The delegate of the Government of Spain in Andalusia, Pedro Fernández, accompanied by the Mayor Escúzar, Antonio Arrabal; of Granada, Francisco Cuenca; the President of the Provincial Council of Granada, José Entrena, and the subdelegate in the province, Inmaculada López Calsalvo, visited today the lands where the Ministry of Science is working since last September for the construction of the scientific complex of clean energy IFMIF-DONES (International Fusion Materials Irradiation Facility -Demo Oriented Neutron Source), “a place that will host the next scientific meeting”.
“It will be from that moment on that hiring begins to start the construction of the largest scientific facility in Spain and one of the main international projects, which will also attract talent of very high qualification and foresees the creation of around 1,000 jobs in Granada, 400 of them researchers,” said Fernández during the visit to the works, “which since 2018 have had the unconditional support of the Government of Spain for this to be the unique European candidacy, with the support of Croatia and with Japan as the only natural competitor of the project,” he added.
March 16 is a “key date” in this project, as the delegate has described, since the Minister of Science and Innovation, Diana Morant, has convened the steering committee, that is, 13 countries of the European Union, a representative of Euratom and Japan, who will treat in the Carmen de los Mártires their participation in the particle accelerator.
The scientific infrastructure under the Ministry of Science and Innovation will be unique in the world and will serve to identify, test and certify materials to be used in future fusion power plants. In Granada, materials will be tested that can withstand the extreme conditions to which the components of the future ITER fusion reactor will be exposed, a project that supports around thirty countries, such as China, the United States or Russia.
The works of the facilities associated with the accelerator, which began on September 20, have a budget of 11.5 million euros and an execution time of 12 months. Three buildings are planned, in addition to the urbanization of a part of the polygon. The first of these, the Administration and Visits, will have an area of about 6,000 m2 dedicated to offices, multipurpose rooms and an auditorium, and will be able to house up to 160 jobs, which will be occupied in the coming years by scientific, technical and administrative staff of IFMIF-DONES.
For its part, the multipurpose warehouse, of about 1,200 m2, will have a clear nave that will house equipment and materials during the construction of the installation and later will serve for the spare equipment. It could also temporarily house some laboratories that IFMIF-DONES will need to set up before having its final location in other buildings of the complex.
In addition, the access control building will be built, which, together with the urbanization of the area of action, will allow to have a sector of the complex fully operational since the end of 2023.
IFMIF-DONES project
IFMIF-DONES is part of the EU’s ambitious programme to develop fusion as an energy source, in an international partnership that includes partners from ITER (International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor). It is also a fundamental pillar for the European objective of building a Fusion Electrical Production Demonstration Plant (DEMO) in the middle of this century.
The estimated construction and start-up budget of IFMIF-DONES is 700 million euros. In addition, the operating cost will be 50 million per year over the lifetime of the facility. Spain has committed itself to financing 50% of the construction cost and 10% of the operating cost.
On November 17, the governments of Spain and Croatia agreed to strengthen collaboration in this project, to which the Croatian minister Radovan Fuchs committed 5% of the funding.
The Government of Spain has already allocated 16 million euros of European ERDF funds to advance the construction of buildings and laboratories of general interest, which will support the future IFMIF-DONES installation.
This project would involve the creation of more than 1,000 jobs in Granada alone, 400 of them of high-level scientific and technical personnel from all parts of the world, which would contribute to the revitalization of the territory and the fight against depopulation.