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Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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The RAIN scale: A good intention that falls short
Radiation protection specialists agree that clear communication of radiation risks remains a vexing challenge that cannot be solved solely by finding new ways to convey technical information.
Earlier this year, an article in Nuclear News described a new radiation risk communication tool, known as the Radiation Index, or, RAIN (“Let it RAIN: A new approach to radiation communication,” NN, Jan. 2025, p. 36). The authors of the article created the RAIN scale to improve radiation risk communication to the general public who are not well-versed in important aspects of radiation exposures, including radiation dose quantities, units, and values; associated health consequences; and the benefits derived from radiation exposures.
I. Hill, N. Soppera, M. Bossant
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 178 | Number 3 | November 2014 | Pages 280-294
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE14-37
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The 2014 International Handbook of Evaluated Reactor Physics Benchmark Experiments (IRPhEP Handbook) spans over 30 000 pages and contains 136 evaluations. In the handbook, evaluations are grouped by reactor type (light water reactor, heavy water reactor, liquid metal cooled fast reactor, etc.) and contain up to ten different types of measurements, each of which can be applied to code and nuclear data validation. Despite the thoughtful organization and strict format rules for evaluations, identifying suitable validation cases remains challenging. To assist with searching and trending the IRPhEP Handbook, a relational database and user interface named IDAT (IRPhEP Database and Analysis Tool) was developed. IDAT was first distributed with the 2013 edition of the IRPhEP Handbook and will be updated annually as evaluations are added and revised. Data characterizing the measurements were extracted to allow for searching and trending in IDAT. Measurement types in the database include criticality, buckling, spectral characteristics, reactivity effects, reactivity coefficients, kinetics, reaction rates, and power distribution measurements. Additionally, the database contains calculated quantities, such as neutron flux/capture/fission spectrum data, neutron balance data, and keff sensitivity data, along with tools to visualize these data. IDAT can employ data to assist in the identification of similar experiments using a variety of metrics, within a “Rank Similar” pane. For each measurement in the database, there is also a “Trending” pane, allowing multilevel plots of calculated over experimental values allowing users to drill down by applying various filters. This paper describes the creation of IDAT as well as its features.
