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Going Nuclear: Notes from the officially unofficial book tour
I work in the analytical labs at one of Europe’s oldest and largest nuclear sites: Sellafield, in northwestern England. I spend my days at the fume hood front, pipette in one hand and radiation probe in the other (and dosimeter pinned to my chest, of course). Outside the lab, I have a second job: I moonlight as a writer and public speaker. My new popular science book—Going Nuclear: How the Atom Will Save the World—came out last summer, and it feels like my life has been running at full power ever since.
R. E. Maerker
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 96 | Number 4 | August 1987 | Pages 263-289
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE87-A16391
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A second example of applying the LEPRICON methodology to an existing pressurized water reactor is described. The present application is an analysis of ad hoc dosimetry inserted into the H. B. Robinson-2 reactor to monitor the effects on pressure vessel fluence produced by the introduction of a low-leakage fuel management scheme during cycle 9. The use of the simultaneous dosimetry at both a downcomer location and in the reactor cavity allowed a quantitative evaluation to be made by the LEPRICON procedure of the relative merits of each location. Unfolded results using the dosimetry indicate that the cumulative neutron fluence above 1 MeV originally calculated for the critical lower circumferential weld of the pressure vessel during cycle 9, 7.2 × 1017 n/cm2± 15.9%, should be adjusted upward by about one standard deviation to a value of 8.8 × 1017 n/cm2 with a reduced uncertainty of 10.9%.