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Conference Spotlight
2025 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 9–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
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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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PR: American Nuclear Society welcomes Senate confirmation of Ted Garrish as the DOE’s nuclear energy secretary
Washington, D.C. — The American Nuclear Society (ANS) applauds the U.S. Senate's confirmation of Theodore “Ted” Garrish as Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).
“On behalf of over 11,000 professionals in the fields of nuclear science and technology, the American Nuclear Society congratulates Mr. Garrish on being confirmed by the Senate to once again lead the DOE Office of Nuclear Energy,” said ANS President H.M. "Hash" Hashemian.
J. A. Turnbull, S. K. Yagnik, M. Hirai, D. M. Staicu, C. T. Walker
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 179 | Number 4 | April 2015 | Pages 477-485
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE14-20
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
To investigate the potential disintegration to powder of high-burnup fuel pellets during a rapid temperature transient, the Nuclear Fuels Industry Research (NFIR) Program commissioned two independent scoping studies. The first investigated the effect of hydrostatic restraint pressure on fission gas release during a series of fast temperature ramps. In the second study laser heating was used to investigate the temperature at which small samples of fuel fragmented. From the observations made in these studies, local burnup and temperature thresholds of 71 MWd/kg HM and 645°C were identified for fuel pulverization during a loss-of-coolant accident (LOCA). It is shown that fine fragment production in integral LOCA tests performed in other independent investigations at Studsvik and Halden was generally well predicted using these thresholds of burnup and temperature. The NFIR investigations also reveal that the degree of pulverization and resulting fragment size are dependent on the temperature ramp rate. Moreover, they confirm that pulverization can be substantially reduced by the imposition of hydrostatic pressure.