The French President Emmanuel Macron and government leaders from China, Europe, India, Japan, Korea, Russia and the US today celebrated the start of work in assembling the components of what claims to be the ‘world’s largest nuclear fusion project’.

Fusion is the nuclear reaction, which powers the Sun and forms a potential source of non-carbon energy.

Launched in 2006 and located in Southern France, the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) planned to trial its first superheated plasma by 2020 and achieve full fusion by 2023.

A total of 35 nations are currently collaborating to build tokamak, a magnetic fusion device, which aims to prove the real potential of fusion as a large scale and carbon-free source of energy.

French President said: “There are moments when the nations of the world choose to overcome their differences to meet a particular moment in history. The decision to launch ITER, in the mid-2000s, was one of these moments. ITER is a promise of peace.”

In a statement, the Chinese President Xi Jinping, said: “The ITER project, one of the most important international scientific collaborations embodies the human desire for the peaceful use of fusion energy.”

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