ANS is committed to advancing, fostering, and promoting the development and application of nuclear sciences and technologies to benefit society.
Explore the many uses for nuclear science and its impact on energy, the environment, healthcare, food, and more.
Explore membership for yourself or for your organization.
Conference Spotlight
2026 Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
August 24–27, 2026
Dallas, TX|Hilton Anatole
Latest Magazine Issues
Jul 2026
Jan 2026
2026
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
August 2026
Nuclear Technology
July 2026
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
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.
Makoto Sobajima
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 60 | Number 1 | May 1976 | Pages 10-18
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE76-A26852
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
It was found that the results of the RELAP-3 code, which is one of the typical analytical codes for analysis of the loss-of-coolant accident (LOCA) of light water reactors, do not agree well with the results from the ROSA-I experiments under certain break conditions. It was determined that the discharge coefficient used in the code as a parameter can be correlated with the quality of the discharged fluid and that the calculated liquid mass transient does not always agree with the experimental one when a constant bubble escape velocity is assumed. These difficulties come from the possibility of shortcomings of the model dealing with the LOCA phenomena. An attempt was made to improve these aspects of the code by incorporating the correlation of the discharge coefficient with the quality and with Wilson's experimental interpretation of the bubble velocity and certain assumptions in its application. The results obtained by the modified code are in good agreement with both those from the ROSA-I experiment and experiments at Hitachi Ltd.