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Conference Spotlight
2025 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 9–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
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Latest News
IAEA again raises global nuclear power projections
Noting recent momentum behind nuclear power, the International Atomic Energy Agency has revised up its projections for the expansion of nuclear power, estimating that global nuclear operational capacity will more than double by 2050—reaching 2.6 times the 2024 level—with small modular reactors expected to play a pivotal role in this high-case scenario.
IAEA director general Rafael Mariano Grossi announced the new projections, contained in the annual report Energy, Electricity, and Nuclear Power Estimates for the Period up to 2050 at the 69th IAEA General Conference in Vienna.
In the report’s high-case scenario, nuclear electrical generating capacity is projected to increase to from 377 GW at the end of 2024 to 992 GW by 2050. In a low-case scenario, capacity rises 50 percent, compared with 2024, to 561 GW. SMRs are projected to account for 24 percent of the new capacity added in the high case and for 5 percent in the low case.
Yu-Huai Shih, Shih-Jen Wang, Kai-Cheng Chuang, Tzu-En Huang
Nuclear Technology | Volume 186 | Number 3 | June 2014 | Pages 340-352
Technical Paper | Reactor Safety | doi.org/10.13182/NT12-145
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The Fukushima Daiichi accident occurred on March 11, 2011. A seismic event and tsunami induced an extended station blackout plus loss of the ultimate heat sink. Three units progressed into a core melt severe accident. The accident occurred in the emergency operation procedure (EOP) domain. However, this situation was already beyond the scope of an EOP. The operator followed the EOP faithfully, and a core melt situation still occurred. An interesting topic is whether it is possible to avoid this type of accident. The purpose of this study is to survey the Fukushima accident progression with respect to the effect of the containment venting strategy for the Chinshan Nuclear Power Plant EOPs. Under the emergency situation, only a small reactor pressure vessel (RPV) injection system was available. This type of accident may be avoided by an early shift from the EOP to the severe accident guideline (SAG), switching from high-pressure injection to low-pressure injection while the reactor core isolation cooling system is available, gradually lowering the RPV pressure, and maximizing the injection flow rate. The plant responses and accident physical phenomena were simulated using MAAP5. The results show that the consequences of an uncovered core and core melt can be avoided by adopting the proper RPV depressurization and containment venting strategy.