Racing against concrete

The ITER Organization has just released a 200-page photobook that covers progress in construction, manufacturing and assembly between 2013 and 2024. 

In 2013, work was ending on the foundations of the Tokamak Complex but no walls were yet built; today civil work has been completed on the 430,000-tonne Complex and efforts have shifted to installing and assembling plant equipment and machine components.

In 2013, only two buildings existed on the ITER site in southern France and mountains of dirt were the most common feature on the platform as contractors worked to install underground drainage networks; today the scientific installation is essentially complete except for the future Hot Cell and the first activities from the control room to manage the plant are scheduled for 19 December 2024.

In 2013, 515 people worked as staff members for the ITER Organization; today, that figure has doubled.

"ITER Progress in Pictures 2013-2024, Construction, Manufacturing & Assembly" covers it all. Visit the Publication Centre on the ITER website (Brochures).

The 360° virtual tour of ITER construction has been updated with drone footage from October 2024. Discover the principal buildings of the ITER worksite, and the equipment inside, by clicking on and rotating the 360° photos.

Accessible from the NEWS & MEDIA pages of the ITER website or by clicking on the link below, the 2D tour requires no special equipment to enjoy. If you do have 3D glasses, click on the yellow goggle symbol at the top of any screen.

Click here to see the latest 360° ITER virtual tour.

The Fusion Industry Association has released The Fusion Workforce: Where it’s heading and how to prepare. It provides a roadmap for addressing fusion workforce and skills needs by giving insights into the current and future fusion industry workforce; projections; and how industry, government, and academia can plan and support. Based on interviews and surveys with the major fusion developers and suppliers, the report details the skills needed for the fusion industry to meet its commercialization challenges. 

The report urges action and synergy by a multitude of players such as governments, fusion developers, suppliers, academia, and trade bodies. Recommended areas of action include: strategic workforce development initiatives, resource centres and skills guidelines, research and technology development programs, and targeted support for workers. It also calls for clear regulatory frameworks, public-private partnerships, and international collaboration to drive the industry’s growth and ensure the development of necessary skills.

Read or download the report on the Fusion Industry Association website here.

The team operating the Korean tokamak KSTAR has announced it is running a new campaign of experiments focused on developing high-performance plasma scenarios. From now through February 2025, experiments will focus on:

* achieving advanced plasma confinement under high-temperature, high-density, and high-current conditions

* testing technologies for instability suppression

* researching tungsten impurity control through tungsten divertor testing and in-depth wall studies

In addition, the KSTAR team is planning over 40 collaborative experiments tackling fusion challenges with international partners, including research teams from DIII-D (USA) and WEST (France), and collaborators in Japan and China. These international partnerships will further expand to include the United Kingdom, the Czech Republic, and other nations in the future.

See a full report on the Korea Institute of Fusion Energy website here.