Construction site
The lights of autumn
16 Oct 2017
Summer is over in Provence and the beautiful autumn light is back, revealing every detail of the landscape ... and of the ongoing works on the ITER construction site.
The ITER site under the autumn light—warm hue, crisp details and transparent shadows ...
Taken at the very end of the afternoon from the top of the highest worksite crane, this view takes in the "heart" of the ITER installation.
To the left, the Tokamak Complex with the spectacular structure of the bioshield at its centre, to the right four massive constructions: the twin Magnet Power Conversion buildings with three transformers already installed in their outdoor bays; the cryoplant, with its frame now covered in the trademark ITER stainless steel cladding; and the Poloidal Field Coils Winding Facility with its red trim ... the first building to rise on the ITER platform.
View the gallery below for a full update on construction progress.
Looking south along the ITER platform, where four long-and-low buildings occupy the middle belt. Manufacturing activities are underway in the European magnet winding facility (far left); the first cryogenic equipment has been installed in the silver-clad cryoplant; and work is underway both inside and outside the Magnet Power Conversion buildings.
Scrubland and forest, rounded hills and perched villages, the Alps half-masked by a blue haze ... the landscape that extends beyond the ITER site is typical of Haute-Provence. Looking north on a clear day the view extends all the way to the Massif des Écrins, a mountain range 200 kilometres distant with summits at more than 4,000 metres.
Save for roads and parking space, every inch of the ITER platform is occupied: pre-assembled formwork ready to be lifted into the Tokamak Pit, steel bars and—most spectacular of all—tens of thousands of embedded plates waiting to be inserted into the rebar lattice of the concrete walls and floors.
Eighteen massive columns will provide structural support to the different levels of the Tokamak Complex. Six among them will have the additional role of supporting the assembly crane rails. At the L2 level of the Tokamak Building, concrete is being poured into one of these "mega columns."
At the end of this week concrete pouring will begin on the third above-ground level of the ITER bioshield (L3). The nest-like structure has been divided into four "plots," each representing between 80 and 100 degrees of the circular structure. Following the concrete pouring of the south-east plot, directly facing the temporary wall of the Assembly Hall, subsequent plots will be poured in early November, late November and mid-January.
They had passed the ITER gate at 3:00 a.m. on Wednesday 27 September. Two-and-a half-weeks later, three of the 128-tonne converter-transformers procured by China are in place in their dedicated bays outside one of the Magnet Power Conversion buildings.