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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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Latest News
Framatome begins expansion of facilities in Virginia
An official groundbreaking last week at Framatome’s Mill Ridge Road facility, in Lynchburg, Va., marks the start of a $50 million expansion and an eventual addition of 500 employees, according to the nuclear company.
Chang H. Oh, J. Han, R. Barner, E. S. Kim, S. Sherman
Nuclear Technology | Volume 166 | Number 1 | April 2009 | Pages 113-120
Technical Note | Nuclear Plant Operations and Control | doi.org/10.13182/NT09-A6973
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The U.S. Department of Energy and Idaho National Laboratory are developing a next-generation nuclear plant, very high temperature gas-cooled reactor (VHTR) to serve as a demonstration of state-of-the-art nuclear technology. The purpose of the demonstration is twofold: (a) efficient low-cost energy generation and (b) hydrogen production. While hydrogen production and advanced energy cycles are still in the early stages of development, research toward coupling VHTR, electrical generation, and hydrogen production is under way.This technical note includes the coupling of a VHTR with a power conversion unit. One of the power conversion configurations in the coupled plant is a combined Brayton cycle and Rankine cycle. This configuration uses a mixture of helium and nitrogen that allows the use of modified gas-turbine technology, including the same design techniques, material, and testing facilities used for conventional air gas turbines, to be used for the VHTR electricity production application. Exhaust heat from the turbine is transferred to a heat exchanger where the transferred heat is used to generate steam for a Rankine cycle.The study was focused on the verification of the steam generator model and comparisons of results from HYSYS and RELAP5-3D. This technical note concludes that the overall results are in good agreement despite the differences in size of different flow regime lengths. The overall heat transfer behavior deviated within ~2.1%, and exit temperatures and temperature drops across the steam generator also show reasonable agreement with <5.1% difference between the two methods.