Oxfordshire scheme set to begin later this year
Construction on a new nuclear fusion demonstrator is set to begin later this year after designs for the south Oxfordshire facility were green lit by planners.
Plans for the building at Culham Science Centre were drawn up by Amanda Levete’s practice AL_A in collaboration with Canadian firm General Fusion, Canadian engineer Hatch and Arup.
The building’s translucent fabric wraps around the 38m high, concrete, cylindrical fusion hall at the centre of the facility, which houses General Fusion’s magnetised target fusion machine.
Daylit, naturally ventilated office spaces, workshops and laboratories are arranged in a loop around the fusion hall, allowing views into fusion and out onto green spaces.
The building, which is aiming for BREEAM excellent accreditation, will use waste heat from the fusion process to warm the building and sits within a generous, biodiverse landscape.
The 10,500 sq m demonstration project will create fusion conditions in a power plant-type environment but at 70% of the scale of a commercial plant.
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