The UKAEA has launched a new tritium training course – taking place on 27 June 2023 – as part of its commitment to upskill the fusion industry.
United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) has launched a new tritium training course – taking place on 27 June 2023 – as part of its commitment to upskill the fusion industry. The course is being launched for the wider fusion industry following a successful pilot course in April, which was attended by a team from private fusion company, First Light Fusion.
Tritium is a likely fuel of future fusion powerplants, which will combine the hydrogen isotopes of deuterium and tritium to generate electricity. Managing, storing and supplying tritium fuel is vitally important for the commercialisation of fusion energy. UKAEA has been safely handling, processing and storing tritium for more than 40 years as part of its research into fusion energy. The course will cover tritium’s chemical properties, behaviours and safety factors, before delving into tritium fuel cycle stages. It will also include the processes and equipment required within a tritium plant.
Hayley Taylor, Tritium Training, Development and Recruitment Manager for UKAEA, said:
“UKAEA is committed to sharing our tritium knowledge to drive forward tritium research across the scientific and engineering community.
“Fusion energy has the potential to be a safe, low carbon and sustainable part of the world’s future energy supply. To make this happen, solutions must be found to address important challenges, such as supply, containment and quantification of tritium.”
UKAEA was pleased to recently host members of the First Light Fusion team for the successful pilot tritium training course.
Ryan Ramsey, Chief Operating Officer of First Light Fusion, said:
“We recognise that training creates future capability in our growing team. Some of the skill sets we need are exceptionally niche and it’s difficult to find organisations that can train them. Being part of the Fusion Cluster has enabled an increase in collaboration as we all search to solve the challenge of fusion.
“The training that UKAEA has provided has been really impressive and our team gained a great deal from the tritium course. The content matched what we needed and the delivery was engaging and focused. We’re looking forward to continuing this part of our broader relationship going forward.”
Course attendees can speak with and learn from UKAEA tritium experts and will experience a tour of UKAEA’s tritium processing plant – providing a unique opportunity to see the real-world application of what they have just learned in the training room. The one day, classroom-based course is applicable to industry, academia, start-ups, graduates, new starters, scientists, engineers and operators with a range of tritium knowledge. Organisations can also contact UKAEA to request bespoke sessions tailored to their areas of interest.
For more information about future course dates this Autumn and to sign up for the next course on Tuesday 27 June 2023, at UKAEA’s Culham Campus, please contact [email protected]
ENDS
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Photo caption: UKAEA tritium trainers with the First Light Fusion team participating in the successful pilot of the tritium training course at Culham Campus.
About United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority
United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) is the national research organisation responsible for the development of fusion energy.
Fusion energy has great potential to deliver safe, sustainable, low carbon energy for generations to come. It is based on the same processes that power the Sun and stars, and would form part of the world’s future energy mix. Achieving this is a major technical challenge that involves working at the forefront of science, engineering, and technology.
UKAEA’s programmes include the MAST-Upgrade (Mega Amp Spherical Tokamak) fusion experiment and the JET (Joint European Torus) fusion research facility, operated for scientists from around Europe in Culham, Oxford. STEP (Spherical Tokamak for Energy Production) is UKAEA’s ambitious programme to accelerate the delivery of fusion energy, with plans to deliver a prototype powerplant producing net electricity in the 2040s in Nottinghamshire.
UKAEA also undertakes cutting edge work with academia, other research organisations and the industrial supply chain in a wide spectrum of areas, including robotics and materials.
More information: https://www.gov.uk/ukaea. Social Media: @UKAEAofficial
About fusion energy
When a mix of two forms of hydrogen (deuterium and tritium) is heated to form a controlled plasma at extreme temperatures – 10 times hotter than the core of the sun – they fuse together to create helium and release energy which can be harnessed to produce electricity.
There is more than one way of achieving this. UKAEA’s approach is to hold this hot plasma using strong magnets in a ring-shaped machine called a ‘tokamak’. The energy created from fusion can be used to generate electricity in the same way as existing power stations.
