ITER contracts L&T to deploy advance tech at reactor's vacuum vessel

Oct 31, 2024

L&T and ITER are teaming up to combine their strengths to build the world’s largest tokamak.

Prabhat Ranjan Mishra

Vacuum vessel provides a high-vacuum environment for the plasma and improves radiation shielding.

ITER/fb

The world’s largest nuclear fusion project, ITER, has awarded a major contract to Larsen & Toubro for the deployment of critical advanced technologies.

The company will assemble ports and complex parts within the vacuum vessel at the ITER’s nuclear fusion project in Southern France.

A vacuum vessel is a hermetically sealed, double-walled steel container that houses the fusion reactions and acts as a first safety containment barrier. In its doughnut-shaped chamber, or torus, the plasma particles spiral around continuously without touching the walls, according to ITER.

Larsen & Toubro had also delivered the world’s largest stainless-steel high-vacuum pressure vessel (Cryostat) for the ITER project in 2020.

The company inked an MoU with the ITER Organization – for technical collaboration on the project. Under the MoU, L&T will help the ITER Organization with the development of ‘state of the art’ technology for the ‘first of a kind’ hardware and assembly of all such fusion relevant systems inside the vacuum vessel of ITER Tokamak to control the plasma operation, according to a press release.

The majority of these activities will be in the tokamak pit at the ITER site, according to L&T.

The vacuum vessel provides a high-vacuum environment for the plasma, improves radiation shielding and plasma stability, acts as the primary confinement barrier for radioactivity, and provides support for in-vessel components such as the blanket and the divertor, according to ITER.

Cooling water circulating through the vessel’s double steel walls removes the heat generated during operation. Forty-four openings, or ports, in the vacuum vessel provide access for remote handling operations, diagnostics, heating, fueling, and vacuum systems.

“I’m happy to announce the signing of this MoU with Larsen & Toubro. In previous contributions to ITER, L&T has demonstrated its reliability in high-tech manufacturing,” said Pietro Barabaschi, Director General ITER.

“This is vital to meeting the technology challenges of the ITER project. I wish to add that India has been a strong partner and contributor to ITER, and we look forward to continued collaboration.”

ITER is a joint project of 35 nations collaborating to build the world’s largest tokamak, a magnetic fusion device designed to prove the feasibility of fusion as a large-scale and carbon-free energy source based on the same principle that powers our sun and stars.

“L&T and ITER are teaming up to combine their strengths to build the world’s largest tokamak, to prove the feasibility of nuclear fusion as a large scale and carbon-free source, based on the same principles that powers the Sun,” said Anil Parab, whole-time director and Sr executive vice president – heavy engineering and L&T Valves.

The first of five vacuum vessel sectors for ITER was completed last month. ITER stated that once assembled, this sector will measure an impressive 19.4 meters in diameter by 11.4 meters in height, weighing approximately 5,200 tons.

ITER claims that in a tokamak device, the larger the vacuum chamber volume, the easier it is to confine the plasma and achieve the type of high-energy regime that will produce significant fusion power.

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Prabhat Ranjan Mishra Prabhat, an alumnus of the Indian Institute of Mass Communication, is a tech and defense journalist. While he enjoys writing on modern weapons and emerging tech, he has also reported on global politics and business. He has been previously associated with well-known media houses, including the International Business Times (Singapore Edition) and ANI.

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