European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures.
Working Group on Neutron Facilities
January 2003


Mandate and Composition of the ESFRI WG on Neutron Facilities
The Working Group on Neutron Facilities was established by the European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI) at its meeting on July 3, 2002. Its mandate is to carry out a comparative study of different scenarios for the development of facilities for neutron based science in Europe. The study will focus on scenarios that (1) include the building of the ESS (either now or in a timely manner) and (2) scenarios which has major upgrades of ILL and ISIS as key elements and ESS as a subsequent option. More specifically, the Working Group’s task is to address the following questions by comparing different scenarios:

1. Output aspects:
   • Type of research questions that can or cannot be addressed
   • European Research Areas perspectives and the influence on technology and the competitive position the European R&D base
   • Socio-economic impact including benefits for the local economy around the proposed facilities/investments
2. Life time aspects
3. Input aspects:
   • Construction costs
   • Operating costs
   • Auxiliary investments

The composition of the ESFRI Working Group on Neutrons is as follows:

F. Barocchi ENSA Chairman	Università di Firenze, Italy
J.K. Kjems Chairman	Risø National Laboratory, Denmark
F. Mezei	Hahn-Meitner-Institut Berlin, Germany
W. Reiter	Naturwissenschaften, Bundesministerium für Bildung, Wissenschaft und Kultur, Austria
A. Taylor	ISIS Facility, CCLRC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, UK
P. Tindemans	European Spallation Source
G.E. Törnqvist	Lund University, Sweden
C. Vettier	Institute Laue-Langevin Grenoble, France
M. Malacarne	European Commission
E. Righi	Scientific Secretary – European Commission

The WG has consulted members of EURAB with industrial background on the industrial scope of the scenarios.

Executive Summary
At its first meeting the Working Group learned that the Millennium Program at ILL and the plans for a Second Target Station at ISIS are well under way and decided to include these developments as a baseline for the scenarios considered.
This report contains a strategic analysis of three medium to long-term future scenarios (10 – 20 years) for neutron-based science and technology in Europe. The analysis has focussed on the existing and proposed top-rank facilities. The three scenarios are compared on the basis of their scientific and technical merits, socio-economic impacts, costs and timeliness seen in a global perspective. The aim of the report is to provide road maps for the decision-making by European governments in the spirit of the European Research Area, ERA.

Scenario 1 aims at a neutron landscape with ESS fully implemented as the new world leading facility, supplemented by a baseline including fully developed ILL and ISIS and a selected network of regional and national sources. This scenario would provide world-leading capability in all areas of neutron science and could serve a growing community of researchers.

Scenario 2 aims at a situation where only the first long pulse phase of ESS is implemented and where the rest of the landscape is similar to scenario one. In this case, Europe would be world leading in some fields and have some leads in others. The total capacity for highest quality neutron beam research would be reduced compared with scenario 1.

Scenario 3 is the least ambitious, with the initial implementation of a new 1 MW short pulse source. This corresponds to maintaining the over-all level of capability and capacity in a manner where Europe would remain competitive but not leading over a broad range of disciplines.

The common trend for all three scenarios is that they focus on the most powerful sources and propose to make them into assets for the whole of the European neutron community in the ERA spirit. The need for a European strategy for neutron science infrastructure represents a challenge for decision making in Europe. There is a window of opportunity to go forward in a coherent manner with one of the proposed scenarios. At the very least this would maintain the momentum that Europe developed over the years, and in the most ambitious case will develop new opportunities for science and technology commensurate with both the standing of Europe in the world and the ambitions expressed by the European leaders in the Lisbon and Barcelona summits.
Elements for an ERA strategy for neutron science infrastructures

• It should be recognised from the outset that the neutron landscape is dynamically changing without any joint decisions at the ERA level. By 2020 it is estimated that only half of the current capacity for neutron experiments will be available, as existing facilities reach the end of their life span.
• A vital element of an ERA neutron strategy is the willingness of the present owners to recycle the funds from existing facilities to the new ones in the scenarios described here.
• The ERA strategy should follow the OECD recommendations with emphasis on the best performing facilities. The corollary is that efforts should be made to ensure that the least performing facilities are retired first.
• The analysis shows that the total recurrent operating costs for the existing (and newly retired) facilities in Europe are approximately 300 M€/year. Retaining the top four to five highest impact facilities would free only 100 to 120 M€ in recurrent spending. However, this would give an opportunity to cover the projected recurrent costs (including investments in instrumentation) in scenario 2 and scenario 3. The realisation of scenario 1 would require additional recurrent costs in the range of 20 M€.

• Provide a viable avenue for decision making, taking into account the possible couplings to other science infrastructure decisions;
• make possible the realisation of the most ambitious scenarios, scenario 1 or scenario 2;
• Maximise the scientific return per unit cost. This is the only affordable way for Europe to maintain a strategic world lead in the broad disciplines and technologies underpinned by neutron science;
• Provide unique and equal opportunities for European scientists, in particular for young scientists and scientists from the new EU member countries;
• Make a visible and credible major step towards the realisation of the Lisbon and Barcelona ambitions.