[FPSPACE] A Nuclear Fusion Reactor - in just twenty years...

[LARRY KLAES]

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000101&sid=a8aaAwgW7Qqc&refer=japan

France Will Host World's First Nuclear-Fusion Reactor (Update3)

June 28 (Bloomberg) -- France was chosen to host the world's first 
nuclear-fusion reactor, ending a deadlock with Japan over a location of the 
4.6 billion euro ($5.6 billion) experiment involving the European Union, 
Japan, the U.S., Russia, China and South Korea.

The six members of the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor, or 
ITER, which means ``the way'' in Latin, agreed in Moscow today to build the 
facility in the southern French city of Cadarache, rather than 
Rokkasho-Mura, the Japanese location favored by the U.S. and South Korea.

``We are dealing with the question of how to address sustainable energy in 
the future,'' Janez Potocnik, European commissioner for science and 
research, told reporters in Moscow today. ``And fusion looks very 
promising.''

Fusion, the process that powers stars, could be cheaper and safer than 
fission, the action at the core of contemporary nuclear power plants. ITER 
members say uniting the atoms of lighter elements such as hydrogen instead 
of splitting heavier ones such as uranium generates more energy, less 
radioactivity.

Construction on the reactor will start by the end of the year and take seven 
years to complete, said Russian Nuclear Energy Agency chief Alexander 
Rumyantsev. Japan, as ``non-host country,'' will build the additional 
facilities -- including a power plant prototype -- that will be needed as 
the multidecade project advances, he said.

Energy Security

``The six-party agreement highlights the fact that energy security is an 
international concern,'' said Kyriakos Gialoglou, energy researcher at the 
Center for European Policy Studies in Brussels. ``With oil prices so high, 
nuclear fusion is among the alternatives that need to be considered.''

Japan, backed by the EU, wants to be the first country to power homes with 
nuclear fusion-generated electricity. Still, all six members of the ITER 
project must agree on where the first plant will be built, said Raymond 
Orbach, director of the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Science.

``We conducted negotiations with the desire to build ITER in Japan,'' Toichi 
Sakata, head of research and development at Japan's science ministry, told 
reporters in Tokyo today. ``Japan has asked the EU to thoroughly undertake 
this task of hosting the reactor. It's a major responsibility.''

With or Without Japan

The EU said in November that it would start the project in France with or 
without the support of Japan, the U.S. and South Korea, and committed itself 
to starting construction in 2005.

The experimental plant will take about a decade to build and the 
infrastructure needed to supply consumers will take about 35 years, said 
Orbach, whose department last month established two fusion research centers 
in the U.S.

``Placing ITER within a broader approach to nuclear fusion, should help to 
bring it to market much sooner,'' the European Commission said in an 
e-mailed statement.

If all goes well and the project advances as planned, the total cost is 
expected to reach 10 billion euros, including operating expenses through 
2040.

Critics of the project, including Greenpeace, the environmental group, call 
the project dangerous and misguided.

`Absurd Project'

``Nuclear fusion poses the exact problems of nuclear fission in the 
production of radioactive waste, the risks of accidents and proliferation,'' 
said Frederic Miller, head of Greenpeace France's nuclear campaign, in an 
e-mailed statement. ``France seems hypnotized by this absurd project.''

ITER will have administrative offices in both Japan and Europe, with ``a 
significant number of the meetings of the ITER council in Japan,'' according 
to a document handed out to reporters at Japan's science ministry today.

The host and non-host will each contribute 46 billion yen ($418.3 million) 
to fund operations in Japan, the document said. The EU will provide 40 
percent of the staff for the project and Japan will provide 20 percent, 
according to the document.

Funding for the reactor is still under discussion, Russia's Rumyantsev said 
today. The host country will probably cover 50 percent of the cost, with the 
other five partners each paying 10 percent, the Russian Nuclear Energy 
Agency said on June 24.


To contact the reporters on this story:

Maria Ermakova in Moscow at mermakova at bloomberg.net;
Meggan Richard in Tokyo at mrichard3 at bloomberg.net.