Atkins has been picked by the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) to design the world’s first tritium fusion energy research centre.
The Hydrogen-3 Advanced Technology facility is set to be built at Culham Science Centre in Oxfordshire and will support ongoing work at ITER, a large fusion experiment being developed in southern France.
Tritium is a rare radioactive form of hydrogen that contains two neutrons and one proton, making it heavier than the common isotope of the element. It is used in the fusion process, which fuses two hydrogen atoms together to form helium, giving off a huge amount of excess energy. The same process powers the sun.