Report of the High Intensity Protons Working Group

The availability and the quality of the "low" energy accelerators have always been a strong asset of our laboratory, and a convincing argument for the construction at CERN of a new accelerator at the energy frontier. LHC is not an exception, and its performance will strongly depend upon the characteristics of its injectors: it is crucial to optimize them for that role and to plan their improvement according to the foreseen needs of the collider. Moreover, other physics communities use the beams delivered by the injector complex, and their needs have also to be taken into account. For these reasons, the High Intensity Proton working group was created at the end of the year 2002, with the mandate to make recommendations to the management of the Accelerators and Beams department for the future of the CERN proton accelerator complex. The working group was specifically asked to collect the needs of the various users communities, evaluate the benefits of the possible improvements and elaborate a preferred long-term scenario of the CERN accelerator complex. Short-term first priority steps had to be proposed, in line and consistent with the long-term scenario. This document is the final report of the HIP working group.