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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.
David D. Ebert
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 55 | Number 4 | December 1974 | Pages 470-476
Technical Note | doi.org/10.13182/NSE74-A23481
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The major objective of this investigation was to study the possibility of measuring dynamic characteristics of the Experimental Breeder Reactor II (EBR-II) by an analysis of the inherent fluctuations at steady state. Subsidiary objectives were to devise a means whereby detailed signature analyses could be obtained on a routine basis and to interpret these signatures. Relatively simple noise models were developed for the EBR-II which aided in the interpretation of the measured signatures. From this interpretation, it appears that it is not possible to measure the power to reactivity transfer function using inherent noise analysis with the existing EBR-II detection equipment. There exists, however, the possibility that this transfer function, and transfer functions of a similar type, may be measured if thermocouples and flowmeters of a different design and/or location are implemented. Detailed, broad frequency range signatures of two neutron detectors have been obtained at low and high power levels for one run. Also, signatures of a single neutron detector have been processed for several runs. These signatures changed in a complicated fashion from run to run.