Eight now on site
With eight D-shaped magnet coils on site and two travelling, the project has officially passed the halfway mark in the procurement of 19 toroidal field coils.
Eighteen toroidal field coils, placed vertically around the ITER plasma chamber, will produce the magnetic field that will confine the plasma particles; a nineteenth will be supplied to the project as a spare.
The coils will be associated by pair with each vacuum vessel sector. Two tools have been erected in the ITER Assembly Hall for this sub-assembly activity, and the first operation is underway on vacuum vessel sector #6.
From niobium-tin conductor supplied by ITER Members China, Europe, Japan, Korea, Russia and the United States, two procuring agencies—the Domestic Agencies of Europe and Japan—are carrying out the complex winding and casing tasks necessary to delivering the final coils.
On Friday 3 September, the European agency Fusion for Energy delivered TF6—the eighth coil to arrive on site. To date, five coils have been delivered by Europe and three from Japan; another two Japanese coils are travelling toward ITER now.
One of ITER's longest-lead procurement programs has reached the halfway mark in terms of deliveries.