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Conference Spotlight
2026 ANS Annual Conference
May 31–June 3, 2026
Denver, CO|Sheraton Denver
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Getting back to yes: A local perspective on decommissioning, restart, and responsibility
For 45 years, Duane Arnold Energy Center operated in Linn County, Ia., near the town of Palo and just northwest of Cedar Rapids. The facility, owned by NextEra Energy, was the only nuclear power plant in the state.
In August 2020, a historic derecho swept across eastern Iowa with winds approaching 140 miles per hour. Damage to the plant’s cooling towers accelerated a shutdown that had already been planned, and the facility entered decommissioning soon after, with its fuel removed in October of that year. Iowa’s only nuclear plant had gone off line.
Today the national energy landscape looks very different than it did just six short years ago. Electricity demand is rising rapidly as data centers, artificial intelligence infrastructure, advanced manufacturing, and electrification expand across the country. Reliable, carbon-free baseload power has become increasingly valuable. In that context, Linn County has approved the rezoning necessary to support the recommissioning and restart of Duane Arnold and is actively supporting NextEra’s efforts to secure the remaining state and federal approvals.
Technical Session|Nuclear Thermal Propulsion
Tuesday, May 7, 2024|3:15–4:55PM MDT|Coronado/DeVargas
Session Chair:
Erofil Kardoulaki
Session Organizer:
Alternate Chair:
Scarlett W. Paisner
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Thermophysical Properties of a Uranium Nitride-Metal Composite Fuel for Nuclear Thermal Propulsion
3:15–3:40PM MDT
J.C. Schaeperkoetter (LANL), S. Widgeon Paisner (LANL), J.T. White (LANL), E. Kardoulaki (LANL), T.P. Coons (LANL), D.D. Byler (LANL), J. Rosales (NASA Marshall Space Flight Center), K.J. McClellan (LANL)
Paper
Addressing Localized Fuel Element Heating in a NERVA-Type HALEU Thermal NTP Design
3:40–4:05PM MDT
Steven Hoak (MIT), Koroush Shirvan (MIT)
TRIPLE: A Coated Particle Fuel Performance Code and its Preliminary Application for NTP Fuel Simulation
4:05–4:30PM MDT
Jongho Park (Seoul Nat'l Univ.), Youho Lee (Seoul Nat'l Univ.)
Initial Modeling of Three-Phase Fuel/Propellant Annulus Design for Centrifugal Nuclear Thermal Rockets
4:30–4:55PM MDT
Dakota Santana (Univ. Alabama, Huntsville), Keith Hollingsworth (Univ. Alabama, Huntsville)
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