Brussels, 28/06/2007 (Agence Europe) - On Thursday 28 June, Commissioner Janez Potocnik took part in a ceremony to inaugurate the headquarters of the new European Joint Undertaking for ITER and the Development of Fusion Energy, known as Fusion for Energy, based in Barcelona, Spain. The Barcelona-based joint undertaking has three main objectives: - supplying European contributions to the ITER international fusion energy project being built in Cadarache, France; - working with Japan on a number of projects to accelerate the development of fusion energy as part of an international agreement known as the Broader Approach; - and organising and coordinating a programme of activities for the first demonstration fusion reactors that can generate electricity. The joint undertaking will have a budget of around €4 billion for the first ten years. The agreement on where the body should be based and the availability of premises, which also sets the conditions for its activity and the status of its personnel, was signed today by the Spanish minister for science and education, Ms Mercedes Cabrera Calvo-Sotelo, and by Mr Potocnik. The signing ceremony was followed by an inaugural meeting of the joint undertaking's government board, which brings together representatives from Euratom, the EU member states and Switzerland, to ensure the overall supervision of Fusion for Energy's activities.
The ITER international fusion energy project involves 7 parties (the EU, China, Japan, South Korea, Russia, India and the United States), representing over half of the world's population. The reactor will be built in Europe (near Cadarache in southern France), and each of the seven parties has agreed to work together with their own industry and research organisations to develop and construct the various component parts needed for the reactor. Europe, as the party hosting ITER, will contribute around half of the components. The international agreement establishing the project was signed in Paris in November 2006. (oj)