Spain's Equipos Nucleares SA (Ensa) has been awarded a contract by Fusion For Energy (F4E) for the design, manufacture and delivery of four additional water detritiation tanks, part of the water detritiation system at the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (Iter) under construction at Cadarache in France. F4E, the organisaiton which manages Europe’s contribution to Iter, said the contract is valued at €1m ($1.07m) and the work is expected to take two years. When Iter starts operating, the detritation system will collect the water containing tritium in order to recover it and subsequently use it in future fusion reactions. In April 2016, six water detritiation tanks were installed at Iter – the first European components to arrive onsite and the first components of the Iter machine to be installed in the Tokamak complex, where the main systems of the biggest fusion device will be housed. According to F4E, the four new water detritiation tanks will be installed alongside the other six, also manufactured by Ensa. F4E said two of the tanks will have a capacity of seven cubic metres and will be used to store water. Two 12 cubic metre feeding will be used to feed the fuel cycle system with tritiated water.
