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Reactor Physics
The division's objectives are to promote the advancement of knowledge and understanding of the fundamental physical phenomena characterizing nuclear reactors and other nuclear systems. The division encourages research and disseminates information through meetings and publications. Areas of technical interest include nuclear data, particle interactions and transport, reactor and nuclear systems analysis, methods, design, validation and operating experience and standards. The Wigner Award heads the awards program.
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2024 ANS Annual Conference
June 16–19, 2024
Las Vegas, NV|Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino
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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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College students help develop waste-measuring device at Hanford
A partnership between Washington River Protection Solutions (WRPS) and Washington State University has resulted in the development of a device to measure radioactive and chemical tank waste at the Hanford Site. WRPS is the contractor at Hanford for the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management.
Guangwen Bi, Shengyi Si, Chanyun Liu
Nuclear Technology | Volume 183 | Number 3 | September 2013 | Pages 308-320
Technical Paper | Fission Reactors | doi.org/10.13182/NT13-A19420
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
This work is focused on core design, spent-fuel characteristics assessment, and fuel cycle analysis for thorium-uranium breeding recycle in a typical pressurized water reactor (PWR), without any major change to the fuel lattice and the core internals but substituting the uranium oxide (UOX) pellet with a thorium-based fuel pellet. Two mixed cores are investigated, one loaded with mixed reactor-grade plutonium-thorium oxide (PuThOX) fuel assemblies and the other with mixed reactor-grade 233U-thorium oxide (U3ThOX) fuel assemblies. The high purity of reactor-grade 233U extracted from burnt PuThOX fuel is used as seeds of U3ThOX for starting thorium-uranium breeding recycle.The core design and analysis indicated that thorium-uranium breeding recycle is technically feasible in current PWRs. In the mixed core with U3ThOX loading, the well-designed U3ThOX assemblies were located on the periphery of the core as a "blanket" region, which remain in core for six cycles and get breeding with 232Th-233U. The feedback parameters and kinetic parameters are dominated by the UOX fuel in the inner core. For the UOX/PuThOX mixed core, the higher plutonium content leads to harder neutron spectrum, smaller reactivity worth of neutron absorbers, and smaller delayed neutron fraction and prompt neutron lifetime, which are similar to the current mixed cores partially loaded with the plutonium-uranium mixed-oxide (MOX) fuel.The fuel cycle analysis has shown that 233U monorecycling with U3ThOX fuel could save 13% of natural uranium resource compared with UOX once-through fuel cycle, slightly more than that of plutonium monorecycling with MOX fuel. If 233U multirecycling with U3ThOX fuel is implemented, more natural uranium resource would be saved.