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Mark Peters: Building on a strong foundation
Summer at the American Nuclear Society carries with it a sense of renewed momentum as the incoming president takes office and starts making plans for the year ahead. This has been particularly true in the last few years, as nuclear energy moves into a new era marked by broader public interest, stronger policy support, and a growing sense of possibility across the field. Mark Peters, the Society’s 72nd president, shares that optimism—and he is focused on turning it into results.
Munemichi Kawaguchi, Yasushi Hirakawa, Yusuke Sugita, Yutaka Yamaguchi
Nuclear Technology | Volume 210 | Number 1 | January 2024 | Pages 55-71
Research Article | doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2023.2214261
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
This study has researched an estimation method for the amounts of residual sodium film and sodium lumps on dummy fuel pins in the Japanese prototype fast breeder reactor Monju by fundamental experiments and demonstration experiments. The residual sodium amounts on the pin surface were measured using three types of test specimens: (a) single pin, (b) 7-pin assembly, and (c) 169-pin assembly. The single pin and 7-pin assembly experiments revealed that the withdrawal speed of the pins and improvement of the sodium wetting drastically increased the residual sodium amounts. Furthermore, the 169-pin assembly experiments measured the practical amounts of the residual sodium in the Monju dummy fuel assembly and demonstrated sodium draining behavior through small gaps between the pins. The estimation method includes four models such as a viscosity flow model, Landau-Levich-Derjaguin (LLD) model, an empirical equation related to the Bretherton model, and a capillary force model in a tube. These calculation results were comparable to the residual sodium amounts obtained by the experiments. In the tests of improving sodium wetting, the amounts of residual sodium on the test specimen were close to 1.4 times larger than those of the thin sodium film estimated by the LLD model. The increased amount of residual sodium by improving the sodium wetting was explained by the ratio of the adhesion energy ().