Expensive Iteration昂贵的循环

Expensive Iteration


昂贵的循环

A huge international fusion-reactor project faces funding difficulties

工程浩大的国际核聚变反应堆正面临资金困难

Jul 22nd 2010

VIABLE nuclear fusion has been only 30 years away since the idea was first mooted in the 1950s. Its latest three-decade incarnation is ITER, a joint effort by the European Union (EU), America, China, India, Japan, Russia and South Korea to construct a prototype reactor on a site in Cadarache, France, by 2018. If all goes to plan, in about 30 years it will be reliably producing more energy than is put in.

自从核聚变的概念在上世纪50年代提出以来，切实可行的核聚变技术才仅30年历史。这三十载努力的化身就是最近的国际热核聚变实验反应堆（ITER），它是由欧盟、美国、中国、印度、日本、俄罗斯和韩国合作计划在2018年前在法国Cadarache建造一座核聚变反应堆原型。如果一切按照计划运行，在未来三十年时间里它将稳定可靠地提供比输入更多的能量。

The International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor became plain ITER following public anxiety about anything that has "thermonuclear" next to "experimental" in its name. ITER aims to produce energy by fusing together the nuclei of hydrogen atoms, confined in a magnetic field at high temperatures―a process akin to that which powers the sun.

因为公众对在"热核聚变"旁边带有"实验"字眼的任何东西都感到恐慌，这座"国际热核聚变实验反应堆"后来被缩写为其貌不扬的ITER。ITER的目标是通过使约束在强磁场内部的高温氢原子核发生聚变而产生能量――这个过程跟太阳的供能方式很相似。

For all its cosmic ambition, ITER has run into the earthiest of difficulties: spiralling costs. The project was never going to be cheap. Initial projections in 2006 put its price at �0 billion ($13 billion): � billion to build and another � billion to run and decommission the thing. Since then construction costs alone have tripled.

尽管有着不同凡响的目标，ITER却面临着尘世间最世俗的困难：不断上升的花销。这项工程本来就造价不菲，2006年的初期估价为100亿欧元（折合美元130亿）：50亿欧元用于建造，另外50亿欧元用于日常运营以及最终退役。但自此光建造费用就已是预期的三倍。

As the host, the EU is committed to covering some 45% of these, with the other partners contributing about 9% each. In May the European Commission, the EU's executive branch, asked member states to stump up an additional �.4 billion to tide the project over to 2013. They rejected the request and suggested instead tapping the EU's existing research budget.

作为东道主的欧盟承诺担当大约45%的花销，其他参加合作的国家则每国承担大约9%。今年五月，欧盟的行政机构欧盟委员会要求其成员国为额外的14亿欧元掏腰包以帮助该计划顺利渡过2013年前的困难期。其成员国不但拒绝了这个不情之请，反而建议欧盟削减既有的研究经费。

On July 20th the commission offered a compromise: one-third of the shortfall would come from cash earmarked for other research, the rest from unspent agricultural funds.

7月20日，欧盟委员会提出了一个折中方案：缺口的三分之一将来自为其他研究领域专拨的现金，其余部分来自尚未花完的农业资金。

Such a proposal may yet be scuppered by EU governments. Nor has it entirely mollified European scientists who rightly fear that ITER will eat indiscriminately into other programmes. This comes at a time when most European governments are slashing spending on science as part of larger efforts to plug budget deficits.

即使是这样一个折中方案也有可能因被欧盟各国政府否决而泡汤。这个方案也没有宽慰那些合理担忧ITER工程会不分青红皂白蚕食其他研究项目经费的欧洲科学家。尤其是这个方案正赶上欧盟各国为了响应更大范围的封堵财政漏洞的努力而削减科研经费支出的时候。

The proposal also needs approval from the European Parliament. Some Green MEPs have called for ITER to be ditched altogether, and its finances diverted to less grandiose ventures. A decision is unlikely in time for a meeting of ITER's governing body on July 27th and 28th, when the project's scope and cost are to be discussed.

这个方案同样需要来自欧盟议会的审批同意。一些绿党议员甚至已经开始要求将ITER项目连窝端掉，并将其资金投入到更切合实际的项目上。旨在讨论ITER项目广度和花费的项目主管部门会议即将于7月27日和28日召开，要赶在此时做出最终决定的可能性并不高。

Unfazed by budgetary wobbles, Fusion for Energy, ITER's European arm, has begun in earnest to divvy out construction work. On July 19th a consortium led by Iberdrola, a Spanish engineering giant, signed a �56m contract to build "winding packs"―massive reactor components that each weigh about 110 tonnes, as much as a jumbo jet.

不过ITER的欧洲分部核聚变能源并没有受到摇摆不定的财政预算的影响，并已郑重其事地开始分配建造任务。7月19日由西班牙工程设计领域的一家大型公司伊维尔德罗拉（Iberdrola）率领的财团签署了一份价值1.56亿欧元的合同，将承包建造每个都有大型喷气式飞机般重量的重达110吨的大型反应堆部件"绕线组"。

This testifies to the project's technical daring. But the commissioning of these parts also illustrates one of its biggest flaws. The European consortium will build only ten of the planned 19 winding packs; the remaining nine will be forged independently by a Japanese contractor.

这就足以证明该项工程在技术设计上之大胆。但是这些部件的测试也显露出了其最严重的缺陷。这家欧洲财团仅将建造计划中19座绕线组中的10座，其余的9座将由一家日本承包商独立锻造。

Unlike the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), another huge international physics experiment near Geneva, ITER does not pool its funds. Instead, each partner orders bits and bobs, typically from compatriots, hoping that everything will dovetail nicely in Cadarache. Moreover, some parties have not got what they had hoped for out of the project, notably Japan, which had wanted to host the reactor. So it has been promised a sweetener in the form of a smaller reactor and a supercomputer. All this is a recipe for duplication.

跟热内瓦附近的另一项大型国际实验物理工程大型强子对撞机（LHC）不同，ITER并不由参与国共同集资。与之相反，每个合作方独自定购相应的部件，而且基本都是从其母国定购，然后指望着在Cadarache所有的部件都能够完美地契合起来。此外，有些参与方并没有从这个项目中得到所期望得到的东西，尤其是日本，其本希望成为该反应堆的东道主的。现在作为聊以安慰的甜头，日本被许诺负责建造一座更小型的反应堆以及一台超级计算机。所有这些也都发生在其他国家身上。

Cost overruns are common in projects as complex as ITER or the LHC. Loosening the purse-strings for energy research and development surely makes sense: government spending on energy research has been falling since the early 1980s, both as a share of GDP and as a proportion of total research budgets, according to the International Energy Agency.

对于像ITER和LHC这样复杂的工程项目来说预算超支是很普遍的，为能源技术研发而掏腰包当然也是可以理解的。根据国际能源署，自从上世纪80年代以来政府在能源研究上的经费一直在减少，不管是从占GDP比例还是从占总研究经费的百分比来看。

That said, it is far from clear whether the best way of countering this trend in energy funding is to plough yet more money into the fusion project, with its vested political interests, at the expense of less prominent scientific endeavours.

总之，应付能源研究经费下降趋势的现状的最好措施是否是在其目前所拥有的各种政治优惠下以牺牲一部分杰出的科学研究成果为代价，仍不断地往核聚变项目耙更多的资金，我们还远远不能下确定的结论