Euro Meeting Holds Key to ITER Project

摘要

Cambridge, U.K.—The clock is ticking toward midnight for the fragile coalition trying to build the $6 billion ITER fusion reactor. This fall research ministers from the European Union (E.U.) set a deadline of 26 November for a decision to begin building the reactor near the French town of Cadarache. But the six partners in ITER are not playing ball: They are currently split down the middle between Cadarache and Japan's proposed site at Rokkasho. Last week, at a meeting in Vienna, Austria, neither the E.U. nor Japan could persuade the other to back down despite both sides claiming to have made major concessions. E.U. officials say they are working to keep the collaboration together, but the ministers' deadline carries with it the implied threat that the E.U. could proceed without the support of all six partners. This week the E.U.'s executives met to prepare rec9mmendations to the ministers.