London

Europe's attempt to build the world's most powerful particle accelerator was plunged into crisis this week as project managers admitted that it faces cost overruns of several hundred million dollars.

Running short: CERN may turn to its member states for the cash to finish the Large Hadron Collider. Credit: CERN

CERN, the European particle physics laboratory, where the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is being built, will face years of budget cuts and belt-tightening as a result of the overruns, its management told staff. But this will cover only a fraction of the extra costs, and CERN is preparing to take the awkward step of asking its 20 member states to cover the rest.

Scheduled to open in 2006, the LHC is intended to be the world's next major high-energy physics facility. But the technical challenge of designing and building the superconducting magnets needed to steer protons and ions through the LHC's accelerators has proven more difficult — and expensive — than CERN expected. Problems with such magnets contributed to the 1993 demise of the US Superconducting Supercollider.

CERN says that the higher costs of the magnets, together with greater installation and civil engineering costs, have put the core project some SFr480 million (US$300 million) over its original SFr2.6 billion budget. But scientists at CERN who have been briefed on the situation say it could cost at least SFr3.4 billion — SFr800 million more than initially planned — to get the LHC up and running. Prototype magnets already built have cost the laboratory about SFr150 million more than it expected, and some SFr220 million extra must also be found to install detectors and to pay for computers.

CERN now has until 7 November to come up with a rescue plan to present to its finance committee, made up of representatives from the European countries funding the facility. “The organization is reviewing various possible options including cuts in the scientific programme, reductions in spending within the organization, bank loans and extra contributions from member states,” says Neil Calder, a spokesman for CERN.

At a crisis meeting of staff and users on 1 October, CERN director-general Luciano Maiani said that the organization was aiming for 10% cost reductions across all divisions. “Basically we're looking at austerity measures over the next few years to pick up the slack,” says one CERN researcher.

Some researchers expressed unhappiness that they first learned of the problems from an article in a local newspaper. Their irritation is shared by the CERN member governments who are paying for the project.

A spokesman for the Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council, which pays Britain's annual £65-million (US$96-million) subscription to CERN, says that the situation is “potentially very serious”. But he says he will wait for the November meeting before commenting on the possible implications for British physics and astronomy.