F4E presents its new procurement strategy for the supply of the Poloidal Field coils

In order to unveil its new procurement strategy regarding the supply of the five Poloidal Field coils that Europe is responsible for, and to offer a complete set of presentations clarifying technical, legal and procurement related questions, F4E organised a one day information meeting on 15 October at its headquarters in Barcelona. Representatives from 27 European companies attended the meeting and had the opportunity to raise questions and network.

The delivery of the components will be broken down into several smaller contracts in order to foster greater involvement and competition across Europe’s industry and SMEs. The overall procurement strategy also received the green light from F4E’s Executive Committee in September and the first contracts are due to be awarded in the first half of 2013. The new procurement strategy aims at optimising the number of tooling and the supply chain in agreement with the delivery dates for ITER’s first plasma.

The seven building blocks that underpin the entire PF coils procurement strategy focus on the following areas: i) PF coils engineering, ii) manufacturing, iii) cold test facility, iv) winding, tooling and equipment, v) impregnation tooling and equipment, vi) additional tooling and equipment, vii)infrastructure and building operations.

To view the presentations of the PF coils Information day click here.