Iran’s Atomic Energy Chief Calls Fusion a Future Energy Priority

TEHRAN — Iran’s atomic energy chief has described nuclear fusion as a strategic technology for the future and said the country cannot afford to fall behind international efforts in the field.

Mohammad Eslami, vice president of Iran and head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, made the remarks during a ceremony marking Iran’s Government Week, where the organization unveiled four knowledge-based achievements. According to the Iranian Students News Agency report, the event took place on Wednesday, 4 Shahrivar, and included the launch of plasma-diagnostic systems for tokamak facilities as well as a laboratory for non-destructive testing.

“ The fusion project, which is considered the energy of the future and in which all developed countries are investing, is not something we can neglect or allow ourselves to fall behind,” Eslami said.

His comments presented fusion as part of a longer-term national technology agenda rather than as an isolated research project. Eslami said Iran needed to plan for future generations and develop emerging technologies through domestic capabilities and the participation of researchers, universities and companies.

He also argued that Iran’s nuclear industry had continued to advance despite what he described as psychological operations, hostile campaigns, sanctions, conspiracies and acts of sabotage intended to obstruct the country’s nuclear development. Eslami said the organization had pursued its path without dependence or fear and had reached a significant scientific and technological level.

The head of the Atomic Energy Organization said the capabilities developed within the organization were now enabling it to provide services and products to different sectors of the country. He described those capabilities as reducing domestic dependence in several areas, although the report did not provide a detailed list of the products or quantify the reductions.

### A push to accelerate the national fusion plan

Eslami said Iran’s national fusion program should move faster and in a more concentrated manner so that research and development efforts could lead to final products. He said Iran had to rely on its own resources because, in his assessment, no one was cooperating with the country in this field.

The official pointed to the organization’s “open innovation” model, which he said had been operational since 1402 in the Iranian calendar. He described the model as a network of knowledge-based companies identified and brought into the organization’s technology ecosystem.

According to Eslami, the fusion teams had moved beyond the stage of proving the technology and had entered stages involving the construction of systems, subsystems and capabilities. He said expanding the network of companies could shorten the route toward a final product.

The report did not specify the technical performance of the fusion systems under development, the timetable for completion, or the criteria being used to define a final product. It did, however, describe the program as involving multiple companies and a range of specialized projects, including plasma-diagnostic and heating systems.

Eslami also called for closer connections between the fusion program and universities. He said university infrastructure was being provided with services so that academic centers could help educate and train specialized personnel. In his view, Iran needed to develop professors and students in the fusion field while strengthening university laboratories alongside its industrial work.

He said the development of companies based on knowledge and technology was another requirement for giving the field greater momentum. The emphasis on education, laboratories and industrial participation reflected the organization’s stated aim of creating a broader domestic ecosystem around fusion research.

Eslami further referred to national policy documents issued in the 1370s in the Iranian calendar, saying that the national fusion plan and nuclear-energy development had been established within the country’s general policy framework roughly 30 years ago. He said that if insufficient work had been carried out, responsibility lay with the organization and its officials rather than with the broader political system.

He called for the remaining path to be pursued “faster, more intensively and more decisively,” with the assistance of the Shams network. The report described the network as having a role in advancing research during the first stage of the program, but did not provide further details about its structure or activities.

### Plasma diagnostics described as a critical capability

Ali Norouzi, a deputy head of the Atomic Energy Organization and managing director of Iran’s Advanced Technologies Company, said diagnostic projects were among the important initiatives included in a portfolio of 100 projects.

Norouzi described diagnostic systems as the “eyes of the plasma.” He said monitoring and controlling plasma was especially important in fusion because the plasma involved reaches temperatures of several million degrees Celsius.

He said conventional diagnostic equipment could not be used for such conditions and that specialized advanced systems were required. Norouzi added that these systems were subject to sanctions and were not readily obtainable. He identified measurements involving ion temperature, electron temperature, density and energy loss as examples of the information that needed to be examined.

The official said Iran had reached a stage at which several of these systems were usable and installable. He said one system had been unveiled several years earlier and that three more systems were presented during the latest ceremony. The report did not identify the installations by location or provide independent technical evaluations of their performance.

The systems unveiled at the event were identified as a photoelectron system, a bolometry system and a charge-exchange system for tokamak plasma diagnosis. The organization also launched a laboratory dedicated to non-destructive testing, or NDT.

Norouzi said the next group of projects would involve heating systems. He added that projects could involve several companies at once, with numerous firms contributing to a single project or individual companies working on separate projects. His comments underscored the organization’s reliance on a distributed network of industrial and technology partners.

### Non-destructive testing and industrial standards

The ceremony also focused on capabilities extending beyond fusion research. Eslami said the new NDT training and testing center would serve industries and processes across the country, which he said required non-destructive testing in different forms.

He described the center as a facility intended to provide evaluation services, qualification assessments and skills training for personnel. He said the center’s creation, alongside the organization’s role as a principal body for materials, could help expand the technology nationally.

Eslami linked industrial quality and standardization to two basic requirements: a detailed understanding of material properties and precision in measurement. Knowledge of material properties, he said, was necessary for evaluating capability, service life and expected behavior. Accurate measurement and strict attention to tolerances were needed to achieve standardized results.

He said applying those principles carefully could help produce standardized and competitive products. Because of the sensitivity of nuclear industries, he described them as the first users of these institutional and technical capabilities. He expressed hope that the initiatives would contribute to industrial quality, technological development and an improved quality of life for people in Iran.

The report did not provide information about the center’s capacity, accreditation status, training schedule or the industries expected to use its services. Its stated functions, however, include testing, personnel qualification and technical education.

### Domestic development amid restrictions

The statements by Eslami and Norouzi placed domestic development at the center of Iran’s fusion strategy. The officials portrayed sanctions and restrictions on access to advanced equipment as obstacles that made local design and manufacturing necessary.

At the same time, the organization’s presentation suggested that its approach involves more than developing individual devices. It is seeking to connect specialized diagnostics, heating technologies, university laboratories, technical training and knowledge-based companies within a single national program.

The evidence supplied for the report establishes that the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization unveiled three tokamak plasma-diagnostic systems and opened an NDT laboratory during the ceremony. It also establishes that Iranian officials regard fusion as a future energy priority and intend to accelerate research through domestic capabilities and institutional cooperation.

It does not establish the current energy output of any Iranian fusion facility, the existence of commercial fusion generation in Iran, or a date by which a commercial product will be delivered. Those elements remain unspecified in the account of the event.

For now, the organization’s public message is focused on building the scientific and industrial foundations needed to advance the national fusion plan. Eslami’s appeal was that Iran should not miss what he described as a global technological race, while Norouzi emphasized the specialized diagnostic systems required to understand and control the extreme conditions inside fusion plasma.

Together, their remarks outline an ambition built around self-reliance, university training and collaboration with domestic technology companies. Whether those efforts can be translated into a completed fusion system will depend on the progress of the projects, the capacity of the participating institutions and the technical results achieved in the next stages.