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College students help develop waste-measuring device at Hanford
A partnership between Washington River Protection Solutions (WRPS) and Washington State University has resulted in the development of a device to measure radioactive and chemical tank waste at the Hanford Site. WRPS is the contractor at Hanford for the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management.
Neil E. Todreas
Nuclear Technology | Volume 167 | Number 1 | July 2009 | Pages 127-144
Technical Paper | NURETH-12 / Fission Reactors | doi.org/10.13182/NT09-A8857
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Thermal-hydraulic challenges in the design of the following four Generation IV fast reactor concepts are presented: sodium \[sodium-cooled fast reactor (SFR)\], lead \[lead-cooled fast reactor (LFR)\], gas \[gas-cooled fast reactor (GFR)\], and liquid salt \[liquid salt-cooled fast reactor (LSFR)\]. The supercritical carbon dioxide Brayton cycle in indirect mode is the candidate power cycle for all coolants except gas, which is direct cycle. Thermal-hydraulic considerations must be closely integrated with neutronic analysis to properly control reactivity feedbacks, particularly that of the coolant density coefficient. The thermal-hydraulic performance of all reactors is compared to the sodium concept, which has superior performance because of the inherent properties of sodium. The chemical incompatibility of sodium with water and air remains a concern, should a steam generator tube or other sodium line leak. Challenges in steady-state operation, transient performance, shutdown heat removal, and loss-of-coolant-accident design accommodation in gas reactors are reviewed.