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Conference Spotlight
Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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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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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.
José M. MartíNez-Val, José M. AragonéS, Emilio míNguez, José M. Perlado, Guillermo Velarde
Nuclear Technology | Volume 90 | Number 3 | June 1990 | Pages 371-388
Technical Paper | RELAP/MOD2 / Nuclear Safety | doi.org/10.13182/NT90-A34401
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The initiating events and propagating mechanisms of the Chernobyl accident are the subject of this analysis. The neutronics and thermohydraulics of RBMK reactors under different regimes are studied. It is found that the reactor response to a loss of pumping power was a reactivity trip that could not be fully overcome by the Doppler effect because of the neutronic importance of hydrogen captures under the conditions before the accident. This very high importance was induced by an incorrect hydraulic regime being established before the accident in order to conduct an electromechanical experiment. This experiment was responsible for the loss of pumping power that triggered the accident.
