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Fusion Science and Technology
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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.
P. T. Lang, B. Ploeckl, R. Fischer, M. Griener, M. Kircher, O. Kudlacek, G. Phillips, B. Sieglin, S. Yamamoto, W. Treutterer, AUG Team
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 78 | Number 1 | January 2022 | Pages 1-9
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/15361055.2021.1940034
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Fuel injection by means of solid cryogenic pellets is expected to provide a sound and efficient tool. Hence, the installation of a pellet launching system will be a necessity. Yet, pellets are considered as a serviceable actuator for integrated supplementary functions as, e.g., fast and efficient delivery of seeding gas, or in case needed, the pacing of edge-localized modes. Consequently, a control scheme has to be developed that is capable of mastering the simultaneous actuations covering different tasks. Our scheme relies on pellet launching by a centrifuge accelerator, providing the option for precisely predictable pellet injection sequences. In order to develop a suitable actuator control scheme, as a first step the central part was brought into service at ASDEX Upgrade. It proved operational for feedback particle flux control of a single pellet source. In a subsequent step, it is now upgraded to enable multitasked control of the JT-60SA multipellet source currently under construction. In its finally designated configuration, this control scheme provides a potential solution for a reactor-grade system.