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Division Spotlight
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.
Meeting Spotlight
Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
Standards Program
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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Latest News
Take steps on SNF and HLW disposal
Matt Bowen
With a new administration and Congress, it is time once again to ponder what will happen—if anything—on U.S. spent nuclear fuel and high-level waste management policy over the next few years. One element of the forthcoming discussion seems clear: The executive and legislative branches are eager to talk about recycling commercial SNF. Whatever the merits of doing so, it does not obviate the need for one or more facilities for disposal of remaining long-lived radionuclides. For that reason, making progress on U.S. disposal capabilities remains urgent, lest the associated radionuclide inventories simply be left for future generations to deal with.
In March, Rick Perry, who was secretary of energy during President Trump’s first administration, observed that during his tenure at the Department of Energy it became clear to him that any plan to move SNF “required some practical consent of the receiving state and local community.”1
Mark L. Williams, R. Raharjo
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 126 | Number 1 | May 1997 | Pages 19-34
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE97-2
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A new method is developed to determine space-dependent, self-shielded cross sections for resonance nuclides with no overlapping resonances, contained in an arbitrarily shaped absorber body within some general lattice configuration. The theoretical basis for the method is discussed, and analytical expressions are presented for the space-dependent flux spectrum in the vicinity of an isolated resonance and for the space-dependent variation in the shielded resonance integral and multigroup cross section. The shielded cross-section expressions contain space-dependent, “weighted escape probabilities” that correspond to the weighted average of the energy-dependent escape probability over each energy group. The method is implemented in an assembly lattice physics code, and results are compared to those obtained with a highly accurate transport theory calculation that uses pointwise cross-section data. The method gives good agreement for the radial variation in the self-shielded cross section through a boiling water reactor fuel pellet.
