ITER Divertor Procurement takes big step forward

On 24 July 2008, the ITER Organization formally accepted the two Qualification Prototypes supplied by the EU Domestic Agency within the Divertor Qualification Program. "These components have successfully completed all the required non-destructive tests and qualification procedures of the manufacturing process," said Mario Merola, Divertor Section Leader in the ITER Organization, "and I am very pleased to sign today their final acceptance. This event culminates several months of dedicated efforts and hard work, which was coordinated by the EU Divertor Responsible Officer Bruno Riccardi. The EU Domestic Agency is, since today, just a step away from its formal qualification, which is a prerequisite to start the procurement of the divertor, planned in February 2009."

The divertor plasma-facing components, together with the toroidal field magnet conductors and the blanket modules, require the qualification of the Member prior to the start of the procurement. This means that each Member allocated one of these critical procurement packages must first "qualify" by demonstrating its technical capability. In regards to the divertor, this is achieved in two steps: first, at least two medium-size "Qualification Prototypes" have to be manufactured and meet all the prescribed acceptance criteria, then at least one of them must withstand the high heat flux performance tests.

The two delivered prototypes were manufactured by the Austrian company Plansee and will be soon followed by a third prototype, supplied by the Italian Ansaldo Ricerche. These components will be shipped to the Efremov Institute in St Petersburg, Russian Federation, where they will be subject to high heat flux performance tests planned for September 2008.