[Moller_L2] Happy Holidays

[James Fast]

MOLLER collaborators,
As I sit here finishing up the final preparations for our January review I was reflecting on all the MOLLER collaboration, project team, NSF cohort an CFI contingent have accomplished in the past 12 months – including a slew of very successful reviews:

  *   In January we had the Detector and GEM PDRs
  *   In May the Spectrometer PDR
  *   In June the Shielding and Utilities PDF
  *   In November we held the annual status and CD-3a Director’s Review
  *   And in December the FDR for all of the MOLLER systems

And we made enormous technical progress as well:

  *   Completed irradiation studies of quartz and started irradiation studies of 3D printed components
  *   Had two successful beam tests at Mainz
  *   Completed designs of all MOLLER systems…for the most part
  *   Completed prototyping of the downstream spectrometer coils
  *   Fabricated and did initial tests on the prototype window for the drift pipe
  *   Completed assembly of [most of] the “phase 1” beam line elements

For much of the year I was contemplating how we could weather a very lean FY23 budget and what that would mean for the MOLLER schedule – and it was not pleasant.  Then in August we were informed that MOLLER would be fully funded through the Inflation Reduction Act and in October we received $31M.  In response to this funding, and difficulties staffing our management team, we postponed CD-2/3 and proposed to DOE that we insert a CD-3a in early CY23 to allow us to proceed with long lead procurements.  After some iteration with DOE we developed a CD-3a plan and justification that they are happy with and are on our way to a CD-3a Independent Project Review (OPA review) in January.  I have little doubt that review will go well and that it will be followed shortly with an ESAAB meeting and finally approval of CD-3a by Tim Hallman.  Then MOLLER will indeed be on its way.

We do face some challenges in the coming year.  Staffing will no doubt continue to be a challenge – one I am continually working with JLab management.  Costs for many items have risen sharply, putting financial strain on the NSF and CFI projects that, unlike the DOE project, do not have cost contingency. Mark, KK, Michael, Juliette and I are all working together to find ways to navigate this. The DOE project too has seen very high cost inflation, but so far it is well within our contingency.  On the technical side we still have some open issues, many off-project, including the readout for the BCMs, electron detectors for the Compton polarimeter, and completion of the ESR-2 cryoplant to name a few.

As I look ahead to next year, I see an exciting transition for MOLLER from a decades-long planning and design phase to fabrication and assembly of the apparatus. Our review schedule will not be as onerous, but we will start the year with a review and shortly afterwards will need to be working diligently on preparations for CD-2/3, primarily ensuring that the costs, labor and schedule we are proposing are all realistic and defensible so that as we execute the project we can do so to plan.  In parallel, the collaboration will be continuing simulations efforts, but also developing software and analysis tools for system testing and ultimately for data analysis.

I am thankful to have landed with such a great team of physicists, engineers, designers and support staff who work so well together.  It makes my job that much easier.  So as we all head in to holiday break, I just want to say thank you all and enjoy a restful and happy holiday season.

Kind regards,
Jim

James Fast
MOLLER Project Manager
Jefferson Lab
757-230-6833 (cell)
757-269-5324 (office)

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://mailman.jlab.org/pipermail/moller_l2/attachments/20221222/6de9a48f/attachment.html>