Tokyo

International negotiators met in Tokyo last week to discuss plans for the construction of ITER, the proposed magnetic-fusion energy experiment.

Among the topics discussed by delegates from the European Union, Russia, Canada and Japan at the two-day negotiations were procedures for selecting a site for the experiment and for procuring equipment.

The United States, which is considering rejoining the project (see Nature 415, 247; 2002), did not take part in the negotiations. But Robert Goldston, director of the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, the largest magnetic-fusion laboratory in the United States, did attend an associated symposium that was held to bolster public support for the project. “I hope the United States joins,” he says.

Whether Japan itself will offer to host the experiment remains unclear. In a preliminary report issued last December, the Council for Science and Technology Policy, Japan's highest scientific research body, reiterated its desire to host the project. The report said that this would cost Japan ¥700 billion (US$5 billion) over the first 10 years, for construction and operations. Japan's estimated cost of participation if the experiment is built elsewhere is ¥300 billion.

Within Japan, public support for nuclear energy has recently weakened (see Nature 411, 729; 2001), and anti-nuclear groups used the negotiations as an opportunity to raise concerns about ITER's safety and viability.

Japan's Ministry of Education, Science, Sports and Culture is still assessing two proposed sites for the facility. One of them, at Naka in Ibaraki, would be close to the Japan Atomic Energy Research Institute's existing nuclear-fusion facilities and quite close to Tokyo's main airport. The second site, at Rokkasho in Aomori, is on the northern tip of Japan's main island, where much of the country's nuclear waste is stored.

The ministry hopes to choose between the two sites before the next ITER meeting in Moscow on 19 March.