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FUSION: THE WORLD’S MOST 

COMPLEX ENERGY PROJECT 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY 

COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE, AND 

TECHNOLOGY 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

JULY 11, 2014 

Serial No. 113–85 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology 

( 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://science.house.gov 
(II) 

COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE, AND TECHNOLOGY 

HON. LAMAR S. SMITH, Texas, Chair 

DANA ROHRABACHER, California 

RALPH M. HALL, Texas 

F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR., 

Wisconsin 

FRANK D. LUCAS, Oklahoma 

RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas 

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas 

PAUL C. BROUN, Georgia 

STEVEN M. PALAZZO, Mississippi 

MO BROOKS, Alabama 

RANDY HULTGREN, Illinois 

LARRY BUCSHON, Indiana 

STEVE STOCKMAN, Texas 

BILL POSEY, Florida 

CYNTHIA LUMMIS, Wyoming 

DAVID SCHWEIKERT, Arizona 

THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky 

KEVIN CRAMER, North Dakota 

JIM BRIDENSTINE, Oklahoma 

RANDY WEBER, Texas 

CHRIS COLLINS, New York 

BILL JOHNSON, Ohio 

EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois 

DONNA F. EDWARDS, Maryland 

FREDERICA S. WILSON, Florida 

SUZANNE BONAMICI, Oregon 

ERIC SWALWELL, California 

DAN MAFFEI, New York 

ALAN GRAYSON, Florida 

JOSEPH KENNEDY III, Massachusetts 

SCOTT PETERS, California 

DEREK KILMER, Washington 

AMI BERA, California 

ELIZABETH ESTY, Connecticut 

MARC VEASEY, Texas 

JULIA BROWNLEY, California 

ROBIN KELLY, Illinois 

KATHERINE CLARK, Massachusetts 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY

HON. CYNTHIA LUMMIS, Wyoming, Chair 

RALPH M. HALL, Texas 

FRANK D. LUCAS, Oklahoma 

RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas 

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas 

RANDY HULTGREN, Illinois 

THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky 

KEVIN CRAMER, North Dakota 

RANDY WEBER, Texas 

LAMAR S. SMITH, Texas 

ERIC SWALWELL, California 

ALAN GRAYSON, Florida 

JOSEPH KENNEDY III, Massachusetts 

MARC VEASEY, Texas 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois 

KATHERINE CLARK, Massachusetts 

EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas 
(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

July 11, 2014 

Page 

Witness List ............................................................................................................. 2 

Hearing Charter ...................................................................................................... 3 

Opening Statements 

Statement by Representative Cynthia Lummis, Chairman, Subcommittee on 

Energy, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives ........................................................................................................... 6 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 6 

Statement by Representative Eric Swalwell, Minority Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Energy, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. 

House of Representatives .................................................................................... 6 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 8 

Statement by Representative Lamar S. Smith, Chairman, Committee on 

Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives ..................... 9 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 10 

Statement by Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson, Ranking Member, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives .... 10 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 11 

Witnesses: 

Dr. Frank Rusco, Director, Natural Resources and Environment, GAO 

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 12 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 15 

Dr. Patricia Dehmer, Deputy Director for Science Programs, DOE 

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 26 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 28 

Dr. Robert Iotti, ITER Council Chair 

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 35 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 37 

Dr. Ned Sauthoff, Director, U.S. ITER Project, Oak Ridge National Laboratory 

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 44 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 47 

Discussion ................................................................................................................. 60 

Appendix I: Answers to Post-Hearing Questions 

Dr. Pat Dehmer, Deputy Director for Science Programs, DOE ........................... 76 

Appendix II: Additional Material for the Record 

Letter submitted for the record by Representative Lamar S. Smith, Chairman, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives ........................................................................................................... 78 

(1) 

FUSION: THE WORLD’S MOST 

COMPLEX ENERGY PROJECT 

FRIDAY, JUNE 11, 2014 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY, 

COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE, AND TECHNOLOGY, 

Washington, D.C. 

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 9:03 a.m., in Room 

2318 of the Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Cynthia Lummis 

[Chairwoman of the Subcommittee] presiding. 
2 
3 
4 
5 
6 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Good morning. The Subcommittee on Energy will come to order. Welcome to today’s hearing, entitled ‘‘Fusion: The World’s Most Complex Energy Project,’’ which a week ago 

I didn’t even know existed, and now I feel pretty well informed 

about this. In front of you are packets containing the written testimony, biographies, and truth in testimony disclosures for today’s 

witnesses. And I now recognize myself for an opening statement. 

In order to ensure that everybody gets to ask questions, I am going 

to keep my statement brief, because we anticipate that we are 

going to have votes in about 70 minutes. 

I want to welcome everyone to today’s hearing on the Department of Energy, Fusion Energy Sciences program, specifically focused on the United States participation in the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor, also known as ITER. Today the 

Energy Subcommittee will discuss the projected costs and schedule 

associated with ITER, as well as the massive potential that fusion 

energy represents. 

This project is one of the most complex scientific and engineering 

undertakings in history. As we will hear today, ITER has, and continues to face, management challenges, lacks a credible schedule, 

and the United States program needs a reliable budget. This Committee has an oversight responsibility to ensure that the United 

States efficiently accomplishes its obligations in accordance with 

the ITER agreement, and that the ITER organization continues to 

remain a solid investment. 

We have an excellent panel of witnesses to testify on the history, 

challenges, and proposed solutions associated with ITER. I want to 

thank our witnesses for participating in today’s hearing, and look 

forward to their testimony. 

[The prepared statement of Mrs. Lummis follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF SUBCOMMITTEE CHAIRMAN CYNTHIA LUMMIS

Good morning. In an effort to ensure that all Members are able to ask their questions I will keep my statement brief. 

I would like to welcome everyone to today’s hearing on the Department of Energy’s Fusion Energy Sciences program, specifically focusing on the United States’ 

participation in the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor, also known 

as ‘‘ITER.’’ 

Today, the Energy Subcommittee will discuss the projected costs and schedule associated with ITER as well as the massive potential that fusion energy represents. 

This project is one of the most complex scientific and engineering undertakings in 

history—and as we will hear today, ITER has and continues to face management 

challenges, lacks a credible schedule, and the United States’ program needs a reliable budget. 

This Committee has an oversight responsibility to ensure that the United States 

efficiently accomplishes its obligations in accordance with the ITER agreement—and 

that the ITER organization continues to remain a solid investment. 

We have an excellent panel of witnesses to testify on the history, challenges, and 

proposed solutions associated with ITER. I want to thank the witnesses for participating in today’s hearing and look forward to their testimony 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. I now recognize the Ranking Member, the 

gentleman from California, Mr. Swalwell, for an opening statement. 

Mr. SWALWELL. Thank you, Chairman Lummis, for holding this 

hearing, and I also want to thank our excellent panel of witnesses 

for being here this morning. 
7 

Fusion holds the promise of providing a practically limitless supply of clean energy to the world. We are actually already dependent 

upon it every day from that great energy source in the sky, the fusion reactor in the sky, better known as the sun. It is essential to 

the existence—for life here on Earth for all of us. And, of course, 

it is a bit trickier for people to replicate what the stars are able 

to do with sheer gravity. 

But from my conversations with some of the top fusion researchers across the world, not just at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, which is in my Congressional District, and their National 

Ignition Facility, which I happen to represent, I have learned that 

the support of fusion energy research is something that is critical 

at this day and age, and now is the right time to build and operate 

experiments that can finally demonstrate that a man-made fusion 

system can consistently produce far more energy than it takes to 

fuel it. 

For the magnetic fusion approach, the next step is clearly ITER. 

ITER is designed to produce at least 10 times the energy it consumes, and would be the first experiment of its kind that enables 

us to provide researchers the opportunity to explore and test the 

behavior of a system where the fusion process itself provides the 

primary heat source to sustain its high fusion reaction rate, also 

called a burning plasma. As discussed in a seminal report by the 

National Academies entitled, ‘‘Burning Plasma, Bringing a Star to 

Earth’’, as well as subsequent reports, this experiment is absolutely 

essential to proving that magnetically confined fusion can be a viable clean energy source. 

That said, I have several concerns, which I hope we can address 

in this hearing. By all accounts, the U.S. ITER Project Office, 

under the direction of Dr. Ned Sauthoff, who is here today, is very 

well managed, and doing everything it can to contain costs, and 

maintain an aggressive schedule. I am also concerned about the administration’s proposed $225 million cap on annual funding for the 

U.S. contribution to ITER, which they have justified solely by saying that this allows sufficient funding for the remainder of the Office of Science’s fusion program. 

This justification, however, falsely assumes that the administration couldn’t simply request a higher budget for fusion in a particular year as it does for other programs when they have projects 

with significant cost profiles. The $225 million cap was not based 

on a bottom up project estimate that minimizes the total cost for 

the U.S. ITER contribution, but, rather, a political calculation, and 

this level falls well below what is necessary to optimize the project 

schedule, and minimize the cost to taxpayers. 

Given the critical importance of ITER to determining the viability of fusion as a clean energy source, and the major contributions 

of U.S. researchers to advancing the science and engineering of the 

field up to this point, I maintain strong support for this project, 

along with other key components of the broader U.S. based fusion 

research program. 

However, this does not mean, of course, that we can provide an 

unconditional blank check. The U.S. must maintain vigorous oversight, and use every means available, with our international partners, to contain costs and schedule, all while keeping an unwaver-
8 

ing focus on achieving the project’s incredibly important goals for 

our world’s energy future. 

Thank you, and I yield back the balance of my time. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Swalwell follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF SUBCOMMITTEE MINORITY RANKING MEMBER ERIC

SWALWELL

Thank you Chairman Lummis for holding this hearing, and I also want to thank 

this excellent panel of witnesses for their testimony and for being here today. 

