Galeria

On April 21, the Ministry of Science, ICT & Future Planning of South Korea released its third five-year plan for the development of nuclear fusion energy.

The South Korean government enacted law for the purpose in 2006 and has set up and implemented its five-year plans since then in order to be capable of building nuclear fusion power plants by 2041. Based on the first plan, it built the Korea Superconducting Tokamak Advanced Research (KSTAR) facilities and participated in the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) project with the United States and the EU. In the phase of the second plan, it set up a new world record in plasma maintenance and signed international contracts worth more than 500 billion won via the ITER project.

The third plan is to set the foundation for research on power generation by means of nuclear fusion. In other words, it is to work on technology for actual power generation based on nuclear fusion and demonstrate the technology for commercial use based on the outcome of the project and the KSTAR.

The team of engineers from F4E, ASG and CNIM, working in Europe’s industrial facility on the ITER site, and their colleagues in ASIPP, the Institute of Plasma Physics of China’s Academy of Sciences, have officially started manufacturing the Poloidal Field (PF) coils assigned to Europe for the biggest fusion device –ITER. ITER will operate with six PF coils. Europe is responsible for five of them and through a collaboration agreement with China one will be fabricated in ASIIP. The remaining coil will be delivered by Russia.

After having successfully completed the winding tests using lengths of dummy conductor, the technicians have started unspooling the “real” conductor and inserted it in the machines to produce the impressive magnetic rings that will control the shape and stability of the super-hot plasma.

In ASIPP, the winding of the first Double Pancake (DP), which consists of two layers of conductors wound in the shape of massive pancakes, started in mid-March and has been completed. Works on the two Helium inlets at the inner joggles, from where Helium will circulate in the conductor to lower its temperature to freezing levels so as to make the coil superconductive, have been concluded. Carefully milling a hole in the jacket, without damaging the superconducting strand underneath, and welding a pipe to feed the helium into the conductor, have been some of the additional delicate works that needed to be performed. This weld has then been X-Rayed and leak tested to ensure that no Helium can escape through the weld. Subsequently, the Helium inlet insulation has then been wrapped around the inlet. On average, the winding of a DP is expected to take 4-5 weeks each.

After a series of rigorous dimensional checks, in order to check whether the shape and dimensions of the component are in compliance, the component will be transferred to the terminal assembly area. The DP will enter its final stage of fabrication by going through Vacuum Pressure Impregnation, where the necessary vacuum will be created to inject the epoxy resin and cure the insulation.

Meanwhile, a few weeks ago in F4E’s PF coils facility, CNIM has already started winding the conductor of the fifth PF coil and the first DP is expected to be completed by the end of May. When the first layers will be completed, the team of technicians will proceed with the installation of the Helium inlets and perform the same steps as in ASIPP.

The good collaboration between F4E, ASIPP and their industrial partners, has been fundamentally important in making good progress in a co-ordinated way. The engineers and technicians supervising the works are witnessing the moment they have all been waiting for: the winding tests are over and the coils are being manufactured for real!

Source: F4E

The first ITER diagnostic components to be supplied by F4E – five Continuous External Rogowski (CER) coils – were delivered to the ITER site earlier this week and  acceptance testing of these items by ITER IO was concluded successfully on 7 March 2017.

The CER coils are to be located outside the ITER vacuum vessel, within the cases of three Toroidal Field (TF) coils. Their purpose is to measure the total electric current flowing in the ITER plasma, a key measurement required for plasma control that also has relevance for safety. By contrast to other common methods of measuring the plasma current, the Rogowski method works with a single sensor, resulting in very high reliability, despite the cryogenic temperatures, high vacuum and mechanical stresses it will be subjected to during operation of the TF coils.

Each CER coil is a flexible, cylindrical structure, measuring approximately 40 metres in length and 12 millimetres in diameter. A special groove will be made in the TF coil cases to house these coils. The ends of the CER coils, emerging from the TF coils, will be housed in protective steel structures that have also been supplied by F4E.  

The CER coils have been manufactured by two companies Axon (France), which supplied the electrical parts of the system, and Sgenia (Spain), which supplied the mechanical parts.

The coils will shortly be transported to Japan by ITER IO, for installation in the TF coils by the Japanese Domestic Agency for ITER, with F4E’s support. Once the TF coils have been installed on the ITER machine, F4E will commission the CER coils for use during first plasma operations.

Source: F4E

The representatives of the nuclear institutions of Kazakhstan who visited ITER on 21st February 2017 stated it simply and clearly: they are very interested in collaborating with ITER. The largest of the Central Asian republics (5.5 times the size of France), Kazakhstan has immense mineral resources and a strong scientific and technological infrastructure inherited from its Soviet past and expanded since the country's independence in 1991.

As of 1 January 2017, Ukraine became part of the EUROfusion consortium. The Ukrainian signatory is the Kharkov Institute for Physics and Technology (KIPT) and it will coordinate the fusion research in seven national universities and research institutes.

Ukrainian fusion infrastructure is currently equipped with stellarators Uragan-2M and Uragan-3M and plasma accelerators QSPA Kh-50 and QSPA-M. The Research Unit includes competences are complementary to those already existing in the EUROfusion consortium. “Ukraine has a particular strong expertise in a number of fields, including plasma facing components, materials, stellarator research and diagnostics,” says EUROfusion Programme Manager Tony Donné.

Head of the Ukrainian Research Unit Igor Garkusha, hopes that with the signing of the EUROfusion agreement Ukrainian researchers will have more participation in JET programmes, as well as in research at other leading fusion facilities in Europe, including the Wendelstein 7-X stellarator. He is also keen on students benefiting from EUROfusion’s Education and Training programmes. “Joining EUROfusion and establishment of Ukrainian Research Unit is an important milestone for our fusion community and we expect further fruitful joint work within EUROfusion Roadmap,” he says.

Source: EUROfusion