International Expert Panel declares ESS Project ready for Construction
The first international review of the European Spallation Source Project has concluded that the project is in good shape and is now ready to begin Construction work.
The ESS will be a research centre for materials and life sciences, and one of the world’s largest research facilities when operational in 2019. The ESS Project, head-quartered in Lund, Sweden, and with 17 international Partner Countries, will conclude the ongoing pre-construction work this year and then plans to enter into construction in early 2013. The first review of the ESS Project by international experts, in its report published today, validated the progress of the project and signaled its readiness to go into construction.
The report gives a clear green light for entering into construction. The review found the ESS Project to be in good shape, and the reviewers were impressed by the progress of the project so far: “In a very short time an efficient and professional organisation has been built up”. They found the timetable ambitious, but appropriate, but also, as expected, saw important factors in the current European political and economic landscape, and in the ability to recruit suitable staff in time, which might affect the project.
- I am pleased that this external evaluation has proven that the ESS Project is on the right track, and has made impressive achievements. For the Board, the message that the project is in good shape is reassuring. And it is very important that we can send this message of strength to the owners, says Sven Landelius, Chairman of the ESS AB Board of Directors.
- This sends a strong positive signal to our 17 European Partner Countries as the negotiations on the formal agreements and funding of the ESS Construction Phase enters into a decisive period. As the Chair of the international Steering Committee, I am particularly satisfied with this outcome, says Lars Börjesson.
- We are delighted that this review finds the project in good health and ready to enter the Construction Phase. Our staff has done an excellent job over the past two years and I congratulate them. We really do have a winning team and I am proud to lead them !, says Colin Carlile, ESS Director-General.
The review panel consisted of Professor John Wood, Secretary-General at Commonwealth Universities and the former chair of the European Strategy Forum for Research Infrastructures (ESFRI), as the chairman, and of Dr Thom Mason, Director of ORNL, USA, and Dr Wolfgang Meissner, Executive Partner of InTech GmbH, Germany.
This has been the first review in a series of regular ones to take place during the lifetime of ESS. Reviews are central processes for large science infrastructures, and a valuable tool for the stakeholders and the management. The goal of this review was to assess the compliance of the ESS Project towards its goals and Programme Plan, its governance and management, and the preparedness of the ESS project to enter into the Construction Phase in 2013.
For more information, please contact:
Sven Landelius, Chairman of the ESS AB Board, tel. +46 (0)70 - 520 18 82
Lars Börjesson, Chairman of ESS Steering Committee, lars.borjesson@chalmers.se, tel. +46 (0)70 - 753 53 07
Marianne Ekdahl, Communications Officer Press & Public Affairs, marianne.ekdahl@esss.se, +46 (0)46 - 888 30 66
ESS IN SHORT:
The European Spallation Source – the next generation facility for materials research and life science
The European Spallation Source (ESS) will be a multi-disciplinary research laboratory based on the world’s most powerful neutron source. ESS can be likened to a large microscope, where neutrons are used instead of light to study materials – ranging from polymers and pharmaceuticals to membranes and molecules – to gain knowledge about their structure and function. ESS will be around 30 times better than existing facilities, opening up new possibilities for researchers in for example health, environment, climate, energy, transport sciences and cultural heritage.
ESS is an intergovernmental research infrastructure project, and it will be built in Lund in southern Scandinavia. Currently 17 European countries are Partners in the ESS project, and will take part in the construction, financing and operation of the ESS. Sweden and Denmark will co-host the ESS and cover 50 percent of the 1,4 B€ investment costs and 20 percent of the operating costs together with the Nordic and Baltic states.
The European Spallation Source ESS AB is a public limited company, today owned by the Swedish and the Danish states. ESS AB is currently working on finalizing the ESS technical design, planning the future research at ESS, preparing for construction, and planning the future international ESS organisation. This is done in collaboration with a large number of research institutes, universities and laboratories around the world. Construction is expected to start in 2013, the first neutrons to be produced in 2019 and the facility to be fully operational around 2025.
ESS is expected to support a user community of at least 5000 European researchers and will have great strategic importance for the development of the European Research Area. Near by there will be complementary laboratories, such as the synchrotron MAX IV in Lund and XFEL and PETRAIII in Hamburg.
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