Fusion holds the promise of providing a practically limitless supply of clean energy to the world. We’re actually already dependent on it—the energy we get from 

that fusion reactor in the sky, better known as the sun, is essential to the existence 

of life on Earth, including us. Of course, it’s a bit trickier for people to replicate 

what the stars are able to do with sheer gravity. But from my conversations with 

some of the top fusion researchers in the world—and not just at Lawrence Livermore’s National Ignition Facility, which I happen to represent - I believe we’re getting there. This is why I am such a strong supporter of fusion energy research, and 

I believe that now is the right time to build and operate experiments that can finally demonstrate that a man-made fusion system can consistently produce far more 

energy than it takes to fuel it. 

For the magnetic fusion approach, that next step is clearly ITER. ITER is designed to produce at least ten times the energy it consumes, and would be the first 

experiment of its kind that enables our researchers to explore and test the behavior 

of a system where the fusion process itself provides the primary heat source to sustain its high fusion reaction rate, also called a ‘‘burning plasma.’’ As discussed in 

a seminal report by the National Academies entitled Burning Plasma-Bringing a 

Star to Earth, as well as subsequent reports, this experiment is absolutely essential 

to proving that magnetically confined fusion can be a viable clean energy source. 

That said, I have several concerns which I hope we can address in this hearing. 

By all accounts, the U.S. ITER Project Office, under the direction of Dr. Ned 

Sauthoff who is here today, is very well managed and doing everything it can to 

contain costs and maintain an aggressive schedule. But the 2013 ITER Management 

Assessment to the project’s governing ITER Council found serious issues with the 

international organization’s management practices, including an overall ‘‘lack of urgency’’ to complete the project on time and on budget due to various cultural and 

accounting practices among a number of the project’s partners. I’m told that the new 

ITER Council Chair, Dr. Robert Iotti, who is also here today, is taking this Assessment very seriously, and working to adopt its recommendations and address the 

issues that the review identified. I look forward to learning more about Dr. Iotti’s 

progress toward these goals shortly. I am also concerned about the Administration’s 

proposed $225 million cap on annual funding for the U.S. contribution to ITER, 

which they have justified solely by stating that this allows sufficient funding for the 

remainder of the Office of Science’s fusion program. This justification, however, 

falsely assumes that the Administration couldn’t simply request a higher budget for 

fusion in a particular year, as it does for other programs when they have projects 

with significant construction cost profiles. The $225 million cap was not based on 

a bottom-up project estimate that minimizes the total cost for the U.S. ITER contribution, but rather a political calculation. 

This level falls well below what is necessary to optimize the project schedule and 

minimize the total cost to taxpayers. As I believe both Dr. Sauthoff and Dr. Dehmer 

would agree, such underfunding inevitably leads to larger total project costs because 

the highly skilled teams required for management and construction of our components are essentially ‘‘standing armies’’ that need significant annual resources even 

if budget reductions force the project schedule to be extended. Moreover, even 

though some other ITER partners are not currently meeting their deadlines, my understanding is that much of what the U.S. is responsible for is or can be decoupled 

from their activities. So we could have a far more aggressive, cost-effective schedule 

to fabricate our components and have them stored until they are ready to be integrated into the reactor complex. I look forward to discussing the potential for this 

path forward with the panel as well. 

Given the critical importance of ITER to determining the viability of fusion as a 

clean energy source, and the major contributions of U.S. researchers to advancing 

the science and engineering of the field to this point, I maintain strong support for 

this project along with the other key components of the broader U.S.-based fusion 

research program. However, this does not mean we can support an unconditional 
9 

blank check. The U.S. must maintain vigorous oversight and use every means available with our international partners to contain cost and schedule, all while keeping 

an unwavering focus on achieving the project’s incredibly important goals for our 

and the world’s energy future. 

Thank you, and with that I yield back the balance of my time. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. I thank Mr. Swalwell, and now recognize 

the Chairman of the full Committee, Mr. Smith. 

Chairman SMITH. Thank you, Madam Chair. Let me say at the 

outset that I appreciate the concerns expressed by you and the 

Ranking Member, and I happen to agree with them as well. 

Madam Chair, the Energy Subcommittee will hear from a panel 

of experts with collectively over a century of experience in science 

and engineering. We look forward to their testimony, and the prospects of nuclear fusion as a future energy source. 

Fusion energy research attempts to achieve an invaluable reward 

for humankind, a sustainable, renewable, zero emissions energy 

source. It also represents one of the greatest scientific challenges 

in history. This scientific undertaking of creating the power source 

of a star on Earth will require persistence and commitment. The 

next step towards achieving this goal is the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor, called ITER. And, by the way, I 

hope someone will explain why we don’t call it ITER, even though 

I know we commonly accept it as ITER. 

The Obama Administration has chosen to underfund ITER in its 

Fiscal Year 2015 request. Instead of adequately supporting ITER, 

which could eventually lead to global energy security, the administration’s budget request cuts this project by $50 million. The Administration instead prioritizes late stage, unreliable renewable energy, such as wind and solar. Fusion energy is in the early stages 

of research, but experts predict that it could someday provide a solution to the challenges of climate change. This is because fusion 

energy has the potential to power the world for millions of years, 

is reliable, and yields zero carbon emissions. Still, the Administration refuses to adequately support this science. 

Depriving the U.S. ITER program of the funds it needs to accomplish its goals is not good policy. To maintain our competitive advantage, we must continue to support fundamental basic research 

that encourages the creation and design of next generation technologies. Fusion energy is the sort of high risk, high reward research that will benefit future generations, if we are bold enough 

to pursue it. 

Thank you, Madam Chair, but before I yield back, I would like 

unanimous consent to put into the record a letter from the American Security Project, which highlights fusion energy’s importance 

for innovation and global energy security. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Without objection, so ordered. 

[The information apperas in Appendix II] 

Chairman SMITH. I thought I had yielded back, but I will be 

happy to do so. 

[The prepared statement of Chairman Smith follows:] 
10 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF FULL COMMITTEEE

CHAIRMAN LAMAR S. SMITH

Today the Energy Subcommittee will hear from a panel of experts with collectively over a century of experience in science and engineering. 

We look forward to their testimony on the prospects of nuclear fusion as a future 

energy source. Fusion energy research attempts to achieve an invaluable reward for 

humankind—a sustainable, renewable, zero-emissions energy source. It also represents one the greatest scientific challenges in history. 

This scientific undertaking of creating the power source of a star on earth will 

require persistence and commitment. The next step towards achieving this goal is 

the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER). 

The Obama Administration has chosen to underfund ITER in its fiscal year 2015 

request. Instead of adequately supporting ITER, which could eventually lead to global energy security, the Administration’s budget request cuts this project by $50 million. The Administration instead prioritizes late stage, unreliable renewable energy, 

such as wind and solar. 

Fusion energy is in the early stages of research. But experts predict that it could 

someday provide a solution to the challenges of climate change. This is because fusion energy has the potential to power the world for millions of years, is reliable, 

and yields zero carbon emissions. Still, the Administration refuses to adequately 

support this science. 

Depriving the U.S. ITER program of the funds it needs to accomplish its goals 

is not good policy. To maintain our competitive advantage, we must continue to support fundamental basic research that encourages the creation and design of next 

generation technologies. 

Fusion energy is the sort of high-risk, high-reward research that will benefit future generations if we are bold enough to pursue it. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. I may not be awake yet, Mr. Chairman. I 

now yield to the Ranking Member, Mrs. Johnson of Texas. 

Ms. JOHNSON. Thank you very much, Madam Chairperson 

Lummis for calling this hearing today, and I would also like to 

thank the witnesses for being here. Nuclear fusion has the potential to provide the world with a clean, safe, and practically inexhaustible source of energy. Producing reliable electric power from 

fusion would undoubtedly serve as one of the biggest and most important scientific achievements in the history of mankind. That is 

why I am so supportive of a strong research program that can help 

us overcome the remaining scientific and engineering challenges for 

this potential to become a reality. 

The ITER project is the next and largest step toward this goal. 

For more than 50 years scientists at our top universities, national 

labs, and in the private sector, as part of a truly global research 

community, have been conducting experiments and performing research that has brought the team to a point where they are confident it is now possible to actually build a full scale test reactor 

that produces far more energy than it uses. 

However, it is highly unlikely that a research project of this size 

can be achieved by one institution, lab, company, or, in this fiscal 

environment, even by a single country. This is why wthe ITER 

project has brought together the best scientists and engineers from 

the world’s largest and most advanced nations to carry out this experiment. 

But managing the dynamics of multiple countries working together toward a common goal, especially one as complex as this, is 

rarely easy, and ITER has proved to be no exception. Recent reports have documented several issues with the International Organization’s management, which must be addressed if this project is 

to succeed. 
11 

I look forward to hearing from our witnesses about how these 

problems are being dealt with, and to further discussing ways we 

can ensure that ITER achieves incredibly important goals. I thank 

you, Ms. Chairman, and I yield back the balance of my time. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Johnson follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF FULL COMMITTEEE

RANKING MEMBER EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON

Thank you Chairman Lummis for holding this hearing today, and I would also 

like to thank the witnesses for being here. 

Nuclear fusion has the potential to provide the world with a clean, safe, and practically inexhaustible source of energy. Producing reliable electric power from fusion 

would undoubtedly serve as one of the biggest and most important scientific 

achievements in the history of humankind. This is why I am so supportive of a 

strong research program that can help us overcome the remaining scientific and engineering challenges for this potential to become a reality. 

The ITER project is the next, and largest, step toward this goal. For more than 

fifty years, scientists at our top universities, national labs, and in the private sector—as part of a truly global research community—have been conducting experiments and performing research that has brought the teams to a point where they 

are confident it is now possible to actually build a fullscale test reactor that produces far more energy than it uses. However, it is highly unlikely that a research 

project of this size can be achieved by one institution, lab, company, or, in this fiscal 

environment, even by a single country. That is why the ITER project has brought 

together the best scientists and engineers from the world’s largest and most advanced nations to carry out this experiment. 

