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Swiss nuclear power and the case for long-term operation
Designed for 40 years but built to last far longer, Switzerland’s nuclear power plants have all entered long-term operation. Yet age alone says little about safety or performance. Through continuous upgrades, strict regulatory oversight, and extensive aging management, the country’s reactors are being prepared for decades of continued operation, in line with international practice.
D. S. Kopecki, K. M. Ralls, E. Linn Draper, Jr.
Nuclear Technology | Volume 29 | Number 1 | April 1976 | Pages 98-107
Technical Paper | Material | doi.org/10.13182/NT76-A16294
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Composition changes that occur during neutron bombardment have been calculated for the first wall of a hypothetical fusion reactor. The first wall materials studied are pure niobium, zirconium, molybdenum, and vanadium, and some of their binary alloys. Two integrated neutron flux intensities, 3.8 × 1014 n/(cm2 sec) and 3.8 × 1015 n/(cm2 sec) up to a fluence of 3.6 × 1023 n/cm2, have been used in the calculations of the first three materials. In addition, the composition as a function of fluence (maximum fluence =4.0 × 1023 n/cm2) has been calculated for a vanadium wall. Graphs for each material have been plotted to show the variation of composition as a function of time and/or fluence. Rates of production of hydrogen and helium have been calculated for all four materials; comparisons for niobium and vanadium walls with literature values show agreement that it is not poor. Furthermore, mixture diagrams have been constructed for two binary alloy systems, niobium-zirconium and niobium-vanadium, to relate composition at constant irradiation time to the initial composition.