Guessing is not a strategy: How to build decision velocity with AI and real-time data
June 10, 2026 | Live Webinar
Categories: case study
Joseph Onstott, PMP, is the Budget and Cost Manager for the ITER project. He presented at Synergy, the PMI UK event for International Project Management Day, last week.
ITER was conceived in 1985 and is a global project with the aim of making fusion energy a reality. Fusion takes intense pressure and a temperature of 100 million degrees Centigrade to create a reaction, Onstott explained, so the technology is complex. In order to develop the technology to use in the power generation, a treaty was signed in 2006 between the EU, India, Japan, Korea, Russia, the US and China. “Sharing in the design and fabrication of components, each participating country could create its own infrastructure and propagate the technology around the world,” Onstott said.
The world uses enough energy per year to fill 28,218 supertankers. Per capital, that equals 24 light bulbs on for 24 hours a day every day but of course this energy consumption is not equally split. The US uses twice as much energy as the UK and 48 times as much energy as Bangladesh. As populations and incomes grow, and the developing nations expand their industrial horizons, world energy consumption will grow too. Onstott said that the prediction is that we’ll be using 50% more energy globally in 2030.
Currently most of our energy, 87% comes from fossil fuels (most of that is oil) and the remainder comes from nuclear power and other sources. Given that our reliance on oil is not durable, the fusion project aims to find an alternative way of creating energy – effectively by “bringing a star to Earth.”
A challenging project
The fusion project has a number of objectives.
Project objective:
- To demonstrate the scientific and technical feasibility of fusion power.
Technical objectives:
- To demonstrate the safety and environmental acceptance of fusion power
- To integrate and test all the components.
There are also a number of project management and technical challenges on a project of this size.
Distributed manufacturing
Each member country is responsible for a piece of the overall system (which when put together is called a tokamak – the machine that does the fusion). The correction coils are being built in China. The cryostat is coming from India and other bits are coming from other technical teams around the world.
Tight schedules
The timeline for the project is long. After signing the treaty in 2006, construction finally began in 2010. By the end of 2014 the design and infrastructure will be finalised. 2015-19 is the test and construction phase. The system will be activated in 2020, so we are some way off having our household energy needs being provided by fusion power.
That might not seem like a tight schedule, but every country has to get their contribution ready at the same time.
Seven party collaboration
The seven treaty signatory states all need to work together. “One of the greatest strengths as a project is the ability to tap into the scientific know-how of our seven members,” said Onstott. However, this is also a challenge as each member has their own staff, budget, links to government and must come together to agree objectives.
Budget
Between 2007 and 2025 Onstott estimates the total project budget will be €2.5bn. As Budget and Cost Manager, it’s his responsibility to manage this mammoth budget. However, he doesn’t know the overall cost of the project as members provide their contributions in kind. Europe has provided an estimate of €6bn, so using that to extrapoloate, Onstott feels that the whole fusion project will cost €13-17bn.
Complex design and challenging assembly
The unit will be 30m in diameter and about the same in height when it is built. So far the building to house the Tokamak is underway and 493 antiseismic supports (see photo) have been put in place to protect against earthquakes and shifts in the Earth’s crust. The coil building, which is where the tokamak will be put together, is complete. Prototypes have been built in various countries so that the design can be finalised and large scale mock-ups have also been put together.
“We’ve moved from finalising the requirements to detailed designs, and from prototyping to actual manufacturing,” Onstott said. At the moment this project is in the transition from design to construction. With so many cultural, social and technical challenges, it’s going to prove to be an interesting project to watch over the coming years.
Photo of seismic isolation pit (c) ITER.org
Posted on: November 03, 2012 08:57 AM |
Permalink