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Division Spotlight
Reactor Physics
The division's objectives are to promote the advancement of knowledge and understanding of the fundamental physical phenomena characterizing nuclear reactors and other nuclear systems. The division encourages research and disseminates information through meetings and publications. Areas of technical interest include nuclear data, particle interactions and transport, reactor and nuclear systems analysis, methods, design, validation and operating experience and standards. The Wigner Award heads the awards program.
Meeting Spotlight
2024 ANS Winter Conference and Expo
November 17–21, 2024
Orlando, FL|Renaissance Orlando at SeaWorld
Standards Program
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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Latest News
NRC restores expiration dates for renewed Turkey Point licenses
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission announced this week that it has restored the expiration dates of the Turkey Point nuclear power plant's units 3 and 4 subsequent license renewals (SLR) to July 19, 2052, and April 10, 2053, respectively.
Cheol Nam, Yong-Hwan Jeong, Youn-Ho Jung
Nuclear Technology | Volume 136 | Number 2 | November 2001 | Pages 158-168
Technical Paper | Fuel Cycle and Management | doi.org/10.13182/NT01-A3235
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
During the last decade, the failure behavior of high-burnup fuel rods under a reactivity-initiated accident (RIA) condition has been a serious concern since fuel rod failures at low enthalpy have been observed. This has resulted in the reassessment of existing licensing criteria and failure-mode study. To address the issue, a statistics-based methodology is suggested to predict failure probability of irradiated fuel rods under an RIA. Based on RIA simulation results in the literature, a failure enthalpy correlation for an irradiated fuel rod is constructed as a function of oxide thickness, fuel burnup, and pulse width. Using the failure enthalpy correlation, a new concept of "equivalent enthalpy" is introduced to reflect the effects of the three primary factors as well as peak fuel enthalpy into a single damage parameter. Moreover, the failure distribution function with equivalent enthalpy is derived, applying a two-parameter Weibull statistical model. Finally, the sensitivity analysis is carried out to estimate the effects of burnup, corrosion, peak fuel enthalpy, pulse width, and cladding materials used.