But managing the dynamics of multiple countries working together toward a common goal, especially one as complex as this, is rarely easy, and ITER has proved 

to be no exception. Recent reports have documented several issues with the international organization’s management which must be addressed if this project is to 

succeed. I look forward to hearing from our witnesses about how these problems are 

being dealt with, and to further discussing ways we can ensure that ITER achieves 

its incredibly important goals. 

Thank you, and with that I yield back the balance of my time. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. I thank the Ranking Member. And if there 

are other Members who wish to submit additional opening statements, your statements will be added to the record at this point. 

Thank you very much again, witnesses. And before I introduce 

you, I will tell you that I had a very lengthy conversation, very 

lengthy conversation last night with an old friend from high school 

by the name of Jeff Hoy. And who would have thought—yeah, I can 

see you all know him. I used to sneak into his back yard in high 

school for parties, and we were—and it has been decades, decades, 

since we have talked to each other, and we were laughing at each 

out about how serendipitous it is that we would now be talking 

about ITER in detail, when a week ago I would never even heard 

of ITER, and—anyway, it was very informative, and it was also delightful to sort of re-acquaint with an old high school buddy. 

So, at this time, I would like to introduce our witnesses. If I mispronounce your name, would you please correct me? Our first witness today is Dr. Frank Rusco. Is it Rusco? 

Dr. RUSCO. Yes. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. What is—how do you pronounce it? 

Dr. RUSCO. Half my friends call me Rusco, and—but I say Rusco. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Rusco, excellent. Well, I want to do what 

you do. Okay. Dr. Frank Rusco, thank you. Dr. Rusco is the Director of the Natural Resources and Environment Team at the Government Accountability Office. Dr. Rusco really leads a broad spec-
12 

trum of energy issues government-wide. Dr. Rusco received both 

his Master’s and Doctorate in Economics from the University of 

Washington. Thank you for being here. 

Now, Dr. Dehmer—— 

Dr. DEHMER. Dehmer. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Dehmer, thank you. Our second witness is 

Dr. Patricia Dehmer, Deputy Director for Science Programs at the 

Department of Energy. Dr. Dehmer provides scientific and management oversight for a number of DOE science programs, including 

fusion energy sciences. 

Our third witness is Dr. Iotti. Did I get—— 

Mr. IOTTI. Iotti, Iotti, either way. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Okay. How do you pronounce it? 

Mr. IOTTI. —Americans—Iotti—— 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Iotti? Okay. Well, I am going to Americanize it, and I—our third witness is Dr. Robert Iotti, Chair of the 

ITER Council. Dr. Iotti became involved in fusion nearly 40 years 

ago, working at the Princeton Plasma Physics lab. Dr. Iotti received his Ph.D. in Nuclear Engineering. 

And our final witness today is Dr. Ned Sauthoff. Did I get that 

right? 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Perfect. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Thank you. Director of the U.S. ITER 

project at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Previously Dr. Sauthoff 

was a physics researcher, and head of the Off-Site Research Department at the Princeton Plasma Physics Lab. Dr. Sauthoff received his Ph.D. in Astrophysical Sciences from Princeton. 

Welcome one and all. As you know, our spoken testimony is limited to five minutes, and Members then will have five minutes each 

to ask you questions. So, again, welcome, and thank you. I now recognize Dr. Rusco for five minutes to present his testimony. 

TESTIMONY OF DR. FRANK RUSCO, DIRECTOR, 

NATURAL RESOURCES AND ENVIRONMENT, GAO 

Dr. RUSCO. Thank you. Chairman Lummis, Ranking Member 

Swalwell, Chairman Smith, and Ranking Member Johnson, Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to discuss 

our recent report on DOE’s cost and schedule estimates for the U.S. 

ITER project. The ITER project is an important scientific endeavor, 

and one that has large potential implications for basic science, and 

for the future of energy production. As you know, the U.S. has committed to providing about nine percent of ITER’s construction costs 

through contributions of hardware, personnel, and cash. In addition, the U.S. has agreed to contribute to ITER’s operational and 

decommissioning costs. 

However, since the ITER agreement was signed in 2006, the 

project has experienced significant cost increases and schedule 

delays. GAO has reviewed the U.S. ITER project twice, in 2007 and 

2014. Both reports identified similar concerns about the reliability 

of cost and schedule estimates for ITER. Specifically, in 2007, we 

reported on the importance of DOE assessing the full costs of U.S. 

participation in ITER, and setting a definitive cost estimate for the 

project. 
13 

We reported that the U.S. had committed to contributing to ITER 

without definitive estimates, or a complete project design, and that 

the preliminary estimate of about $1.1 billion could change significantly as a result. We also noted that the international ITER organization faced a number of management challenges that might significantly affect U.S. costs. 

In our most recent report, published in June 2014, we found that 

DOE’s current estimate of about $4 billion for the U.S. ITER 

project basically did a good job of incorporating the important characteristics of reliable cost estimates. However, factors outside of 

DOE’s control continue to prevent it from setting a reliable cost 

baseline more than seven years after the project began. Most importantly, the overall international project schedule that DOE uses 

as the basis for the U.S. schedule is not reliable. This is in part 

because of long running management deficiencies within the international ITER organization that continue today. 

For example, an external assessment of the ITER organization in 

2013 found that significant management issues hindered international project performance. The ITER council has committed to 

addressing these issues, and, as part of that effort, the ITER organization is currently reassessing the international project schedule, 

and will report its results to the council in June 2015. The purpose 

of the reassessment is to create a realistic schedule for ITER that 

will provide all members, including the U.S., a credible overall 

project schedule to which they can link their individual efforts and 

cost estimates. 

Given the importance of a reliable project schedule for completion 

of the ITER project, this next year will be critical to ITER’s long 

term success. In line with that, we recommended in our report that 

DOE continue to formally advocate for timely implementation of 

the necessary actions laid out in the management assessment that 

are needed to set a reliable international project schedule, and improve ITER organization project management. 

We urge DOE to be vigilant in its efforts to influence to the maximum extent possible the ITER organization’s development of this 

schedule so that, at this time next year, the U.S. will be in a position to endorse the revised international schedule and use that to 

set a definitive cost baseline for the U.S. project. 

In conclusion, the ITER project is at a crossroads. In the absence 

of a reliable schedule and improved international project management, ITER will remain subject to a significant amount of uncertainty, and may continue to face significant cost overruns or schedule delays. DOE should do as much as it can over the next year 

to push the ITER organization toward a realistic schedule and improved project management. Only if this is achieved will DOE be 

able to provide a firm and reliable estimate to Congress of the expected U.S. contribution to the ITER project. 

Alternatively, if DOE cannot, upon evaluating the ITER organization’s revised schedule, determine that this schedule is indeed reliable, it is imperative that DOE provide a transparent and complete accounting of the schedule’s deficiencies to Congress, so that 

lawmakers can have the information to make reasoned budget and 

other decisions. 
14 

Chairman Lummis, Ranking Member Swalwell, and Members of 

the Subcommittee, this concludes my prepared statement. I will be 

pleased to answer any questions you may have. 

[The prepared statement of Dr. Rusco follows:] 
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Chairwoman LUMMIS. Thank you, Dr. Rusco. 

I now recognize Dr. Dehmer to present her testimony. 

TESTIMONY OF DR. PATRICIA DEHMER, 

DEPUTY DIRECTOR FOR SCIENCE PROGRAMS, DOE 

Dr. DEHMER. Chairman Lummis, Ranking Member Swalwell, 

Chairman Smith, Members of the Committee, I am pleased to come 

before you today to discuss the Department’s Fusion Energy 

Sciences program, which supports work to understand matter at 

very high temperatures and densities, and to build the scientific 

foundation needed to develop a fusion energy source. The ITER 

project is the only planned burning plasma experiment in the 

world, and it is an important component of the Fusion Energy 

Sciences program. Indeed, our program is configured to support 

ITER activities, both now and in the future. 

The idea to build a burning plasma device through an international agreement originated from a Geneva superpower summit 

in November 1985, at which time Premier Gorbachev proposed to 

President Reagan that an international project be established to 

develop fusion energy for peaceful purposes. Many years, and may 

project changes later, including a congressionally directed withdrawal when project costs were escalating, the U.S. re-entered 

ITER in 2007. 

At that time, the expected U.S. cost for ITER was $1.1 billion, 

which was a tractable amount in an era of projected strong budget 

growth. Indeed, in 2007, President Bush signed the America Competes Act, which authorized a doubling of funding for the Office of 

Science, and other Federal basic science programs over a period of 

a decade. 

However, since that time, as you well know, the estimated cost of U.S. ITER contributions has grown to more than $4 billion. The 

growth arises from several factors, which are summarized in the 

GAO report. The project has also seen a multi-year schedule slip 

from the original projected completion date. In contrast to the increased estimate for the cost of U.S. obligations to ITER, funding 

for the Office of Science has grown more slowly. 

This makes annual budgeting a challenge. It is made significantly more challenging each year, owing to stunning new scientific 

discoveries and new technologies that have created imperatives in 

every program of the Office of Science. For example, we are in 

worldwide competitions for the most capable scientific computers, 

and for revolutionary X-ray light—laser light sources that probe 

matter at the atomic level. Neither was envisioned a decade ago. 

Increased urgency has been placed on research to develop new materials, new chemistries, and new biological processes for clean and 

efficient energy. 

In addition to cost growth and schedule slip, other issues have 

emerged that affect ITER. In late 2013 to third biennial management assessment of the ITER organization identified significant 

management issues that threatened the success of the project. 

Eleven recommendations resulted. The U.S. agreed with all of the 

recommendations put forward. Key among them is that leadership, 

management, and culture within the ITER project must be improved if it is to succeed. 
27 

The U.S. has spent significant time and energy to help ITER succeed. We have sent our best personnel in the United States to work 

at the ITER organization. We have recommended that Dr. Bob Iotti 

be the council chair, and he accepted, and we are very pleased. And 

we have insisted that all of the management assessment recommendations be adopted and implemented. The administration 

maintains its commitment to our responsibilities under the joint 

implementing agreement for ITER, but we insist on the reforms articulated in the management assessment report. 

