ground insulation materials of the module, which is critical for structural integrity and also contributes to insulation capability. The station is now under construction and will be ready for testing with the mockup module in early summer 2015. Before the first superconducting module is vacuum pressure impregnated with epoxy resin, fabrication and testing of the mockup module will be completed.The final step for the module fabrication is cold testing at 48.5 kilo amps and 4.7 Kelvin, which is comparable to the operating conditions inside the ITER reactor. Now under design, the cold test station will be ready for the completed mockup module in February 2016. Eventually, the station will be the final proving ground for the production modules before they are prepared for shipment to the ITER site. The mockup will complete its tour of the work stations by early 2016 and the production modules are scheduled for completion by February 2019.Further progress is also underway on the structural supports for the central solenoid. A contract has been awarded to Petersen, Inc. (Utah) for fabrication of the lower key blocks that provide the primary support for the massive 1,000-metric-ton solenoid. Procurement of the tie-plates, which provide a restraining cage around the solenoid, is now in process. Design of the assembly tooling for putting the central solenoid together at the ITER facility is also well underway; a final design review of the earliest-need items was completed in September.

Representatives from China, Japan and Korea met for the first trilateral workshop on ITER from 1 to 2 December at the Canton Hotel in Guangzhou, China. Hosted by the Chinese Domestic Agency, the workshop aimed to discuss technology, the experience of ITER procurement, and the development pathway for a fusion facility in China, Japan, and Korea.   Over 50 experts from the Chinese Domestic Agency and Chinese industry met with 7 experts from the Japanese Domestic Agency and 9 from the Korean Domestic Agency, including delegates from governments and all three Domestic Agency heads.   The need for information exchange and close collaboration between China, Japan, and Korea was stressed as a necessary condition to developing fusion energy. Synergies in terms of culture, nature, and project mind in the three countries were also evoked.   Each Domestic Agency head introduced the organization of its agency and described procurement items, progress in their procurement, and future plans. Dedicated exchanges took place on blanket and divertor manufacturing technology, the Test Blanket Module program, conductor and magnet manufacturing technology, and diagnostics manufacturing. A session on "Beyond ITER" focused on the DEMO development plan and design progress in each country.   Collaborative actions were set forth and may be the focus of satellite meetings in the individual topics at a later date.

​For the third consecutive year, young scientists involved with ITER Project implementation from Russia's major research centres were invited to the Russian Domestic Agency in the framework of the 57th Scientific Conference of the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (MIPT). Academician Evgeny Velikhov, ITER Council member and president of the Kurchatov Institute, gave the opening, stressing that "ITER is not only a scientific facility; it is also a technological platform that will provide the basis for fusion energy in the future." Participants heard reports on R&D and manufacturing progress for ITER key components, including diagnostic systems (Budker Institute, Novosibirsk; MIPT, Dolgoprudnyj; TRINITI, Troitsk; Kurchatov Institute, Moscow), blanket modules (Efremov Institute, Saint Petersburg; Dollezhal Institute, Moscow), and high-temperature testing of in-vessel components (Efremov Institute, Saint Petersburg; MEPhI, Moscow). Evgeny Velikhov concluded the conference by expressing confidence that "sooner or later humanity will certainly come to fusion."  

​The Governing Board of the European Domestic Agency for ITER Fusion for Energy (F4E) has decided to appoint Dr Pietro Barabaschi as Acting Director of F4E with effect from 1 March 2015 until a new Director takes up duties. The Governing Board has also agreed to initiate the process to recruit a new Director.Dr Barabaschi will replace the outgoing Director, Professor Henrik Bindslev, who will leave F4E on 28 February 2015. Professor Bindslev has been appointed Dean of the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Southern Denmark.The Chair of the Governing Board, Mr Stuart Ward, expressed, on behalf of its members, his gratitude to Professor Henrik Bindslev for the vision and leadership that he has demonstrated as the Director of F4E, which manages Europe's contribution to ITER and the Broader Approach projects with Japan.Dr Barabaschi has been head of F4E's Broader Fusion Development Department at Garching, Germany, since 2008. An electrical engineer, he started his career in the JET project. In 1992 he joined the ITER Joint Central Team in San Diego and by 2006 he was the deputy to the Project Leader as well as head of the Design Integration Division of the ITER International Team at Garching.See the original story on the F4E website.

With a lecture on the subject of "The Fusion Roadmap and the challenges of the ITER era," Francesco Romanelli completed his tenure as EFDA Leader and EFDA Associate Leader for JET on 28 November.   As EFDA and JET Leader and interim Programme Manager during the first months of EUROfusion, Francesco Romanelli was the driving force behind the European Fusion Roadmap and had played a key role in re-definition of the fusion research programme in the European Commission research and innovation program Horizon 2020.   In his talk, he briefly reviewed the history of fusion research since the 1960s. Looking back on his time at JET, he made the audience smile when he pointed out that "the average life-time of a JET director was either seven months or seven years. I can claim to have stayed the longest—seven years AND seven months."   He finished by thanking the many individuals and groups who made the roadmap and the successes in JET happen. Steve Cowley, Director of CCFE, reminded the audience of Francesco Romanelli's scientific career in theoretical fusion science and his papers which are still highly important. "I have an enormous respect for Francesco, he said". "Fusion owes him a great deal."   EUROfusion Programme Manager Tony Donné, paid respect to the tremendous amount of work which had been done under Francesco's leadership.   Read the full article on the EUROfusion website.   -- Francesco Romanelli poses with family members at the farewell event.