The seven international partners in the multibillion dollar ITER fusion energy project initialed an agreement in late May to begin construction of the facility in Cadarache, France, early next year. After the US Congress and the governments of the other participating nations approve the preliminary agreement, a final pact is expected to be signed on 29 November, with the eight-year construction process beginning a few months later.
Raymond Orbach, the new Undersecretary for Science at the US Department of Energy, and representatives of the six other ITER partners—the European Union, Japan, China, India, South Korea, and Russia—initialed the agreement in Brussels, Belgium. Orbach, who has been a strong advocate for ITER since joining DOE as director of the Office of Science in 2002, was passionate in discussing the implications of the agreement, and the eventual importance of fusion energy.
Calling the signing “a momentous occasion in the history of science,”...