I would like to close by remarking on the GAO report. As always, 

we thank the GAO for its findings and its recommendations. This 

was a particularly difficult report, and the GAO did an excellent 

job. The Department of Energy agrees with the four recommendations for executive action. We have already implemented those recommendations that we can address more, and we plan to take action on the recommendations that first require the international organization to baseline the project. 

Finally, I want to thank this Committee for holding the hearing 

on ITER, and providing the Department with the opportunity to 

testify. We look forward to continuing to work with you on the complex domestic and international challenges that we face in fusion 

research. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Dr. Dehmer follows:] 
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Chairwoman LUMMIS. Thank you, Dr. Dehmer. 

And now I recognize Dr. Iotti to present his testimony. 

TESTIMONY OF DR. ROBERT IOTTI, 

ITER COUNCIL CHAIR 

Mr. IOTTI. Thank you, Madam Chairman, Ranking Member 

Swalwell, Chairman Smith, Members of the Subcommittee. I thank 

you very much for the opportunity of appearing before you. I am 

presently the chair of the council, but I want to make sure that you 

understand I don’t represent the view of the council, but my own 

as a person who has been involved for over 45 years in defense and 

nuclear—commercial nuclear facilities, as well as fusion facilities. 

I could not be as eloquent as the members themselves on the 

promise of fusion, or why ITER is so important, so let me just get 

to the status of ITER. This is a nuclear facility which is licensed 

in France. It is being constructed in Cadarache, and work is progressing on site. At 6:00 a.m. yesterday morning the project began 

pouring the major slab on which the tokamak itself will sit, and the 

design, the fabrication, and the construction of the various component structures, buildings, and systems that comprise ITER are 

progressing, both on site, as well as in the domestic agencies, of the 

various parties that contribute to ITER. I brought a booklet to the 

Committee that I ask the Committee to be part of this record because, pictorially, it will show progress, and it will take me thousands of words to explain what pictures will tell you. 

Unquestionably, ITER has had management problems. The 

schedule is uncertain, as is its final cost. What is known is that the 

schedule is going to be longer, and the cost higher than had originally been anticipated. And, as mentioned, the project is preparing 

an updated schedule, which should be ready by the middle of 2015. 

The reasons for the cost and schedule overruns are varied, but 

unique to ITER is the ITER international agreement itself, which 

causes some of these problems. 

The Director General of the ITER organization is responsible for 

the overall design, the licensing, the construction, the commissioning, and the operation, but the various buildings, components, 

systems are provided by—as contribution in kind by the domestic 

agencies, and the domestic agencies have all of the funds. The operations are funded from those funds, and the funds are subject to 

budgets that are allocated to ITER by the various parties. So the 

Director General and the ITER organization have really no direct 

control on the funds, or on the domestic agencies, so that when 

there is any misalignment between the ITER organization and domestic agencies on any particular topic, decisions would typically 

require unanimity, or at the very least consensus cannot be readily 

made, leading to delays and cost increases. 

Now, funding shortfalls can contribute to those schedule delays 

and consequent cost increases. Given the delays and increases experienced to date, many parties have budget problems, and the 

U.S. is not alone. However, the U.S. strategy to minimize yearly 

funding until the schedule is known with high degree of confidence, 

and ITER performance is improved, will increase the ITER cost for 

the U.S., and could delay the ITER schedule. You know, when the 

new schedule becomes known, whether the U.S. will be a critical— 
36 

or not is uncertain at this point. But if they are, lest they cause 

international delays, they may have to adjust the budget afterwards. The same failure of any member can affect any of the members. 

Now, with regard to the management assessor, the council has 

immediately improved its effectiveness and efficiencies. We used to 

take up days without concluding anything, and take up a large 

fraction on trivial matters. Now they are disposed instantly by approving a consent package that contains all the non-controversial, 

and then the council concentrates on the big issues. The IO has 

prepared a detailed action plan, and the detailed action plan has 

been acted upon on all actions, so we are responding to every recommendation of the management assessors. 

Now, some actions pay immediate dividend. We see now we are 

meeting milestones on the schedules that before we used to meet 

only 50 percent of the time. That is a good sign. On the other hand, 

changing culture takes time, so all of the action related to culture 

will be work in progress for a bit of time. 

Perhaps the most important action taken is on the action of 

changing the management of ITER. A formation of a search committee has already occurred. This committee meets Tuesday in 

Paris to elect their own chair, and then start evaluating the recommendation of—members, potential candidates for Director General, and other important positions on the project. 

So I would like to leave the Committee that, in summary, we are 

not just making progress in constructions. We are also making 

progress in fixing the management project. Will ITER be successful? Well, you know, it is an experimental reactor, but it is based 

on the knowledge acquired throughout the world, and all of the fusion devices, so the likelihood of not meeting performance is low. 

There are no showstoppers, and the technological challenges can be 

met and overcome. So let me stop right now, and ask the Members—again, thanking them. If there are any question, I will be 

happy to answer them. 

[The prepared statement of Dr. Iotti follows:] 
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Chairwoman LUMMIS. Thank you, Dr. Iotti. It is an amazing scientific experiment, but it is also an amazing experiment in international management of a very complex project. We recognize the 

challenges that you face. 

I now recognize Dr. Sauthoff to present his testimony. 

TESTIMONY OF DR. NED SAUTHOFF, 

DIRECTOR, U.S. ITER PROJECT, 

OAK RIDGE NATIONAL LABORATORY 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Well, thank you very much, Chairman Lummis, 

Ranking Member Swalwell, Chairman Smith, other Members of the 

Committee, and other distinguished Members of Congress. As 

Chairman Lummis said, my name is Ned Sauthoff, and my role is 

the director of the U.S. ITER Project Office, which has been 

charged by DOE with executing the U.S. part of the ITER project. 

And—so I am the ‘‘evil’’ domestic agency, as Bob would call it. 

In any case, I would like to deviate from my prepared text by responding to Mr. Smith’s question about ITER/ITER, okay? Turns 

out that ITER is called ITER because it is a Latin Third Declension 

noun meaning the journey or the way, and it is the origin of the 

word itinerary. 

Chairman SMITH. Correct. 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Okay? So I could see why it could be ITER, if it 

is in Latin, or ITER, if it is itinerary. So you were right. 

Chairman SMITH. If the gentleman would yield, and I don’t want 

to eat up into your 5 minutes, but having taken more years of 

Latin than I want to confess, we always pronounced it ITER. As 

you say, it means the way, the road, the journey. It is where we 

get the word itinerary. So it seems counter-intuitive to pronounce 

a word with a long E that starts with an I. And I know that is 

more than we want to hear today, so—— 

Mr. WEBER. ITER way, you are both correct. 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Okay. Well, building on Mr. Smith’s comment, I 

would like to characterize ITER by a sentence from Virgil’s Aeneid, 

‘‘Forsan et haec olim meminisse juvabit.’’ Perhaps someday it will 

be a pleasure to remember even this. 

Chairman SMITH. Very good. 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Okay. So let me move on from that. If I could 

have the first slide brought up? Okay. What we will see is the 

ITER site. And as Dr. Iotti described, there are buildings popping 

up out of the ground. In the foreground you see a headquarters 

building. In the middle you see where the tokamak will be built. 

In the background you see a building built by the Indians for building the cryostat, which is too big to ship. And behind—and beside 

that you see a poloidal field coil building, where the Europeans will 

build magnets that are also too big to ship, okay? 

And then if we focus in on the tokamak building, this is the basement for the tokamak, on which the tokamak will sit. And, as Dr. 

Iotti said, yesterday they started pouring the concrete of a 1–1/2 

meter thick slab on which the tokamak will be built. That slab is 

actually not on the ground. It is on 493 seismic isolator pillars because you have to avoid earthquakes, okay? So it is a rather complex building within a building, and so what we are in the process 
45 

of doing now is pouring the basement floor of the inner building, 

okay? And that is what you see there. 

If we look at what is going on around the world, you would see 

that there are many pieces of hardware being built around the 

world. And now let me focus on the U.S. hardware, because I know 

you are interested in the U.S. part particularly. These are pieces 

of hardware, which we are fabricating, and have either delivered, 

or are delivering this year. 

If you look in the upper left, that is an 800 meter long spool of 

conductor. It is four meters wide, four meters tall, you know, a 

meter is, like, a yard, so it is really big. This is our prototype winding, where we validated all of our fabrication processes. That conductor has been shipped to Italy, to ASG in La Spezia, Italy, where 

the Europeans will turn it into a coil, a trial coil. We have also 

shipped 100 meter superconducting coil, a spool, which was built 

out of conductors that came from Oxford Superconductor in 

Carteret, New Jersey, and Luvata, in Waterbury, Connecticut. And 

it was then cabled in New Hampshire, and then it was integrated 

and jacketed in Tallahassee, at a small business called High Performance Magnetics. 

So we actually have put money into 40 different states. And so 

what we are trying to do is to build up the technological capability. 

And let me just elaborate on that. Oxford Superconductor and 

Luvata have gotten contracts from other ITER parties because our 

investment in those companies has made them the world leader. 

There was more than $50 million went to one of them to provide 

superconductor to Europe, okay? So here it is, a case where our investment in ITER enabled U.S. industry to be world class competitive, and win contracts from another member. 

Below, you see some components which we are providing to provide site power. And to the right you see one of five drain tanks 

of about 60,000 gallons, which have to be put into the basement before they pour the next floor up. That is why our schedule is not 

totally within our control. We have to fit into the schedule of the 

building. 

