It has been almost one year since the F4E Antenna started taking shape. Under the supervision of Laurent Schmieder, Head of Site, Buildings and Power Supplies Division, the team he manages brings together a taskforce of engineers whose core mission is to ensure the timely construction of the ITER buildings and infrastructure.
By the end of the year the team will grow to 15 members and it will have the titanic task of managing roughly 500 engineers, technicians and workers working on the site. For Schmieder, whose track record includes the AIDA project in Siberia and the Laser Megajoule in Bordeaux, this task is business as usual but putting together the team and integrating its members in the cycle of the project while splitting his time between Barcelona and Cadarache has been a real challenge. “Building the team and delivering in parallel is not easy. F4E had to follow up negotiations with ITER IO for the Procurement Arrangements, proceed with contracts linked to the site management, select engineering consortia to go ahead with the design activities and approve the layout and construction of the first building to host F4E staff to which we moved on 7 June. The team had to be instantly integrated into the project”.
F4E signs the ITER Architect Engineer contract, one of the biggest engineering contracts ever in Europe
Worth approximately 150 million EUR, the Architect Engineer contract for ITER Buildings and Civil Infrastructures was awarded to the Engage Consortium on 13 April.
It represents a total of around 1,700,000 hours of work, spread over the 8 years foreseen for the design and the construction of ITER buildings bringing together 230 engineers and designers.
The Health and Safety Protection Coordination and Legal Inspection Services contract was also signed, worth approximately 9 million EUR and was awarded to Apave.
Construction of the heart of the ITER project can now begin: Tokamak seismic isolation pit construction contract signed
The contract giving the go-ahead for the first steps in constructing the building which will host the ITER tokamak, the heart of the project, was signed by F4E and GTM Sud Consortium on 20 May. Entitled "Construction of the Tokamak Complex Seismic Isolation Pit", this contract is worth approximately 36 million EUR (with options).
Keys for JWS 3 handed over: detailed designing of the ITER building on site can now start
The keys for the Joint Worksite III (JWS 3) building were officially handed over by Agence ITER France (AIF) to the ITER Organization on 27 May. Financed by F4E, the construction of the temporary office building has been delegated to AIF. This responsibility has been carried out on time and within the budget.
Full of firsts: First product under the first F4E-ITER PA completed
The production of the first two batches of copper strand, to be used for European share of the procurement of the Cable-In-conduit conductor Unit lengths for Torodial Fields coils of the ITER magnet system, has been successfully completed.
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Procurement for pre-compression rings starts The Procurement Arrangement (PA) between F4E and ITER IO for the delivery of 9 pre-compression rings, signed on 12 May, is the start signal for the commencement of the procurement process for these vital parts. An open call for tender with the expected worth of over 1 million EUR will be launched during this summer. Read more |
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Broader Approach supercomputer Procurement Arrangement signed The Procurement Arrangement (PA) for the supply of the supercomputer and peripheral equipment for the IFERC Project (CSC Activity) was signed by F4E Director Frank Briscoe and Hiromasa Ninomiya, Director General for Fusion at Japan's Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) in Rokkasho, on 28 April. This PA concerns a supercomputer centre for a value of around 63 million EUR which will be provided by Europe. Read more |
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F4E signs the Ion Source and Extraction Power Supplies contract High-energy beams of neutral atoms, such as deuterium, will be injected into the core of the ITER plasma through a Neutral Beam Injection (NBI) to transfer their energy to the plasma and raise the overall temperature. Read more |
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Euratom Associations meeting held at F4E
A Euratom Associations meeting was held at the F4E offices on 29 April. An all-day event, the meeting consisted
of an information session about F4E grants, followed by relevant training in areas such as
Quality Assurance (QA), intellectual property issues, grant management, and the submission of proposals.
Chinese delegation visits F4E
A delegation from the Chinese Domestic Agency, headed by Dr Jinpei Cheng, Director of China ITER Plans Implementation Center, visited F4E on 10 May.
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F4E media trip to Cadarache F4E together with the Representations of the European Commission in Madrid and Barcelona organised a media trip during the Spanish Presidency between 7 and 9 June. Through this initiative, Representations aim to communicate better the role of EU bodies based in Spain and illustrate the value of their work. |
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Blanket Information Day held at F4E Targeting potentially interested companies, this one-day meeting was held on 19 May at F4E. The technical requirements of the ITER blanket first wall system, about 50% of which will be supplied by Europe, were presented to a total of 66 representatives from 30 different companies/associations who participated at the event. Read more |
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Calendar
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2-7 July 2010: ESOF 2010, Torino
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27 Sept.-1 Oct. 2010: SOFT 2010, Porto
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11-16 Oct. 2010: 23rd IAEA Fusion Energy Conference, Daejeon
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Focus on
Focus on the Business Intelligence Group
F4E’s first objective is to provide Europe’s contribution to the ITER international fusion energy project. F4E’s Business Intelligence (BI) Group works in order to achieve this objective by supporting the Contracts & Procurement Department in the preparation of procurement activities.
