Technical Benefit of an International Project

One critical issue examined in the present phase of the International Tokamak Reactor (INTOR) has been an evaluation of the technical benefit of dividing up the design and component production tasks of all major advanced technologies among all participants. Two approaches were evaluated: (a) a “splitting” approach in which each country provides 1/4 of the components of each major system (e.g., 3 of 12 TF coils), (b) a “branching” approach in which each country provides all components of selected major systems (e.g., first country provides all TF coils, second country provides all torus sectors, etc.). Quantitative cost and schedule estimates were developed for each of the two approaches and compared to the cost and schedule of the entire device if it were produced only by one country. The results of the U.S. evaluation indicated that the ratio of total estimated cost to the “national” cost was 1.66 for “splitting” and 1.20 for “branching.” The cost per participant was 0.41 and 0.30, respectively. The increase in the construction schedule was estimated to be 2.6 years.