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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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IAEA again raises global nuclear power projections
Noting recent momentum behind nuclear power, the International Atomic Energy Agency has revised up its projections for the expansion of nuclear power, estimating that global nuclear operational capacity will more than double by 2050—reaching 2.6 times the 2024 level—with small modular reactors expected to play a pivotal role in this high-case scenario.
IAEA director general Rafael Mariano Grossi announced the new projections, contained in the annual report Energy, Electricity, and Nuclear Power Estimates for the Period up to 2050 at the 69th IAEA General Conference in Vienna.
In the report’s high-case scenario, nuclear electrical generating capacity is projected to increase to from 377 GW at the end of 2024 to 992 GW by 2050. In a low-case scenario, capacity rises 50 percent, compared with 2024, to 561 GW. SMRs are projected to account for 24 percent of the new capacity added in the high case and for 5 percent in the low case.
Supathorn Phongikaroon, Steven D. Herrmann, Michael F. Simpson
Nuclear Technology | Volume 174 | Number 1 | April 2011 | Pages 85-93
Technical Paper | Reprocessing | doi.org/10.13182/NT174-85
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
In this study, a diffusion-based kinetic model essential for design and operational analysis of spent nuclear fuel reduction has been developed. The model considers the cathode side of the system to be rate limiting and deals with diffusion of lithium metal through the basket loaded with uranium oxide (UO2 or U3O8). Faraday's law was implemented into the model to observe the electrochemical effect on the model. Solutions with different conditions are developed, and detailed results are presented. These solutions were compared against experimental bench scale data. At high operating current conditions (I > 0.8 A), the model fits the data well. The fitting resulted in estimated effective lithium diffusion coefficients for high and low void fraction UO2 crushed fuels of 8.5 × 10-4 cm2/s and 2.2 × 10-4 cm2/s, respectively. The effective diffusion coefficient for U3O8 is estimated to be 8.6 × 10-4 cm2/s. In some experiments, a porous magnesium oxide basket was used for containing the U3O8. It was estimated that the lithium diffusion coefficient through this magnesia basket is 3.3 × 10-5 cm2/s.