And then the last slide here are components that we are putting 

into a new building at General Atomics in Poway, California for us 

to fabricate the world’s highest stored energy superconducting 

pulsed magnet in the world, okay? So this is a case where the U.S. 

is going to have a capability which no one else has, and we will 

have built a magnet that has more energy in it in a pulsed way 

than anyone else. So at the left is a heat treatment furnace, where 

we can cook it for 100 hours at 650 degrees Centigrade to turn Niobium and Tin into Niobium-3 Tin. And at the right, you see the 

first of 11 stations for doing the winding. 

So—I am done with the slides now, so you can return to the camera. So, as others have said, what we are building on here is an 

attempt to create a burning plasma. This is a plasma which emulates the sun, and the key part is that the fusion reactions themselves keep it hot. And so, within the U.S., we have done the systems engineering such that we know what we have to build. We 

know the system performance requirements for all the components 

for first plasma. We know the interfaces so that we can reliably 

proceed to fabricate those components with acceptable risk. Those 
46 

that are needed post-first plasma need more design work, so we are 

not ready to run with those. 

But let me just report to you that our team is ready to run. The 

funding that we are now getting allows us to walk. We would prefer to run. It would be cheaper for us to run, and I am sure some 

of the questions will relate to that. And I also wanted to comment 

that ITER alone does not constitute a U.S. fusion program. What 

we have to do is to support ITER design, and position the U.S. for 

leadership in ITER research. And that means we have to be studying the topics that ITER will be studying on our domestic facilities 

in such a way that the U.S. has world leadership capability so that 

we are part of the teams that do experiments on ITER. And lastly, 

let me say that we also have to move on, before we have a fusion 

reactor, to study materials, components, and the like, and that is 

part of the strategic planning exercise which is now being conducted. 

So I conclude by saying our fusion community is confident, we 

are excited about the opportunities before us, and we look forward 

to working with you and the Department of Energy in developing, 

and planning, and implementing a vibrant U.S. fusion program. 

[The prepared statement of Dr. Sauthoff follows:] 
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Chairwoman LUMMIS. Thank you again, all of you, for being 

available for questioning today. We will now begin member questions, reminding Members that Committee rules limit questions to 

five minutes. And the Chair will, at this point, begin. And in order 

to get us all an opportunity to ask some questions before anticipated 10:15 votes, I would ask all the Members to err on the side 

of brevity. 

First of all, Dr. Rusco, thank you again for being here. Recognizing the complexity of this project, the reliance of 11 nations on 

each other to do their part to keep this thing on schedule, and, to 

the extent we can, as close to a reasonable budget as could possibly 

be attained, given the difficulties of managing all these languages, 

all these countries, all this science, it is almost mind boggling. 

Your report provides a historic account of the U.S. ITER project’s 

increasing costs and schedule. What can our government do to establish a reliable budget and schedule, so DOE and U.S. ITER have 

a clear plan to fulfill the U.S. hardware obligations, and lower 

overall costs? 

Dr. RUSCO. Very briefly, the U.S. project is dependent on the success of the management improvements of the international organization. That—those must occur, and there must be a reliable and 

definitive schedule put out before they can use the tools, which 

they are using very well, of cost estimation to give a reliable cost 

estimate to Congress. So it is really—it is—the first step is the 

international organization has to improve its management practices in very important ways, and then it has to come up with a 

full schedule in consultation with all the members. And then the 

U.S., I think, has the tools to make a reliable cost estimate for our 

own share of that. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Hence I will skip now to Dr. Iotti, and ask, 

is that an attainable goal within a reasonable timeframe, to have 

just the international scope of work, budget, and timeline? 

Mr. IOTTI. The brief answer is yes. Sorry. The brief answer is 

yes, and I could elaborate, but I will be even more confident come 

this September, where I am going there to review the progress on 

coming up with the schedule, the resource—and where the project 

will be in the middle of 2015. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Who will be responsible between now and 

September in preparing the schedule that you will be reviewing? 

Mr. IOTTI. There is the—a group within the ITER organization 

that is preparing the schedule as we speak. And they already have 

prepared the front end of that schedule, which is the 2014 annual 

work plan, and that is the one that I was referring to. In the past, 

when we made this annual work plan, the project would miss about 

half the milestones. Now they are meeting them all. In fact, sometimes they are beating them. And those that are in jeopardy, they 

are acted upon right away to mitigate possible delays, or retreatment entirely. So there is a whole new spirit of can-do attitude that 

did not—was not present in the past. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Okay. So there is scope of work, there is 

timeline—— 

Mr. IOTTI. Correct. They are all—— 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. —and there is—— 

Mr. IOTTI. —together. 
61 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. —budget. Okay. 

Mr. IOTTI. Correct. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. All three of those elements are being handled by the same—— 

Mr. IOTTI. With the cooperation of the domestic agencies. It is 

not, you know, that has to be a complete cooperation between the 

ITER organization that prepares the overall schedule and the domestic agencies, because each of the domestic agencies prepare its 

own schedule for their own scope, when then has to be integrated 

overall. And then the whole thing has to make sense—— 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Um-hum. 

Mr. IOTTI. —which is one of the reasons I am going there also 

in September, to make sure that everything is right. And when 

that has happened, then you can have a high confidence both in 

the ITER organization, as well as the domestic agencies. That is 

what Mr. Rusco is referring to. Until we have that, it is very difficult for the U.S. to prepare anything, okay? 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Who is preparing the budget for each 

country’s scope of work within the timeframe? 

Mr. IOTTI. That you would have to address—for instance, for the 

U.S., you would have address Dr. Sauthoff. The domestic agencies 

prepare the basic information, which then goes to the government 

to request certain budget to enable them to do the work. That is 

within the domestic agencies. It is not within the purview of the 

overall ITER organization. They just have to integrate all of those 

and alert members when they see a problem. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Okay. Dr. Sauthoff, given that, can you 

give me the 25 second version of your answer? 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Yes. My answer is that we have a very good process for developing schedule and cost estimate. As Dr. Rusco said, 

GAO reviewed us, and they said that we have all the characteristics of a reliable schedule system, and we have most of the characteristics of a reliable cost system. The only things they cited as 

missing had to do with an independent cost estimate, and a more 

extensive sensitivity analysis, which is something we do before 

baselining. So we have a good system, and I am proud of our cost 

estimate of 3.9 billion. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Thank you, panel. I now recognize Mr. 

Swalwell for 5 minutes. 

Mr. SWALWELL. Thank you, Chairman Lummis, and I was also 

delighted to hear from Chairman Smith that—his remarks about 

how ITER, and investments in fusion research can get us to an energy source that is carbon neutral. And that, you know, Chairman 

Smith, could really change the debate in this town, and make moot 

a lot of the back and forth about fossil fuels versus other sources 

of energy. I mean, I am a big believer in the renewables, but an 

investment in something like this, I think, could render many of 

these debates moot, and I think we would both embrace that, if we 

could get to that point. 

And—so my question first, for Dr. Sauthoff, is—I have been told 

that a significant portion of the U.S. contribution to ITER can be 

decoupled from the international schedule almost entirely, and that 

we have the opportunity to reduce the total cost to our taxpayers 
62 

if we simply focus more attention and resources on those components in the near term. So I guess, first, is this true? 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Yes, it is true. Roughly 2/3 of our scope is aimed 

at coming up with the first configuration of the machine, which is 

the core tokamak, and that is what is sometimes called the first 

plasma configuration. It is what you need to demonstrate that the 

tokamak itself works. It is roughly 2/3 of our scope. We know what 

we have to build well enough that we can proceed to fabricate at 

acceptable risk. And if we were to proceed on an optimal profile, 

we think we could probably reduce that cost from 3.9 billion to 

about 3.4, saving about half a billion dollars. 

Mr. SWALWELL. And also, Dr. Iotti, any thoughts on whether an 

accelerated contribution could work? 

Mr. IOTTI. Well, clearly—will lower the cost. I think what Dr. 

Sauthoff said is absolutely right. The other thing that, though, he 

did not add is I happen to know that in his own estimate he has 

a large amount of contingency, something on the order of—I think 

it is close to 900 million. 

If you accelerate, you retire some of that contingency. My experience in large project is the sooner you finish, the less risk you incur 

of changes, and that also saves some of that money that would otherwise go to pay for that risk. So the overall saving, in my opinion, 

would be larger than the half a billion, and may be close to 3/4 of 

it. 

Mr. SWALWELL. Thank you, Dr. Iotti. And, Dr. Dehmer, speaking of contributions, I did mention in my opening statement the $225 

million U.S. cap. And was I correct in describing this as an arbitrary level that the administration decided what would be politically palatable, or is this something that was arrived at from a bottom up project estimate that minimizes the total cost for U.S. taxpayers, and our contribution to ITER? 

Dr. DEHMER. It was not a bottoms up, as you say, but it was also 

not arbitrary. Let me give you the context that we were living in 

when we made that decision. At the time, the Department, and as 

now, the Department leadership was very supportive of the joint 

implementing agreement for ITER. But we were having requests 

from the project upwards of $350 million a year. The project had 

no international baseline, it had no U.S. baseline, no cost and 

schedule profiles. 

There were rumors of very significant cost growth and schedule 

delay, and deliberately many of these rumors were not put in the 

open, or kept silent. We have heard about the management weaknesses, and we heard that very significant improvements were 

needed. And all of this came against a background of sequestration, 

and many other projects that we were trying to support at the 

time. 

Therefore, we made a decision that, with no cost and schedule 

baselines, with significant management weaknesses, we could not 

provide this project with everything that it was requesting. We had 

to make a balance across the opposite sides, and we chose $225 

million. We believed that amount would allow us to go forward, 

and deliver what we needed to deliver, so as not to delay the 

project, but would allow us to do other things that we needed to 

do in the Office of Science. 
63 

Mr. SWALWELL. Thank you, Dr. Dehmer. And knowing what we 

know now, listening to the testimony of the witnesses, and that by 

and large much of sequestration has been rolled back, do you anticipate that the next recommendation for funding will increase beyond today? 

