FPN10-42

ITER Council Approves New Project Baseline; Names New Director

July 29, 2010

The ITER Council, meeting in Cadarache, France, has approved a new project baseline, formally accepting a one year delay, to November 2019, for achieving first plasma and approving a new cost estimate for the construction project.

Under the new baseline, the cost of ITER construction is estimated to approximately double, to about 15 billion Euros ($19.2 billion), to which the European Union will contribute 6.6 billion Euros. Estimates for the other six ITER Parties, at 9% of total project cost, would be around 1.4 billion Euros, or around 1.8 billion dollars each.

The date for first deuterium-tritium fusion experiments would be delayed another year, to 2027, according to the new baseline, but the Council expressed the hope that this date could be accelerated.

At the meeting, the Council appointed Osamu Motojima to be ITER Director-General, succeeding the outgoing Kaname Ikeda. Motojima was formerly Director General of the National Institute for Fusion Science (NIFS) in Japan and led the construction of the billion-dollar-class Large Helical Device (LHD) there. He was the recipient of Fusion Power Associates 2008 Distinguished Career Award.

For further information, see the postings at http://fire.pppl.gov