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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.
K. Forsberg, Ning He, A. R. Massih
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 122 | Number 1 | January 1996 | Pages 142-150
Technical Note | doi.org/10.13182/NSE96-A28555
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Distribution of some important fuel rod performance parameters, internal rod pressure, and fission gas release in a boiling water reactor are studied using the quasi-Monte Carlo (QMC) probabilistic method. Rod power histories and important fabrication parameters are considered. The deterministic fuel performance code STAV6 together with a QMC pre- and postprocessor are used in the analysis. The convergence rate of the QMC method is considerably higher than the standard Monte Carlo method, which saves a substantial amount of computer time. Asymptotically, the error for QMC is proportional to 1/N, and for Monte Carlo, it is essentially proportional to 1/ where N is the number of calculations (computer runs). Principles of the QMC method are discussed, and an algorithm to generate such data is outlined.