Dr. DEHMER. We are in negotiations on that now, and so I can’t 

talk about that. What I definitely want to say is we are looking forward to the June 2015 baseline exercise from the international organization. 

Mr. SWALWELL. Thank you, Dr. Dehmer. Thank you, Chair, and 

yield back the balance of my time. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. The Chair now recognizes the full Committee Chairman, Mr. Smith of Texas. 

Chairman SMITH. Thank you, Madam Chair. Let me direct my 

first question to Dr. Dehmer, Dr. Iotti—I am tempted to say Dr. 

Iotti, but I won’t—Dr. Iotti, and Dr. Sauthoff. And, Dr. Rusco, I 

don’t mean to slight you, but the question really is not for the 

GAO, and you will see why. 

And it is this. I think we have to acknowledge that the practical 

delivery of fusion energy is dollars away and years away, but nevertheless it has incredible potential, and that is the point of my 

question. If we are successful in developing future sources of fusion 

energy, wouldn’t that largely solve the problem of carbon emissions? And this is something that the Ranking Member alluded to 

as well. So, Dr. Dehmer? 

Dr. DEHMER. It would help mitigate the problem of carbon emissions, and the if is a long way off, and—— 

Chairman SMITH. I acknowledge that. 

Dr. DEHMER. Yeah. Okay. And—— 

Chairman SMITH. I am talking about the potential. 

Dr. DEHMER. Yes, I think everyone agrees that the potential is 

very great. 

Chairman SMITH. Okay. And, Dr. Iotti? 

Mr. IOTTI. Well, I use an example that I borrow from Dr. 

Llewellyn Smith in Oxford. The potential of fusion, in terms of the 

issues that you are referring to can be translated in 40 liters of 

water, and the lithium from one laptop battery—— 

Chairman SMITH. Oh boy. 

Mr. IOTTI. —can provide the per capita consumption in the 

United States for 15 years, and do away with 70 tons of coal. That 

is—— 

Chairman SMITH. I have never heard it put that way. That is a 

very descriptive and very persuasive answer. I thank you for that. 

Dr. Sauthoff, going back to our pronunciation, we may have to split 

the difference between ITER and ITER, because we checked the 

dictionary, and the correct pronunciation is in between, as it ITER, 

I–T. So ITER, or ITER. 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. It depends whether you are going classical, 

church, or colloquial. 

Chairman SMITH. Yes, I was always in the colloquial, and—— 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Yes. 

Chairman SMITH. —that is why we got the ITER. 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. But do you do you veni, vidi, vici or veni, vidi, 

vici? 
64 

Chairman SMITH. Veni, vidi, vici, though, doesn’t involve the I. 

By the way—from Caesar. But anyway, enough digression, I guess. 

If you want to talk about the potential, that would be great. 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Okay. The potential is indeed quite great. The 

amount of energy that you get out of a nuclear reaction is more 

than a million times that of what you get out of a chemical reaction. And so, per pound of fuel, you get more than a million times 

out in either fission or fusion than you get out of chemistry. 

And what we have is a system which will allow us to address the 

risk of a fusion system, big risk of the plasma, but we only know 

how to do it on a big scale. It will be a central station plant—— 

Chairman SMITH. Right. 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. —so we won’t have addressed portable electricity 

and the like, and that is going to take storage. We haven’t yet figured out how to make the Mr. Fusion machine that Professor Emmett Brown put on the top of his DeLorean in Back to the Future, 

and we won’t know how to make that power pack that—— 

Chairman SMITH. Yeah. 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. —Tony Stark had in Iron Man. But we do know 

how to make the arc reactor that is in the bottom of the Stark 

Tower in Iron Man 2. 

Chairman SMITH. Okay. These are great answers. Let me ask a 

second question of the same three individuals. We will go in reverse order. And that is, what are the impacts of the proposed cuts, 

either on the mission, or on our international partners? Dr. 

Sauthoff? 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Well, we are totally dependent on the other partners, and they are dependent on us. And what we have to do is to 

find a way where we work together such that all of us deliver all 

of our parts. And what we have to do there is to build up both a 

trust and a way to work together. And, as Dr. Iotti will—or Iotti, 

okay—will perhaps talk about, we have underway various approaches to achieving that interactivity, and that integration. And 

what we really need is to have an integrated team with strong 

leadership, and effective project systems that allows us to cooperate, and to achieve our mutual goals. 

Chairman SMITH. Okay. Thank you. Dr. Iotti, the impact of the 

cuts? And I am afraid you are going to have to be the last one to 

answer, because of the time limitation. 

Mr. IOTTI. There is—as Ned said, we have to work together. The 

moment that the other partner sees the U.S. is possibly wavering 

because of the budget cuts, it shows—it is much more difficult for 

us to influence the other ones, and working together. That is the 

bottom line. So we need to deliver just as much as we expect the 

other part to delivery. Budget cut can influence our ability to do. 

Chairman SMITH. Okay. Thank you all. Thank you, Madam 

Chair. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Chair now 

recognizes the gentlewoman from California, Ms. Lofgren. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Well, thank you very much. I was excited by the 

title of this hearing, ‘‘Fusion: The World’s Most Complex Energy 

Project’’, and—but all we are talking about is ITER. And I learned, 

when I first was elected to Congress, that the competition and disagreement between scientists about whether you want to do iner-
65 

tial confinement fusion, or magnetic fusion, it is, like, almost a religious dispute, and people have very strong views. 

But one question I have is how we might—or are we utilizing the 

information that we are obtaining out of the important work that 

is being done here in the United States, both at MIT, and at Lawrence Livermore that was mentioned earlier. How is that being integrated into the design of the science of this project, if at all? Anybody who could—— 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Okay, let me start. First of all, the design of 

ITER has evolved to adapt to the best practices and best configurations known from the existing research, and the U.S., among others, has contributed a lot to that. We have adapted the ITER configuration recently by adding what are called in—vessel coils to address things that have been found on U.S. and other devices. We 

also have come up with ways of addressing how to increase confinement, and how to minimize the effects of instability. 

And so these features have been put into the ITER design, such 

that the basic ITER has the systems in place, based on our knowledge to date, and there is a flexibility in all the peripheral systems 

to improve how you fuel it, how you heat it, and how you change 

the profiles. And so both past research has contributed, and future 

research will contribute not only to the peripheral systems, but 

how we operate ITER. 

Ms. LOFGREN. I worry—I support funding for this project, I will 

just say that up front, but I worry about completion, given the terrible economic conditions in Europe, and whether people who have 

made commitments in the end are going to be able to follow 

through on those commitments. And I am also mindful that when 

you have a big construction project like this, by the time you finish, 

you know, the technology has moved forward, and it is dated. I 

mean, for example, NIF, by the time it was done, they would now 

have a facility probably a third the size. I mean, the lasers would 

be so different. Not that it isn’t a useable facility, but I am sure 

the same will be true of ITER. 

And so I guess—here is a question, looking at what—and I hope 

we—Madam Chair, we might be able to have a hearing on some 

of the other projects in the fusion arena, because it is very exciting, 

what is going on at Livermore. I just got a briefing yesterday from 

their scientific team, and with their high step efforts, I mean, they 

are generating alpha particles in a very interesting way. 

You know, they are—I believe they have created fusion, although 

not ignition. And we don’t know, it is a science experiment, whether they will. But let us just say what if they actually hit their ignition target before ITER is completed. Would that have an impact 

on ITER’s development? Because they are making great progress in 

stability issues and the like. Would—how would that information 

be integrated into this project? 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Well, if I might be so bold as to start, I think, 

first of all, it would be a great accomplishment, and it will be a 

great accomplishment when NIF achieves ignition, and I believe 

that that will raise the recognition of the potential for fusion. And 

I personally believe that we should succeed in fusion in any way 

we can—— 

Ms. LOFGREN. I do as well. 
66 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. —and I also believe we should succeed in multiple ways. Because, in that redundancy, we get reliability, and we 

will be able to optimize the systems. And, quite frankly, I hope that 

inertial confinement succeeds, magnetic confinement succeeds, and 

some of these alternate concepts succeed. 

You know, if we had set out to say we were only going to build 

one sort of a car, you know, we wouldn’t have the variety—— 

Ms. LOFGREN. No, I absolutely agree, but the question is can you 

incorporate—I mean they have learned a lot on material 

science—— 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Yes. 

Ms. LOFGREN. —moving forward. That, I believe, would be instructive and useful for this alternate approach—— 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Right. 

Ms. LOFGREN. —and I agree. Once we get ignition, all that is left 

is engineering. And so, you know, that is a big challenge. But once 

we clear the science, I have a high level of confidence on implementation. 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Yes. I believe that there are areas that can be 

synergistic, and materials are among them. The systems are somewhat similar, but they are also quite different, and that means that 

we have multiple paths to success in fusion, and so we ought to celebrate the differences as well as we celebrate the similarities. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. And the gentlewoman’s time has expired. 

I now recognize the gentleman from Kentucky, Mr. Massie. 

Mr. MASSIE. Ms. Lofgren asked most of my questions, and better 

than I could have, but I have the same sort of interest in this. And 

some of these research efforts that are global can almost be described as the analogy to 1,000 monkeys typing on keyboards, that 

eventually they will produce the works of Shakespeare, but this is 

not one of them. We have only a few bets to place on fusion, because the projects—the scale of the projects doesn’t lend itself to 

having a lot of people working on different approaches. So I think 

it is very important, when we place our bets, what we place them 

on. 

Dr. Sauthoff, you said that first plasma was an important milestone, or at least that is what it sounds like. What is the next milestone after that? And then, Dr. Iotti, in the event of 100 percent 

success of this project, what will this experiment produce? But Dr. 

Sauthoff, please. 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Okay. So the first event is a big integrated systems test that results in a plasma. We call that first plasma. That 

means the core tokamak is working. 

