ITER LHe Plants Parallel Operation

The ITER Cryogenic System includes three identical liquid helium (LHe) plants, with a total average cooling capacity equivalent to 75 kW at 4.5 K.The LHe plants provide the 4.5 K cooling power to the magnets and cryopumps. They are designed to operate in parallel and to handle heavy load variations.In this proceedingwe will describe the presentstatusof the ITER LHe plants with emphasis on i) the project schedule, ii) the plantscharacteristics/layout and iii) the basic principles and control strategies for a stable operation of the three LHe plants in parallel.