ANS is committed to advancing, fostering, and promoting the development and application of nuclear sciences and technologies to benefit society.
Explore the many uses for nuclear science and its impact on energy, the environment, healthcare, food, and more.
Division Spotlight
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.
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!
Latest Magazine Issues
Apr 2024
Jan 2024
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
May 2024
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
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.
A. Petruzzi, M. Cherubini, F. D'Auria
Nuclear Technology | Volume 193 | Number 1 | January 2016 | Pages 47-87
Technical Paper | Special Issue on the RELAP5-3D Computer Code | doi.org/10.13182/NT14-144
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The application of RELAP5 at GRNSPG & NINE (Nuclear Research Group of San Piero a Grado–Nuclear and Industrial Engineering) started more than 30 years ago during which several versions of the code have been applied for the analysis of a very large variety of scenarios occurring in facilities and nuclear installations. The present paper has two goals: (1) to summarize the results and main outcomes achieved through the application of RELAP5 to international projects and benchmarks in which GRNSPG & NINE was involved and (2) to qualify the system’s thermal-hydraulic code calculations through the systematic application of a set of developed procedures.
Among the analyses performed, this paper will provide insights into the code results and, whenever possible, into the comparison with the reference/experimental data of scenarios measured in (1) integral test facilities: PSB-VVER, ATLAS, PKL, LOBI, LOFT, SPES, PACTEL; (2) separate effect test facilities: BFBT, Neptun, PANDA; (3) research reactors: Experimental Breeder Reactor (EBR); and (4) nuclear power plants: Atucha-II [pressurized heavy water reactor (PHWR)-Konvoi], VVER-1000, Darlington (CANDU).
In relation to the methodology developed for qualifying a system thermal-hydraulic code calculation, this paper provides a short description and spot results of the systematic application to the cases mentioned above in respect to some of the following steps: (1) demonstration of the geometrical fidelity; (2) demonstration of the steady-state achievement; (3) qualification at the on-transient level, which implies the characterization of (a) phenomenological windows and (b) relevant thermal-hydraulic aspects; and (4) quantitative analysis to evaluate the accuracy of the code calculation using the fast Fourier transform based method.
Finally, the main outcomes of the analyses summarized in this paper are the characterization of the level of assessment of RELAP5 and the demonstration of existence of a robust procedure to qualify system thermal-hydraulic code calculations.
