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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.
M. J. Pettigrew
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 114 | Number 3 | July 1993 | Pages 179-189
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE93-A24032
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Under actual reactor conditions, the mechanical characteristics of nuclear fuel are particularly affected by thermal expansion of the fuel pellets. The results of an experiment studying the vibration behavior of nuclear fuel under reactor conditions are presented. The experiment was conducted in an experimental reactor in a two-phase flow test loop simulating a Canada deuterium uranium (CANDU) reactor fuel channel. The effect of fuel power in particular was investigated. The natural frequency of the fuel elements increased by ∼50% at full power. The effect of the fuel channel parameters such as flow velocity, steam quality, and pressure were also investigated.