12 November 2018

The European XFEL is an international research facility of superlatives:

27,000 flashes of light per second with a luminosity a billion times higher than that of the best conventional X-ray sources open up a wide range of new research possibilities.

Research teams from all over the world use the European XFEL to study nanoscale structures, ultrafast processes and extreme states of matter, capture three-dimensional images of viruses and proteins, and film chemical reactions.

More than 350 employees work directly for European XFEL, with a further roughly 240 DESY colleagues operating the linear accelerator for European XFEL.

With costs of 1.25 billion euros (at 2005 price levels) and a length of 3.4 kilometres, the European XFEL is one of the largest and most ambitious new research facilities in Europe.

The X-ray laser facility extends from the DESY campus in Hamburg to the research campus in Schenefeld (Pinneberg district). Construction began in early 2009, and scientific user operations started in 2017.

The research campus has seen the construction of buildings with modern architecture, such as the headquarters building XHQ, the workshop building XHWS and the canteen XHC. Further buildings, such as a guest house, are in planning.

PLANATEL Planungs- und Beratungsges. mbH has supported European XFEL in Schenefeld with the development of the site through consulting services and construction supervision in security technology and lightning protection since 2013, and is thus directly involved in the creation of the new site.

The entire PLANATEL team is proud to have won over European X-Fel through experience and expertise, and is delighted with the commission.