Indian Firm Took Part In Building World’s 1st Fusion Reactor

Population growth has forced global demand for energy to skyrocket. Moreover, we understand that relying on fossil fuels isn’t sustainable.

So the solution is to find a limitless energy source that doesn’t harm our environment. What about the sun’s energy or any other star?

Compared to a chemical reaction like the burning of coal, gas, or oil, nuclear fusion can produce almost four million times more energy.

Organization ITER is trying to crack the mystery of how to attain energy with controlled fusion reactions.

Recently, it shared an update of the project, saying that it has accomplished an important milestone. Larsen & Toubro, an engineering major from India has done building the largest steel vacuum chamber in the world. The 3,800-tonne cryostat will play an important part in the ITER machine, the largest tokamak ever built.

In September 2012, the Indian Domestic Agency sent the contract for the ITER cryostat’s fabrication to Larsen & Toubro. Almost eight years later, the firm is ready to ship the final segments to ITER.

Parts that weigh around 650 tonnes will be shipped from India to France where the ITER site is located. Once these parts arrive in France, they will be assembled and welded. However, this is actually not the first shipment of Larsen & Toubro. Because of the component’s size, the firm had to go for a “three-stage, kit-like process,” involving the manufacturing of 54 segments.

Larsen & Toubro then shipped the segments to ITER in four large sections, including the base, the upper and lower cylinder, and the top lid. L&T has already handed over three sections of the cryostat to the ITER. On 26 May 2020, ITER installed the cryostat base in the Tokamak pit. Later in August this year, they will lower the lower cylinder into the pit.

ITER or the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor is a $23.7 billion project funded by 35 nations. The purpose of the reactor is to prove the feasibility of using fusion as a large-scale source of energy that is carbon-free.

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