On July 23 Russian president Vladimir Putin has signed the federal Law "Ratification of the Agreement for establishment of the International organization for thermonuclear power for the joint realization of ITER project and Agreement for privileges and immunities of ITER thermonuclear power organization for the joint realization of ITER project" adopted by the Gosduma on June 27 and approved by the Federation Council on July 6, 2007.
The Agreements were signed by countries-participants in Paris on November 21, 2006. These agreements created necessary international juridical basis for realization of International thermonuclear experimental reactor ITER, which will allow to establish scientific -technical basis for thermonuclear power engineering having practically unlimited fuel resources, high degree of safety and ecological purity. The aim of the project is to demonstrate scientific and technical possibility of peaceful use of thermonuclear power. This project is based on Tokamak system developed by Russian scientists for keeping high temperature plasma in magnetic field.
This project will be realized on the territory of European Union (France), because EU will pay up to 50% of the project's cost, obligating to prepare the site for construction including development of the necessary infrastructure. The contribution of Russia into ITER project will be 10% both at construction (deliveries of Russian made equipment) and operation stages.
Russia will have all access to full volume of scientific-technical information within the project.Participation of Russia in the project will allow keeping and fixing position of Russian science in the area of thermonuclear fusion, as well as provide training of scientific specialists for involvement in future both in realization of the future thermonuclear projects and in other areas of science and engineering.
Russia, European Union, India, China, USA, South Korea and Japan take part in the project with the total cost of USA $ 13 billion.
It has been decided to construct reactor in Cadarache (France), and management and data processing center in Rokkasho (Japan). The start-up of the first thermonuclear reactor with power of 500 MW is suggested in 10 years. The reactor will be operated by the above countries during 20 years.
Thermonuclear reactor uses energy of hydrogen and oxygen nuclei fusion, practically without radioactive waste. This fuel produces approximately 10 times more energy than oil or gas and approximately 100 times more energy than uranium nuclei fission.
According to opinion of academician Eugene Velikhov, commercial implementation of thermonuclear reactors can launch already in 20-25 years.
SOURCE: AtomInfo.Ru
DATE: July 26, 2007