Mr. MASSIE. Is that novel? Has that been achieved before? 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. There has never been—it has never been 

achieved at this scale. You know, what we will be doing is to build 

a system that has more stored energy, and higher forces, and the 

like, than anywhere else. What we have to do after that is then 

build on top of the basic tokamak. We have to add the heating system, so that it gets up to thermonuclear temperatures. We have to 

add the instrumentation, so that we can study what is going on. 

We have—and we have to continue to optimize. 
67 

One of the key things is we have to start a tritium system, because the fuel is deuterium and tritium, and that is a system which 

is very complex, state of the art, beyond the current state of the 

art. It is not just like what you do in the weapons system. What 

you have to do is do this fast enough where you can separate different isotopes of hydrogen to separate out the deuterium, and the 

tritium, and the protium in time that you can cycle it back into the 

tokamak. 

So this is a real development. We are doing our part at Savannah River. We are doing the separation. That then goes to Europe, 

that does the isotope separation. We are doing the exhaust processing, get hydrogen and separate it from other things. Europe is 

doing the isotope separation, and then it goes to China and Korea 

for injection. 

Mr. MASSIE. Dr. Iotti, the ultimate outcome from this giant experiment will be what? 

Mr. IOTTI. Well—— 

Mr. MASSIE. When I—I got excited when I saw the—— 

Mr. IOTTI. Two things—— 

Mr. MASSIE. —electrical substation. I thought, wow, they are 

going to send power out. But then I realized that is the power coming in—— 

Mr. IOTTI. That is the power coming in—— 

Mr. MASSIE. —to the magnets. 

Mr. IOTTI. —right. It—— 

Mr. MASSIE. Okay. 

Mr. IOTTI. The moment we can say that is the power out—— 

Mr. MASSIE. Yeah. 

Mr. IOTTI. —we will have been successful. Well, first of all, this 

experiment is going to allow us to enter the regime where the plasma itself heat it. We have never been there for any substantial period of time. So that is the science, if you will. After you conquer 

the science, then it becomes an engineering problem. 

So this device by itself will not enable us to immediately go to 

a demo plant. We can design a demo plant, but we will need information on materials. We will need other information that comes 

from other facilities that are being built around the world, by the 

way. But the fundamental output of ITER will be the knowledge 

of the science, and some of the engineering that is necessary to go 

to the next step, which will be the—not just the design, but the actual construction of a demonstration facility, which will produce 

power that will be put in the grid. 

Mr. MASSIE. But not this facility? 

Mr. IOTTI. Not—this facility will not put power in the grid—— 

Mr. MASSIE. Got you. 

Mr. IOTTI. —no. 

Mr. MASSIE. I want to use my remaining time to ask Dr. Rusco 

a few questions—or one question. I will leave it open ended. The 

design of the management of this project presents, I would imagine, some unique obstacles, and increases the overhead of completing these goals. What are some of those unique problems inherent in the management of this project? 

Dr. RUSCO. Our review mostly focused on the U.S. project, but 

the management assessment which we were able to review laid out 
68 

some really important challenges. And among the key ones were a 

top heavy management culture, and structure, and many managers 

from different—— 

Mr. MASSIE. Languages? 

Dr. RUSCO. —and cultures. I don’t think that the language and, 

you know, cultural aspects are as much of an issue as have too 

many managers, and too many layers of decision-making. Decisionmaking was not pushed down to the lowest reasonable level, and 

so it is a top heavy organization. Another is that they have an absence of a systems engineering culture, and they need that. 

This is a huge, complex system, and it is a huge project. And another one is that they are lacking in things like a nuclear safety 

culture. And these are big changes, big cultural changes in an organization that is made up of people from all the member countries. 

And I think that that is just inherently a large challenge. 

Mr. MASSIE. If—can I have just a little more time? 

Mr. IOTTI. Could I add one more, if I may, because I think it responds to his question? There is an issue—imagine that you have 

a project, and you are the owner of the project. Normally the owner 

has the funds, and tell its contractors what to do. Not so in ITER. 

It is the reverse. The domestic agencies have the fund. They are 

the provider of the equipment to the owner, the ITER organization, 

which has no funds. So that is a big problem. It is not unsolvable. 

And, as a matter of fact, one of the reaction to the recommendation of the management assessment said, improve the IO/DA interaction. It is a key of the group formed by the council, which is 

studying the problem, and is making good progress. That is something that is unique to ITER. 

Mr. MASSIE. That occurred to me when Dr. Rusco talked about 

the problem with the decision process. Well, so many of the decisions have already been made. You know who you are going to buy 

it from, and what they are going to build, so why would it matter 

if you made a decision to do something else? You don’t have the 

money to change the plan, seems like. I yield back. My time has 

expired. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. I thank the gentleman, and recognize the 

gentlelady from Massachusetts, Ms. Clark. 

Ms. CLARK. Thank you, Chairman Lummis. I am very excited to 

be here, and very excited about the potential of fusion energy. And, 

with all apologies to George Gershwin, I say ITER, you say ITER, 

but let us not call the whole thing off. And I do have some particular questions. I have been very fortunate to be able to go out 

to the fusion lab at MIT and see the C–Mod there. 

And I have some questions for Dr. Dehmer, because you have 

oversight of sort of what I see as two parallel management structures, one having to do with the Fusion Energy Advisory Committee, and one having to do with the High Energy Physics Advisory Board, and the P–5. And there seem to be similarities on these 

two, but some key differences, and I wondered if you could help me 

think through some of the differences. 

In the P–5 panel, there is a feeling that there has been a better 

opportunity to incorporate community input, and there has also 

been some differences, in that membership in the strategic planning panel on the fusion side has barred membership from major 
69 

U.S. facilities to avoid conflicts of interest, but this has not been 

the case in the P–5 panel. And so that the feedback that I have 

been getting is that people feel the P–5 panel has been able to 

work through solutions in a better way. And I wondered if you 

could comment on that, and the difference in structures, and how 

we might reconcile these two parallel structures? 

Dr. DEHMER. Yes. Let me talk about that. There are three committees that I would like to talk about. One is the P–5 HEPAP, one 

is the FESAC, and the third is the Basic Energy Sciences Advisory 

Committee, which went through a similar exercise about a year 

ago. 

In prior committees under FESAC, there had been some concern 

expressed to me verbally, that the committee didn’t appreciate conflict of interest as well as it should. So when we started this most 

recent study, I admonished them to be very, very careful about conflict of interest. Now, you can do that in a number of ways. You 

can have your sub-panel composed of people who have no obvious 

conflicts of interest, and that is what the chair of FESAC did. That 

was Mark Koepke. And that is also what BESAC did. 

The BESAC and the FESAC committees were very, very similar. 

Neither one of the sub-panels had members from institutions that 

were directly affected. However, in both cases, there were very 

open community activities in which communities put white papers, 

and other kinds of documents, into the sub-panel, and had an opportunity to formally brief the sub-panel. That worked very well for 

BESAC, and FESAC Mark Koepke chose to adopt that for FESAC 

as well. 

There is no intent whatsoever to inhibit input from these major 

facilities. And, in fact, if you look at the FESAC webpage for this 

activity, it is full of calls to the communities to provide input. And, 

in fact, they met just this week. Their meeting concluded yesterday, and they heard from all of the major facilities, national and 

international, that briefed the Subcommittee, and put in white papers for the Subcommittee. This worked very well for BESAC. I 

think Mark Koepke decided to adopt this for FESAC. 

Ms. CLARK. Great. Thank you very much. I yield back my time. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. I thank the gentlelady, and yield to the 

gentleman from Illinois, Mr. Hultgren. 

Mr. HULTGREN. Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you to all 

of our witnesses. We most definitely have a very distinguished 

panel here today. I think this hearing is very important as we continue to assess ongoing viability of the ITER program. I think everyone on this Committee knows about my interest in our national 

labs, and I also recognize the need for international collaboration 

in some of these large science projects. Because of the sheer size 

of such of—as this, there is no way for the United States just to 

go it alone. 

And it is not just a cost issue, it comes down to portfolio management. Doing this alone would require nearly all of the fusion budget, plus increases. We do have to ensure a balance of projects, because we don’t always know where the next discovery or game 

changer will come from. 

Dr. Dehmer, first of all, I want to thank you for the incredible 

work that you have done at the Office of Science. As I talk to my 
70 

scientist back in Illinois, one word that keeps coming back to me 

is tough. And I don’t think that is a bad thing, neither do they. 

They know that they have to have their plans well thought out and 

put together before they bring them to your desk. And I have faith 

that you have been a responsible steward of the taxpayers’ dollars, 

and I thank you for that. 

My first question comes down to our standing in the international community for these types of international programs. Our 

partners obviously get frustrated with the United States because of 

our yearly budgets, or sometimes monthly budgets, compared to the 

more long term planning in other nations. I wondered if you could 

talk briefly about if the United States pulls out of a program of this 

size, how do you believe the international community will react 

when we want to join in a host of other—or host other programs? 

I wondered if you could also discuss the importance of domestic 

research and facilities programs in relation to ITER and other 

international partnerships. One last thing, also, how are these programs interrelated, and what would pitting one against the other 

mean for the ability to continue future work in fusion energy? 

Dr. DEHMER. Let me answer the the Office of Science. And we 

heard today a lot about aggressively accelerating funding for fusion, but we simply can’t do that, because there are so many other 

projects. 

We have tried to assess how withdrawal from ITER, and we 

aren’t proposing to do that, might affect other activities, both scientific and other, and we simply don’t know the answer to that. I 

have to say that I have not heard from any part of the scientific 

community that they are nervous about the United States position 

on ITER. And you well know, with Fermilab in your district, that 

international projects are an increasingly important component of 

the science portfolio. 

And you well know from the P–5 HEPAP report that encouraged 

Fermilab to reach out and internationalize the long baseline neutrino facility, and we are going forward in doing that. And that will 

be one of the first examples of a major international project on U.S. 

soil. 

