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Operations & Power
Members focus on the dissemination of knowledge and information in the area of power reactors with particular application to the production of electric power and process heat. The division sponsors meetings on the coverage of applied nuclear science and engineering as related to power plants, non-power reactors, and other nuclear facilities. It encourages and assists with the dissemination of knowledge pertinent to the safe and efficient operation of nuclear facilities through professional staff development, information exchange, and supporting the generation of viable solutions to current issues.
Meeting Spotlight
2024 ANS Annual Conference
June 16–19, 2024
Las Vegas, NV|Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino
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The Standards Committee is responsible for the development and maintenance of voluntary consensus standards that address the design, analysis, and operation of components, systems, and facilities related to the application of nuclear science and technology. Find out What’s New, check out the Standards Store, or Get Involved today!
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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.
Rui Zhang, Jonas D. Fontenot, Dragan Mirkovic, John S. Hendricks, Wayne D. Newhauser
Nuclear Technology | Volume 183 | Number 1 | July 2013 | Pages 101-106
Technical Paper | Radiation Transport and Protection | doi.org/10.13182/NT13-A16995
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Monte Carlo simulations are increasingly used to reconstruct dose distributions in radiotherapy research studies. Many studies have used the MCNPX Monte Carlo code with a mesh tally for dose reconstructions. However, when the number of voxels in the simulated patient anatomy is large, the computation time for a mesh tally can become prohibitively long. The purpose of this work was to test the feasibility of using lattice tally instead of mesh tally for whole-body dose reconstructions. We did this by comparing the dosimetric accuracy and computation time of lattice tallies with those of mesh tallies for craniospinal proton irradiation. The two tally methods generated nearly identical dosimetric results, within 1% in dose and within 1 mm distance-to-agreement for 99% of the voxels. For a typical craniospinal proton treatment field, simulation speed was 4 to 17 times faster using the lattice tally than using the mesh tally, depending on the numbers of proton histories and voxels. We conclude that the lattice tally is an acceptable substitute for the mesh tally in dose reconstruction, making it a suitable potential candidate for clinical treatment planning.