The ITER organization has revised both its English-language and French-language web sites to more accurately describe the goals of the ITER program, and to remove the misleading claim that the ITER reactor is designed to produce net energy.
The Old Regime
Six years ago, I requested the net energy correction through investigations published in New Energy Times and in my direct communications with ITER leadership, including Bernard Bigot, the former director-general of the ITER organization.
The ITER organization made limited corrections after I published the fact, on Oct. 6, 2017, that the ITER reactor as a whole was designed to consume at least 300 megawatts of electricity rather than 50 megawatts. But Bigot refused to withdraw the misleading energy claims from his organization’s Web site.
Four years later, Bigot falsely claimed during an Oct. 27, 2021, hearing of the French Senate’s Committee on Economic Affairs that the projected power gain for the overall reactor is between three and five times the power it is designed to consume. This claim was untrue because ITER has a projected electrical input of at least 300 MW (more likely 440 MW) and a projected thermal output of 500 MW. Bigot died on May 14, 2022.
The New Regime
On Sept. 14, 2022, the ITER Council appointed Bigot’s successor, Pietro Barabaschi. A month later, the ITER organization published a news story saying that Barabaschi intended to emphasize “collaboration and integrity.”
On Oct. 29, 2022, I wrote to...
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