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Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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Deep Space: The new frontier of radiation controls
In commercial nuclear power, there has always been a deliberate tension between the regulator and the utility owner. The regulator fundamentally exists to protect the worker, and the utility, to make a profit. It is a win-win balance.
From the U.S. nuclear industry has emerged a brilliantly successful occupational nuclear safety record—largely the result of an ALARA (as low as reasonably achievable) process that has driven exposure rates down to what only a decade ago would have been considered unthinkable. In the U.S. nuclear industry, the system has accomplished an excellent, nearly seamless process that succeeds to the benefit of both employee and utility owner.
Darrell F. Newman, Bryan F. Gore
Nuclear Technology | Volume 37 | Number 3 | March 1978 | Pages 227-245
Technical paper | Reactor | doi.org/10.13182/NT78-A31992
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Neutron multiplication factors calculated as a function of temperature for three graphite-moderated 233 U02-Th02-fueled lattices are correlated with the values measured for these lattices in the high-tempera-ture lattice test reactor (HTLTR). The correlation analysis is accomplished by fitting calculated values of k^T) to the measured values using two least-squares-fitted correlation coefficients: (a) a normalization factor and (b) a temperature coefficient bias factor. These correlations indicate the existence of a negative (nonconservative) bias in temperature coefficients of reactivity calculated using ENDF/B-IV cross-section data. Use of an alternate cross-section data set for thorium, which has a smaller resonance integral than ENDF/B-IV data, improved the agreement between calculated and measured temperature coefficients of reactivity for the three experimental lattices. The results of the correlations are used to estimate the bias in the temperature coefficient of reactivity calculated for a lattice typical of fresh 233U recycle fuel for a high-temperature gas-cooled reactor (HTGR). This extrapolation to a lattice having a heavier fissile loading than the experimental lattices is accomplished using a sensitivity analysis of the estimated bias to alternate thorium cross-section data used in calculations of kx(T). The envelope of uncertainty expected to contain the actual values for the temperature coefficient of the reactivity for the 233U-fueled HTGR lattice studied remains negative at 1600 K (1327°C). Although a broader base of experimental data with improved accuracy is always desirable, the existing data base provided by the HTLTR experiments is judged to be adequate for the verification of neutronic calculations for the HTGR containing 233 U fuel at its current state of development.
