CNCP organized a visit to the British and European Scientific Centre at Culham
for top-management of the Kazakhstan National Nuclear Centre, Kurchatov, July 2008
British Tokamak Experience
From July 20-28, 2008, CNCP organized a visit to the British and European Scientific Centre at Culham for top-management of the Kazakhstan
National Nuclear Centre (City of Kurchatov). The main goals of the tour were to get acquainted with the JET and MAST tokamaks, and to discuss
technical and organizational areas of potential cooperation.
Representatives of the National Nuclear Centre (NNC) learned about experience in experiment planning and international cooperation based
on fusion facilities, and technical peculiarities of fusion machine launching and operation, and discussed the possibilities for internships
for Kazakh specialists. Each day was packed with tours and meetings with nuclear centre specialists. These were held in a friendly atmosphere
and turned out to be very valuable for the specialists from the Nuclear Energy Institute, which is currently installing the Kazakh Tokamak
for Material Studies (KTM). KTM start-up, work arrangements, the operation of diagnostic systems, along with potential interaction in the
framework of European tokamak research programmes were discussed.
The Culham specialists showed their guests the control panels for the JET and MAST facilities, shared video-materials and reports, and
outlined their most important results in fusion. The delegates, in their turn, explained the role of NNC and the state of progress with
KTM. They discussed research on materials carried out in Kazakhstan under the international ITER Programme and the possibilities for joint
projects with Culham and the European EFDA Programme.
The delegation visited the JET and MAST tokamaks; during their tour. They learned about the special technical solutions required for
different systems, and visited the JET division, which specializes in tritium processing. The group was amazed by the remote-control
manipulator used for inter-chamber work in the JET machine. The parties talked about the possibilities for measuring ion temperatures in
the central part of KTM plasma discharge, using a high resolution spectrometer, and wireless data transmission from sensors located on the
KTM diverter. They also learned about methods of conditioning KTM’s vacuum chamber, drawing on experience of similar operations in JET, and
studied master Culham’s master programming codes with a view to using them in preparation for KTM’s launch.
During the visit the issues of mutually benefi cial cooperation in the framework of the intergovernmental agreement between Euratom and
Kazakhstan on controlled fusion were discussed.
Despite the short time available for the group to digest a huge amount of information and to make useful contacts, the delegates were
very pleased with the first visit, which was efficiently organized by CNCP. Valuable experience was gained during the tour of the Culham
Centre, potential cooperation was discussed and future steps were planned. Only integration into the international scientific environment will
save KTM from becoming a very expensive, but little used piece of equipment, and will guarantee orders for research and provide opportunities
to create sustainable and prestigious jobs for highly qualified specialists, including former nuclear staff.
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