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2024 ANS Annual Conference
June 16–19, 2024
Las Vegas, NV|Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino
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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.
O. L. Gonçalez, L. P. Geraldo, R. Semmler
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 132 | Number 1 | May 1999 | Pages 135-147
Technical Note | doi.org/10.13182/NSE99-A2055
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Neutron photoproduction studies for 232Th and 238U were carried out from 5.61 to 10.83 MeV, by using up to 30 neutron capture gamma rays with high resolution in energy (4 to 20 eV), produced in an experimental arrangement at the IPEN-IEA-R1 2-MW research reactor. Samples of U3O8 depleted to 0.34% in 235U and natural ThO2 were irradiated inside a 4 sr long-counter neutron detector system, 520.5 cm away from the capture target. The gamma-ray flux was determined by means of a coaxial solid state Ge(Li) detector (EG&G ORTEC, 25 cm3, 5%) previously calibrated with capture gamma rays from a standard target of nitrogen (melamine). The compound neutron photoproduction cross section was measured for the gamma-ray spectrum produced by each capture target. Two methods to unfold the set of experimental data were proposed in order to obtain the differential cross sections at the main gamma line energies: the iterative and the least-squares methods. The calculated neutron photoproduction cross sections for 232Th and 238U were compared with experimental data reported by other authors who have employed different gamma-ray sources. A good overall agreement was observed among the experimental data, however, marked discrepancies were identified for some data points, indicating the possibility of narrow structures showing up at these excitation energies.