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DOE announces NEPA exclusion for advanced reactors
The Department of Energy has announced that it is establishing a categorical exclusion for the application of National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) procedures to the authorization, siting, construction, operation, reauthorization, and decommissioning of advanced nuclear reactors.
According to the DOE, this significant change, which goes into effect today, “is based on the experience of DOE and other federal agencies, current technologies, regulatory requirements, and accepted industry practice.”
Paul A. Roth, J, Stephen Herring
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 4 | Number 2 | September 1983 | Pages 1121-1126
Environment and Safety | doi.org/10.13182/FST83-A23008
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Recent fusion reactor conceptual designs include pressurized water as the coolant for the first wall and blanket. To determine design adequacy, the consequences of a pressurized water cooling tube failure within the blanket have been analyzed using the time-dependent computer code ATHENA. The ATHENA code, being developed by EG&G Idaho, Inc., simulates safety related transients in fusion blankets, first walls, and other reactor systems. The analysis showed that some blanket design modifications must be made to ensure module integrity following an internal cooling tube break.