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The busyness of the nuclear fuel supply chain
Ken Petersenpresident@ans.org
With all that is happening in the industry these days, the nuclear fuel supply chain is still a hot topic. The Russian assault in Ukraine continues to upend the “where” and “how” of attaining nuclear fuel—and it has also motivated U.S. legislators to act.
Two years into the Russian war with Ukraine, things are different. The Inflation Reduction Act was passed in 2022, authorizing $700 million in funding to support production of high-assay low-enriched uranium in the United States. Meanwhile, the Department of Energy this January issued a $500 million request for proposals to stimulate new HALEU production. The Emergency National Security Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2024 includes $2.7 billion in funding for new uranium enrichment production. This funding was diverted from the Civil Nuclear Credits program and will only be released if there is a ban on importing Russian uranium into the United States—which could happen by the time this column is published, as legislation that bans Russian uranium has passed the House as of this writing and is headed for the Senate. Also being considered is legislation that would sanction Russian uranium. Alternatively, the Biden-Harris administration may choose to ban Russian uranium without legislation in order to obtain access to the $2.7 billion in funding.
Robert Lunsford, Roger Raman, A. Brooks, R. A. Ellis, W.-S. Lay
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 75 | Number 8 | November 2019 | Pages 767-774
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/15361055.2019.1629246
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The electromagnetic particle injector (EPI) concept is advanced through the simulation of ablatant deposition into ITER H-mode discharges with calculations showing penetration past the H-mode pedestal for a range of injection velocities and granule sizes concurrent with the requirements of disruption mitigation. As discharge stored energy increases in future fusion devices such as ITER, control and handling of disruption events become critical issues. An unmitigated disruption could lead to failure of the plasma-facing components resulting in financially and politically costly repairs. Methods to facilitate the quench of an unstable high-current discharge are required. With the onset warning time for some ITER disruption events estimated to be less than 10 ms, a disruption mitigation system needs to be considered that operates at injection speeds greater than gaseous sound speeds. Such an actuator could then serve as a means to augment presently planned pneumatic injection systems. The EPI uses a railgun concept whereby a radiative payload is delivered into the discharge by means of the J×B forces generated by an external current pulse, allowing for injection velocities in excess of 1 km/s. The present status of the EPI project is outlined, including the addition of boost magnetic coils. These coils augment the self-generated railgun magnetic field and thus provide a more efficient acceleration of the payload. The coils and the holder designed to constrain them have been modeled with the ANSYS code to ensure structural integrity through the range of operational coil currents.