Documenting The International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor

New Email: Please meet Alex. He is based in Shanghai and I think he will meet your needs, @Alex this is Alistar working with Bloomberg.

Best, - Mr. X

Sometimes it is that easy. Working as a freelance photographer, project manager or whatever it may be, comes with the work of finding the job before you actually work on what you are skilled in. However every now and then an email places itself neatly in your inbox and you can skip the frustrations of finding work. Alistar told me about the project which was to document a certain piece of the ITER. ITER stands for International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor.

Most of my work revolves around commercial brands that I am already familiar with so this was an interesting foundation for a project. Doing research about what I was getting myself into brought a new level of excitement to the project. If you want in-depth information about ITER and this project you can check out the article Bloomberg wrote up here.

Currently, traditional nuclear reactors generate power by splitting atoms inside fission reactors. ITER is the opposite in a sense. ITER aims to fuse (instead of split) atoms together at 150 million degrees Celsius, a temperature 10 times hotter than the sun. So the big take away is that ITER is looking to create energy in a way that is theoretically possible but has never been achieved in a real-world scenario. ITER is approaching this project on a global scale. Instead of working solely out of one country the project aims to bring the world together by having certain parts of the machine be built all over the world. In Hefei, China the area I was responsible for documenting, this particular factory was responsible for manufacturing and testing the coils within ITER.

My expectations of the factory site: armed guards at the entrance, spotless shiny metals, hustling and bustling scientists in uniform.

The reality of the factory site: We arrived at the entrance to the factory complex for a 9 am call time. The guards opened the gate and let us in with no problems. I was surprised to see how desolate and empty the streets of this factory complex were. It took maybe 3 or 5 minutes to drive from the entrance of the complex to the entrance of our specific building unit. Alistar is a seasoned photographer who focuses on photographing large industrial machinery. Alistar has seen his fair share of factories around the world and he said that this building was either the biggest or second-biggest factor he has ever been in, in his entire life. The scale was jaw-dropping. Big enough that I could easily fly my drone inside which was lucky because Alistar’s original plan was to document getting this coil onto a freight ship that would be arranged to be sent to France where everything will be assembled from all over the world. However, that plan changed when they were delayed from shipping out the unit.

That was definitely not the biggest surprise of the day. When we arrived there was casing over the coil which enclosed it for testing. We learned that the casing for the coil may not be lifted from the coil that day. It would all depend on the testing they were doing that morning. This was a serious issue as Alistar had traveled all the way from Copenhagen and my self from Shanghai for this one narrow window to document the coil. The factory site itself deserves mention. This gargantuan space used to be a factory where diesel engines were manufactured. The factory must have gone out of business because only a small portion of the space was being used and that was for the development of the ITER coil. It was interesting to realize they did not need a special environment to produce the coil.

With only time to tell, we spent the morning shooting photo and video of the machine with the case on it. Wearing bright blue work helmet, milling about this tremendous factory brought on a sensation of authority and intention to my job. I was the lego man I used to play with many years ago. There was something very satisfying about working within a factory as if I had this added boost of confidence.

As we watched them do their tests it felt like almost nothing was happening at all. It was silent and the technicians were just looking at computer screens to read data as it came through. We were lucky the tests went in favor of releasing the coil of its casing. The casing was lifted by a crane and placed to the side of the coil. The inside of the coil was revealed: messy copper wiring, tin foil, black tape and some shiny metal that was quite as shiny as I would have liked it to be. The factory space was incredible for flying my drone. This was by far the biggest indoor space I have flown in allowing for interesting angles. However, the metals and materials within the space created difficulty with a remote connection to the drone itself limiting distance and speed I could go. Enjoy the end product.

Working outside of the norm, especially on a project that could literally transform the world felt like an experience worth sharing. Thanks a bunch to Alastair and Jane from Bloomberg for this awesome opportunity. I’m looking forward to seeing the progress of ITER and where it takes us into the future.