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The deadline arrives: Checking in on the Reactor Pilot Program
On May 23, 2025, President Trump signed Executive Order 14301, “Reforming Nuclear Reactor Testing at the DOE,” which instructed the Department of Energy to create a Reactor Pilot Program (RPP)—a new system in which companies could pursue DOE authorization to build and test their first-of-a-kind nuclear technologies. EO 14301 set an ambitious goal for that program: three reactors achieving criticality by July 4, 2026.
A. B. Chilton
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 27 | Number 2 | February 1967 | Pages 403-410
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE67-A18279
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
On the basis of a simplified theoretical model and formulas, a method is presented for calculating the exposure field in the air near an air-ground interface on (or very near) which a point isotropic source of monoenergetic gamma rays has been placed. Necessary functions have been calculated and are presented for cobalt-60 (1.25 MeV) and cesium-137 (0.662 MeV). Within the limitations of the model, calculated results have an uncertainty on the order of 1%, for source-detector distances out to about 15 m. Comparison with previous experimental and theoretical results is made. At detector locations very near the source (on the order of a meter or less), the exposure field is somewhat affected by the exact height of the source above the interface, even for variations on the order of a centimeter.