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Division Spotlight
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
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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Remembering Charles E. Till
Charles E. Till
Charles E. Till, an ANS member since 1963 and Fellow since 1987, passed away on March 22 at the age of 89. He earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Saskatchewan and a Ph.D. in nuclear engineering from Imperial College, University of London. Till initially worked for the Civilian Atomic Power Department of the Canadian General Electric Company, where he was the physicist in charge of the startup of the first prototype CANDU reactor in Canada.
Till joined Argonne National Laboratory in 1963 in the Applied Physics Division, where he worked as an experimentalist in the Fast Critical Experiments program. He then moved to additional positions of increasing responsibility, becoming division director in 1973. Under his leadership, the Applied Physics Division established itself as one of the elite reactor physics organizations in the world. Both the experimental (critical experiments and nuclear data measurements) and nuclear analysis methods work were internationally recognized. Till led Argonne’s participation in the International Nuclear Fuel Cycle Evaluation (INFCE), and he was the lead U.S. delegate to INFCE Working Group 5, Fast Breeders.
T. Fei, M. J. Driscoll, E. Shwageraus
Nuclear Technology | Volume 186 | Number 3 | June 2014 | Pages 378-389
Technical Paper | Fuel Cycle and Management | doi.org/10.13182/NT13-21
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The purpose of this study was to demonstrate the neutronic feasibility and competitive fuel cycle economics of sodium fast reactors operating with uranium metal (UZr) fuel on a once-through fuel cycle. Uranium startup fast reactors (USFRs) decouple their deployment from that of expensive reprocessing and recycle facilities. This could facilitate and speed up the deployment of conventional fast reactors, which, in their traditional designs, heavily depend on the availability of reprocessing facilities for transuranic fuel production. The uranium requirement and fuel cycle cost of studied USFR core designs are calculated to be comparable to those of typical light water reactors. The main design constraint is the fast neutron fluence imposed on the cladding material, which is required to be below 5.0×1023 n/cm2 even for advanced oxide dispersion strengthened steels. Therefore, moderators need to be inserted in the fuel assemblies to lower the fast neutron flux so that the fuel residence time limited by neutron fluence can be extended to match the reactivity limited fuel residence time. In this study, magnesium oxide is used for reflectors as well as for the moderator.