By Steven B. Krivit
March 25, 2024

The ITER Organization announced today that it has started to repair the damaged reactor vacuum vessel sectors. Assembly of the reactor core has been on hold for more than two years.

Three years ago, ITER, the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor under construction in France, failed a periodic inspection by ASN (Autorité de Sûreté Nucléaire), the French nuclear regulator. The ITER organization had not publicly disclosed the report or the damage. New Energy Times was the first to report that story.

A dramatic statement on the ITER Organization Web site, evoking a sense of science-fiction, introduces the news today:

Built up against vacuum vessel sector #7, the scaffolding reaches almost 20 metres in height and masks the massive component. Streaks of blinding light, filtered by thick, semi-transparent red plastic sheets, flash here and there—proof that in the ITER Assembly Hall, the repair campaign has begun in earnest.

Jan 5, 2024
By Steven B. Krivit

The first vacuum-vessel sector waiting in the assembly hall, Dec. 2021. The core of the reactor will be built from nine of these sectors.

Second Anniversary

Two years ago today, French nuclear authorities ordered a halt to assembly of the core of ITER, the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor. Neither the French regulators nor the ITER Organization publicly initially disclosed the shutdown. New Energy Times broke that story on Feb. 21, 2022.

The organization was unable to proceed with assembly of the massive vacuum-vessel sectors because of multiple fabrication and shipping defects. Ancillary construction on the site continued; however, assembly of the reactor core is an essential process of the critical-path for the project.

New Energy Times asked Laban Coblenz, the spokesman for the organization, for the earliest projected date for the installation of the repaired sectors. He did not reply.

Timeline entry posted on ITER Organization’s Web site, Dec. 2021

When the ITER project was approved by its international partners, the cost was estimated at €5 billion. But that value did not include most of the parts. In 2018, David Kramer of Physics Today broke the story that — as of 2018 — a more realistic estimate for the project was $65 billion (€59 billion).