The €20bn ($21.4bn) International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (Iter) nuclear fusion project in southern France is now aiming for “a robust” reactor startup that will allow the project to make up for some of the delays it has accumulated and also provide for better risk mitigation, director-general Pietro Barabaschi told a press conference.

Barabaschi answered questions about a new project schedule that is being evaluated by the Iter Organisation’s governing body. He said Iter’s goals have not changed, but the first experimental phase of the machine, although delayed, will be “much more consequential than originally planned”.

An earlier 2016 schedule had seen a “low-energy, low-current first plasma” startup as the first major milestone – to be immediately followed by a multiyear assembly period to install major in-vessel components.

Barabaschi said the new schedule replaces the 2016 schedule, which for some time had been publicly acknowledged to be no longer “feasible, practical or optimal”.