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Osamu Motojima |
- De ‘founding fathers’ van het ITER-project, de EU, China, India, Rusland, Korea, Japan en de USA, hebben het budget en de planning van de prestigieuze reactor goedgekeurd. Nadat de bouw een jaar heeft stilgelegen kan het ambitieuze project eindelijk worden voltooid. De Japanse kernfysicus Motojima wordt de nieuwe directeur-generaal.
After one year of political struggle, construction of the
International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) may finally
resume. The governing council consisting of its seven members
(China, the European Union, India, Japan, Korea, Russia and the
United States) finally agreed today on the project's baseline
outlining costs, time frame and design of this ambitious project.
Furthermore, the governing council announced that the Japanese
fusion-scientist Osamu Motojima would become the new
director-general of ITER.
ITER aims at constructing a fusion reactor prototype that
imitates the chemical process that fuels stars with their power and
thereby creating vast amounts of energy. For one year any progress
was interrupted since the costs of the projects soared and member
states struggled with financing decisions. Since the EU is hosting
the project in southern France it incurs with 45 % the biggest
share of costs. As the cost estimates almost tripled, the EU struggled to finance its share and reallocated
funds from existing research projects towards ITER. Facing the debt
crisis, the EU is struggling with the funding of ESA and
other research projects with leading politicians such as EU
commissioner Neelie Kroes trying to avoid subsidy races.