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Isotopes & Radiation
Members are devoted to applying nuclear science and engineering technologies involving isotopes, radiation applications, and associated equipment in scientific research, development, and industrial processes. Their interests lie primarily in education, industrial uses, biology, medicine, and health physics. Division committees include Analytical Applications of Isotopes and Radiation, Biology and Medicine, Radiation Applications, Radiation Sources and Detection, and Thermal Power Sources.
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2024 ANS Annual Conference
June 16–19, 2024
Las Vegas, NV|Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino
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Glass strategy: Hanford’s enhanced waste glass program
The mission of the Department of Energy’s Office of River Protection (ORP) is to complete the safe cleanup of waste resulting from decades of nuclear weapons development. One of the most technologically challenging responsibilities is the safe disposition of approximately 56 million gallons of radioactive waste historically stored in 177 tanks at the Hanford Site in Washington state.
ORP has a clear incentive to reduce the overall mission duration and cost. One pathway is to develop and deploy innovative technical solutions that can advance baseline flow sheets toward higher efficiency operations while reducing identified risks without compromising safety. Vitrification is the baseline process that will convert both high-level and low-level radioactive waste at Hanford into a stable glass waste form for long-term storage and disposal.
Although vitrification is a mature technology, there are key areas where technology can further reduce operational risks, advance baseline processes to maximize waste throughput, and provide the underpinning to enhance operational flexibility; all steps in reducing mission duration and cost.
Kazuo Haga, Yoshihiro Kikuchi
Nuclear Technology | Volume 70 | Number 2 | August 1985 | Pages 220-234
Technical Paper | Nuclear Fuel | doi.org/10.13182/NT85-A33646
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A series of experiments was performed to assess the thermal effect of a burst-type fission gas release from fuel pins. Simulated fission product gas was injected continuously and transiently from the central pin of a 37-pin bundle. The opposite pin surface impinged on by the released gas showed an extreme temperature rise under high coolant-flow conditions. Comparison of measured temperature change data with analytical results by a simple computer code revealed that the ratios of the heat transfer coefficient after gas injection to those of sodium single-phase flow were in the range of 0.05 to 0.15, irrespective of the magnitude of the gas plenum pressure and the nozzle diameter. The estimated pin-surface temperature increased by gas release in actual reactor operating conditions was less than the saturation temperature of sodium. The measured pressure pulse at the transient gas release was <0.2 times the initial gas plenum pressure.