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Division Spotlight
Operations & Power
Members focus on the dissemination of knowledge and information in the area of power reactors with particular application to the production of electric power and process heat. The division sponsors meetings on the coverage of applied nuclear science and engineering as related to power plants, non-power reactors, and other nuclear facilities. It encourages and assists with the dissemination of knowledge pertinent to the safe and efficient operation of nuclear facilities through professional staff development, information exchange, and supporting the generation of viable solutions to current issues.
Meeting Spotlight
International Conference on Mathematics and Computational Methods Applied to Nuclear Science and Engineering (M&C 2025)
April 27–30, 2025
Denver, CO|The Westin Denver Downtown
Standards Program
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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May 2025
Latest News
Argonne’s METL gears up to test more sodium fast reactor components
Argonne National Laboratory has successfully swapped out an aging cold trap in the sodium test loop called METL (Mechanisms Engineering Test Loop), the Department of Energy announced April 23. The upgrade is the first of its kind in the United States in more than 30 years, according to the DOE, and will help test components and operations for the sodium-cooled fast reactors being developed now.
Karel L. Papez, Daniel H. Risher
Nuclear Technology | Volume 61 | Number 2 | May 1983 | Pages 260-275
Technical Paper | Second International RETRAN Meeting / Heat Transfer and Fluid Flow | doi.org/10.13182/NT83-A33196
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The loss-of-main-feedwater transient without reactor trip (scram) has received particular attention in pressurized water reactor (PWR) anticipated transient without scram (ATWS) analysis primarily due to the potential for reactor coolant system overpressurization. To assist in the licensing of the U.K. PWR, Sizewell ‘B’, comparative calculations of a loss-of-feedwater ATWS have been performed using the Westinghouse-developed LOFTRAN loop analysis code and the Electric Power Research Institute/Energy Incorporated-developed RETRAN-01 code. The calculations were performed with and without the emergency boration system (EBS), which is included in the Sizewell reference design. Initial results showed good agreement between the codes for the major features of the transient, but also a time shift in the transient profiles at the time of the pressurizer pressure peak. This was found to be due to differences in the steam generator modeling, which resulted in a difference in the onset of the very rapid degradation in heat transfer as the steam generators approach dryout. When the same model was used in both codes, very good agreement was obtained. Remaining differences in the results are attributed primarily to differences in the boron injection models, which resulted in an overprediction of the core boron concentration in the RETRAN calculation. The results with an EBS indicate that the peak pressurizer pressure is relatively insensitive to variations in modeling.