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Human Factors, Instrumentation & Controls
Improving task performance, system reliability, system and personnel safety, efficiency, and effectiveness are the division's main objectives. Its major areas of interest include task design, procedures, training, instrument and control layout and placement, stress control, anthropometrics, psychological input, and motivation.
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2024 ANS Annual Conference
June 16–19, 2024
Las Vegas, NV|Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino
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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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February 2024
Latest News
Can hydrogen be the transportation fuel in an otherwise nuclear economy?
Let’s face it: The global economy should be powered primarily by nuclear power. And it probably will by the end of this century, with a still-significant assist from renewables and hydro. Once nuclear systems are dominant, the costs come down to where gas is now; and when carbon emissions are reduced to a small portion of their present state, it will become obvious that most other sources are only good in niche settings. I mean, why use small modular reactors to load-follow when they can just produce that power instead of buffering it?
Shahram Sharafat, Aaron Aoyama, Neil Morley, Sergey Smolentsev, Y. Katoh, Brian Williams, Nasr Ghoniem
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 56 | Number 2 | August 2009 | Pages 883-891
Test Blanket Modules | Eighteenth Topical Meeting on the Technology of Fusion Energy (Part 2) | doi.org/10.13182/FST09-7
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The U.S.-ITER DCLL (Dual Coolant Liquid Lead) TBM (Test Blanket Module) uses a Flow Channel Insert (FCI), to test the feasibility of high temperature DCLL concepts for future power reactors. The FCI serves a dual function of electrical insulation, to mitigate MHD effects, and thermal insulation to keep steel-PbLi interface temperatures below allowable limits. As a non-structural component, the key performance requirements of the FCI structure are compatibility with PbLi, long-term radiation damage resistance, maintaining insulating properties over the lifetime, adequate insulation even in case of localized failures, and manufacturability. The main loads on the FCI are thermally induced due to through the thickness temperature gradients and due to non-uniform PbLi temperatures along the flow channel (∼1.6 m). A number of SiC-based materials are being developed for FCI applications, including SiC/SiC composites and porous SiC bonded between CVD SiC face sheets. Here, we report on an FCI design based on open-cell SiC-foam material. Thermo-mechanical analysis of this FCI concept indicate that a SiC-foam FCI structure is capable of withstanding anticipated primary and secondary stresses during operation in an ITER TBM environment. A complete 30 cm long prototypical segment of the FCI structure was designed and is being fabricated, demonstrating the SiC-foam based FCI structure to be very low-cost and viability candidate for an ITER TBM FCI structure.