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
Education, Training & Workforce Development
The Education, Training & Workforce Development Division provides communication among the academic, industrial, and governmental communities through the exchange of views and information on matters related to education, training and workforce development in nuclear and radiological science, engineering, and technology. Industry leaders, education and training professionals, and interested students work together through Society-sponsored meetings and publications, to enrich their professional development, to educate the general public, and to advance nuclear and radiological science and engineering.
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
May 2024
Jan 2024
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
June 2024
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
Proving DRACO will deliver
The United States is now closer than it has been in over five decades to launching the first nuclear thermal rocket into space, thanks to DRACO—the Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Orbit.
P. Silvennoinen, T. Vieno, J. Vira
Nuclear Technology | Volume 48 | Number 1 | April 1980 | Pages 34-42
Technical Paper | Fuel Cycle | doi.org/10.13182/NT80-A32445
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A technique has been devised to combine multiple criteria in fuel cycle optimization. Besides the conventional economic optimum, the model comprises the objectives of minimizing the economic risk as well as the proliferation hazard in the light water reactor (LWR) fuel cycle. Based on a material flow model, objective functions are formulated in a form amenable to linear programming. The scheme commences with a single-criterion stage, where the three solutions and suboptimal strategies obtained span the domain of feasible multigoal solutions. The multigoal optimum is searched by means of fuzzy optimization techniques that are eventually reduced again to linear programming. The method is applied to a reference nuclear power program. In this case, the economic optimum is found to motivate plutonium recycle in the LWR. The sole minimization of the proliferation risk corresponds to recycling the uranium only. Reprocessing and plutonium utilization should take place in a more resistant system. Minimization of economic risks would in this case lead to the once-through cycle. The combination of all the three criteria in the multigoal optimum is achieved by a recycle strategy where the recycle loadings are batched and scheduled to take place in a discontinuous manner. A substantial reduction of the proliferation risk can be claimed at an economic penalty that would be on the order of 10 to 15% of the fuel cycle costs.