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NN Asks: Is the U.S. ready for nuclear construction to accelerate?
Craig Stover
Yes, but . . .
The United States is better positioned today for nuclear construction than it has been in decades. Some of that comes from the experience gained at Vogtle and V.C. Summer. I was part of the team that helped start the V.C. Summer project in 2008, and at that time we were trying to build a nuclear construction workforce from scratch. We learned a lot through that effort, and many of those lessons learned have since been studied, documented, and shared.
The nuclear industry is also benefiting from the wave of investment that started growing around 2020. Over the last five or six years, there has been a serious effort across the country to get ready for new nuclear builds. The U.S. government and the private sector are investing billions of dollars in new nuclear. Much of that work is happening before widespread commercial deployment contracts are signed. This is real, and we need to prepare.
Wasim Raza, Kwang-Yong Kim
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 161 | Number 2 | February 2009 | Pages 245-254
Technical Note | doi.org/10.13182/NSE161-245
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
In this work multiobjective shape optimization of a 19-pin wire-wrapped fuel assembly is carried out using a hybrid multiobjective evolutionary approach in order to achieve an acceptable compromise between two competing objectives, i.e., enhancement of heat transfer and reduction of friction loss. Two nondimensional variables, wire-spacer diameter to fuel rod diameter ratio and wire-wrap pitch to fuel rod diameter ratio, are chosen as design variables. The response surface approximation method is used to construct the surrogate with objective function values calculated by means of Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes analysis of the flow and heat transfer. The shear stress transport turbulence model is used as a turbulence closure. The optimization results are processed by the Pareto-optimal method. The Pareto-optimal solutions are obtained using a combination of the evolutionary algorithm NSGA-II and a local search method. The Pareto-optimal front for the wire-wrapped fuel assembly has been obtained. With an increase in the wire-spacer diameter, both heat transfer and friction loss in the assembly increase. The design with higher heat transfer on the Pareto-optimal curve shows not only a lower maximum temperature but also a more uniform temperature distribution on the cross section of the assembly in comparison with the other designs.