Mr. HULTGREN. I hope we can do it well. And, again, with our 

challenges budgeting here, where other nations, I think, have done 

a better job of long term planning, as far as science is concerned, 

I do think it is important for us to show that we can follow through 

if we have a hope of having future projects that we can work together on. 

Dr. Iotti, I wonder—if I understand, that one of the key management challenges with ITER is the unanimity requirement for cost 

of schedule decisions, which allows one member to stall the decision-making process. Is there agreement on the council that this is 

a problem, and how do you plan to address this issue so that the 

organization can function? 

Mr. IOTTI. Yes, the council has recognized the issues. They 

formed a working group that is called, surprisingly, IODA Interaction Group, and the group is making very good progress. They 

have defined a process whereby decisions are presented to a group 

which is chaired by a senior person in the ITER organization, but 
71 

includes all of the most senior persons from each of the domestic 

agencies, and has formed kind of an executive group. 

These decisions—the options for the various decisions, with the 

pros and cons, are presented to the group, and the decision then 

is made jointly by the ITER organization and the domestic agencies, and presented to the Director General, who can then still, if 

necessary. But generally they will come to an agreement. It will 

not solve all problems, but it will considerably ameliorate the issue. 

Mr. HULTGREN. Real quickly in my last few seconds, Dr. Dehmer, 

if I can go back, what lessons has the United States learned about 

creating an international decision-making body for other projects 

domestically? As you mentioned, I am thinking about the P–5, the 

proposal of the international facility. But I think we have these 

questions about anything that we might ever want to host or join. 

While I do think ITER management problems can be rectified, is 

the current management a case study for how not to manage a program like this in the future? 

Dr. DEHMER. I think we have examples of international projects 

that have worked, the Large Hadron Collider—— 

Mr. HULTGREN. Yes. 

Dr. DEHMER. —and we have had examples, and ITER is one of 

them, where we would modify that agreement, if we had to do it 

all over—— 

Mr. HULTGREN. So lessons have been learned with—— 

Dr. DEHMER. Yes, indeed. 

Mr. HULTGREN. Well, again, thank you so much. Madam Chair, 

thank you so much. Appreciate your generosity. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Those were sweeping questions, and very 

succinct answers. Very impressive line of questioning. I want to 

recognize now the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Veasey. 

Mr. VEASEY. Thank you, Madam Chair. I have a question for Dr. 

Sauthoff. We have three major magnetic fusion research facilities 

here in the U.S., at MIT, Princeton, and General Atomics in San 

Diego. And what I was curious about was if you would be able to 

explain how the smaller scale experimental facilities are contributing to ITER? 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Okay. Well, the smaller scale facilities in the U.S. 

are world class, even though they are not at ITER scale. There is 

not an ITER scale facility in the world. But the U.S. facilities are 

world class. They have produced results which have enabled ITER 

to optimize its design. I mentioned in-vessel coils, but there are 

other areas where that has been done. They have also identified 

ways where ITER can be operated more effectively, better modes 

of confinement, different modes of stability, better ways of protecting against loss of control and the like. 

Furthermore, they provide a training base for—let us call it the 

workforce. We also want to establish a reputation where the U.S. 

has the stature to really be effective in international research, and 

be able to propose winning proposals, to win run time, to be members of international teams that do the research. And so, quite 

frankly, we have the ability to study the physics, which can then 

be extended to the ITER scale, based on understanding the basic 

physics, and then extrapolating it. And that extrapolation uses 

supercomputer simulations. 
72 

So, really, what I see is devices such as today’s tokamaks giving 

better understanding, giving rise to better physics models that are 

then embodied in supercomputer codes, which allow us to then extrapolate to the ITER scale. 

Mr. VEASEY. Would there—were you finished? I am sorry. Would 

there still be a strong justification for continuing to support the 

current set of U.S. based magnetic fusion facilities if there were no 

burning plasma experiment like ITER in the works? 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Well, first of all, I hope that situation doesn’t 

arise. However, you know, if there were no burning plasma facility 

in the world, there would be a gaping hole, because one of the 

greatest risks has to do with not understanding the dynamics of a 

burning plasma, or the effects of the energetic particles, or the size 

scaling. 

However, there would be many things to learn if there were not 

a burning plasma facility. However, the E in fusion energy would 

not be fulfilled. What we would be studying is plasma physics. And 

so what we really need to do is have a balance between plasma 

physics and putting the E into fusion energy. 

Mr. VEASEY. Interesting. On the facilities again, I mean, are we 

sufficiently supporting these facilities, and the related research 

programs at universities throughout the country to ensure the success of ITER? 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Well, I will transfer it to Dr. Dehmer in a moment. Of course it would be better if there were more run time on 

these facilities. They are starved for run time. A very small fraction 

of the available time is used for operation. But it is a question of 

balance, and so that is where Dr. Dehmer comes in. 

Mr. VEASEY. Dr. Dehmer? 

Dr. DEHMER. We do try to balance the amount of run time, and 

we have deliberately been pushing to increase the run time, particularly on NSTX, which is just finishing its upgrade at Princeton 

Plasma Physics Laboratory, and we are trying to have a very, very 

good run the first year after that upgrade is finished. 

Mr. VEASEY. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. I thank the gentleman from Texas. Without objection, the Chair recognizes Mr. Rohrabacher for five minutes for his questions. Those bells were just the call for votes, but 

this first vote is a 15 minute vote, thereby allowing Mr. Rohrabacher his complete use of time, so—— 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Okay. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. We are going to complete our hearing, and 

still make votes. Perfect. 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. All right. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. Mr. Rohrabacher? 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. 

Sorry I was a bit in and out. As we speak, that sound in Israel is 

the sound of a rocket coming in and blowing innocent civilians up. 

We were just briefed by the ambassador, and by an Israeli military 

official. 

About fusion, as compared to other alternatives—and I am sorry 

I missed—I will come back and read your testimony as the hearings go on, but I have been here during this whole decision-making 

process for the last 26 years, and it seems to me that already what 
73 

we have got again is a description of management problems with 

a multi-billion dollar program, and this is very serious. 

And—especially if we have very limited resources now in this 

country. We are borrowing money from China in order to, you 

know, in order to do anything, in order to actually meet our own 

budget. So these management problems need to be overcome, I just 

would like to put that one the record, or we need to, say, have a 

serious look at whether we will continue pouring money into the 

project. 

Madam Chairman, I would suggest that over these years there 

have been many spin-offs from the Fusion Energy Research Program that are very valuable. And I know that, for example, the 

railgun that has just been disclosed by our military would not have 

been possible without the material and development of the metals, 

and the things that were necessary for the fusion project to move 

forward. And it actually permitted us to develop a system that I 

think will enable us to build a defense system, so that if those 

alarms go off, we will actually have a missile defense system that 

will protect our people, and save thousands of lives. 

So, in that degree, fusion energy research has been a benefit to 

the people of the United States. Perhaps, however, we should be 

looking now at whether or not the money we are going to be putting in to fusion, as compared to the money that would be putting 

in to small modular nuclear reactors that are fission reactors, we 

know we are going to get a benefit from that. 

We know if we put several billion dollars into that, we will have 

a new system of fission reactors that will provide safe energy for 

our people, and we are assured of that. Can we be assured that the 

billions of dollars that we will need to pump in to the—to finish 

this project, this fusion project, can we be certain that it will result 

in an energy system for our country? We know it will if we put it 

into fusion. Do we know it—fission. Do we know it will happen if 

we put it into fusion? Whoever on the panel wants to go. Maybe 

each one of you could say, yes, we know, or no, we don’t know. 

Maybe start at this end, and just run them down. Go ahead. 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Okay, I will start. No, we don’t—do not have absolute certainty. But what I think we have to do is act somewhat 

as an investor. We have to look at what would be the return on 

investment if it were to succeed, and then—— 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Yeah. 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. —consider what are the probabilities—— 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Versus risk, and—— 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Yeah. It is—I think we ought to treat it as a portfolio management problem. 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Okay. 

Mr. IOTTI. I agree with—— 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Okay. So the idea is that no, we do not—— 

Mr. IOTTI. We do not know for certain. 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. —we do not know for certain, but we feel 

there is a probability? 

Mr. IOTTI. Very high probability. 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Okay. 

Dr. DEHMER. Exactly the same. Long term, high risk project. 
74 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. All right. But we do know that there is an 

alternative, in terms of development of nuclear energy for the use 

of our people that is far less risky, in terms of—we know we can 

produce fission reactors that are small modular reactors. 

Mr. SAUTHOFF. Yeah. 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. I mean, I asked that of other witnesses, and 

they say absolutely we can, if we had the resources. So, for the 

same amount of money, we could have a certain return, versus— 

and, due to dealing with fusion, we don’t have a certain return. 

However, we do have a probability. One last note our GAO, how 

does that all add up? 

Dr. RUSCO. I can’t add anything to what they said. It is a high 

risk, potentially high reward project. 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. All right. Thank you very much. 

Chairwoman LUMMIS. We have had a fascinating line of questions and answers today. We all thank you for your valuable testimony, and I thank the Members for their valuable questions, and 

thoughtful questions. Members of the Committee will have additional questions for you, and if they come to you, we will ask you 

to respond in writing. The record will remain open for two weeks 

for additional comments and written questions for Members. 

Members, we have on the floor eight minutes remaining on a Motion to Recommit on H.R. 4718, so plenty of time. And, again, with 

gratitude towards our panel, this hearing is adjourned. The witnesses are excused. Thank you. 

[Whereupon, at 10:30 a.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.] 
(75) 

Appendix I 

ANSWERS TO POST-HEARING QUESTIONS
76 

ANSWERS TO POST-HEARING QUESTIONS

Responses by Dr. Dehmer 
(77) 

Appendix II 

ADDITIONAL MATERIAL FOR THE RECORD
78 

LETTER SUBMITTED BY CHAIRMAN LAMAR S. SMITH
79 
80 
81 

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