Last week, at our experimental facility HELCZA (High Energy Load Czech Assembly) in Plzeň, we started the next phase of testing the thermal resistance and cooling capabilities of the inner protective envelope of the ITER fusion reactor.
This reactor is being built by an international consortium in Cadarache, southern France. ITER is an experimental nuclear reactor that will verify the technological feasibility of energy production through nuclear fusion, which is widely regarded as a potential, long-term sustainable, emission-free energy source.
Following previous stages, where we successfully tested prototypes of the first wall panels and subsequently their advanced variants, we are now testing the so-called divertor. This part of the protective envelope will be exposed to higher thermal flux than the first wall panels during the operation of the ITER tokamak. This corresponds to a more demanding testing programme, in which the divertor will gradually be exposed to thermal flux of up to 20 MW/m². The divertor is also more complex in shape than the first wall panel, and therefore the HELCZA facility had to be adapted to new conditions.
We managed all necessary engineering work with our own design and technical capacities, and the subsequent production of newly designed components also took place in our experimental workshops in Řež. All this greatly contributed to the smooth preparation of the testing campaign and thus to the successful start of a new phase of cooperation with our long-term partners, Fusion for Energy and ITER Organization.
