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 ANS Annual Conference
May 31–June 3, 2026
Denver, CO|Sheraton Denver
Latest Magazine Issues
Mar 2026
Jan 2026
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
April 2026
Nuclear Technology
February 2026
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
60 Years of U: Perspectives on resources, demand, and the evolving role of nuclear energy
Recent years have seen growing global interest in nuclear energy and rising confidence in the sector. For the first time since the early 2000s, there is renewed optimism about the industry’s future. This change is driven by several major factors: geopolitical developments that highlight the need for secure energy supplies, a stronger focus on resilient energy systems, national commitments to decarbonization, and rising demand for clean and reliable electricity.
Akio Yamamoto, Kuniharu Kinoshita, Tomoaki Watanabe, Tomohiro Endo, Yasuhiro Kodama, Yasunori Ohoka, Tadashi Ushio, Hiroaki Nagano
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 181 | Number 2 | October 2015 | Pages 160-174
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE14-152
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Uncertainties of various neutronics characteristics in commercial boiling water reactor (BWR) and pressurized water reactor (PWR) cores due to cross-section covariance are evaluated by the Latin Hypercube Sampling (LHS) method, which is an efficient random sampling algorithm. Thermal-hydraulic feedback and burnup effects are fully and explicitly taken into account using a licensing-grade core simulator. Uncertainties for various core characteristics are evaluated by the statistical processing of core calculation results based on the LHS method. The calculation results indicate that uncertainty of critical eigenvalue (i.e., core reactivity) in the BWR core is comparable to that of a typical PWR core. On the other hand, uncertainties of assembly relative power distribution and maximum assembly burnup in the present BWR core are much smaller than those of the present PWR core. The strong thermal-hydraulic feedback effect in the BWR core significantly contributes to the difference of uncertainties in BWR and PWR cores.