On November, 21 Paris local time, The representatives of the 7 parties including EU, the USA, Russia, Japan, South Korea, China and India officially signed the relevant Agreements on the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) Plan at the Elysee Palace of the French President, thus ushering this scientific cooperative project into the implementation stage in mankind's history of science and technology, which is only of secondary importance to the international space station project.

French President Jacques Chirac personally hosted the signing ceremony on that day. In his speech, President Chirac highly commended the future and true significance of the ITER Plan and the efforts made by the relevant countries, saying this is a pioneering undertaking in the history of mankind.  EU President Jose Manuel Barnoso was also present at the signing ceremony.  Xu Guanhua, Chinese Minister of Science and Technology signed the relevant agreements on behalf of the Chinese Government.  In his speech, Xu said: "The official signing of the ITER Plan" is a historic moment as well as a new milestone for all the countries in the world to seek ways of resolving, through cooperation, the energy and environment issues confronted by the human beings and for the realization of sustained development of mankind.  He also said that not long ago, China's self researched and manufactured all-super Daotuoka Mark EAST nuclear experimental set-up had been successfully debugged and generated.  As this set-up has some similarities with the ITER in appearance, its operation will make contribution to the early state research and development of the international thermonuclear plan. 

In 1985, proposed by the heads of government of the United States and the Soviet Union and approved by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the ITER Plan was established.

The ITER Construction was first jointly undertaken by Russia, Japan, the US and Europe.  In February 2003, China announced that it will take part in the negotiation of the plan in the capacity of a full-authority independent member.

In May this year, the "Agreement on the Establishment of an International Organization for the Joint Implementation of the ITER Plan" was jointly initiated by the representatives of the 7 related parties of the ITER Plan.

The total cost of this project is estimated at US$9.9 billion, of which, EU will bear 50 percent and the six parties will bear 10 percent each.  The exceeding part will be used to cope with the budget over-expenditure caused by price factors in the process of construction.  As a reward, all the participating parties are entitled to all the scientific research results and intellectual property of the project on a full and equal footing.

2006-11-28

2006-11-28