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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.
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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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Commercial nuclear innovation "new space" age
In early 2006, a start-up company launched a small rocket from a tiny island in the Pacific. It exploded, showering the island with debris. A year later, a second launch attempt sent a rocket to space but failed to make orbit, burning up in the atmosphere. Another year brought a third attempt—and a third failure. The following month, in September 2008, the company used the last of its funds to launch a fourth rocket. It reached orbit, making history as the first privately funded liquid-fueled rocket to do so.
M. Ishii, H. K. Fauske
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 84 | Number 2 | June 1983 | Pages 131-146
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE83-A17719
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
For certain postulated severe accident conditions such as a loss of piping integrity and a loss of heat sink in connection with liquid-metal fast breeder reactor safety analysis, the process of decay heat removal can lead to coolant boiling. For such low-heat-flux/low-flow conditions, a dryout or critical heat flux criterion is required in order to assess the potential for fuel pin failure and melting. Computer codes and full-scale experimental data are not available to completely address this problem at this time. Based on the interpretation of available experimental data and new analyses, it is concluded that a typical subassembly can be safely cooled (avoid dryout) under natural convection conditions for heat fluxes below ∼8 to 10% of the average nominal power; i.e., decay heat power levels can be safely accommodated in the natural convective regime. Furthermore, since this coolability limit is predicted to be rather insensitive to the subcooling value, it follows that the safety case relative to decay heat removal for an intact core geometry also becomes essentially independent of detailed accident conditions such as the potential for temporary stagnated flow or inlet flow reversal conditions.