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LLNL, Ampera partner to develop thorium-based TRISO fuel
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has formed a strategic partnership with Ampera to develop the company’s nuclear fuel concept through a project named THUNDER, for Thorium Unimodal Droplet Ejection for Reactors.
The focus of THUNDER is fabricating TRISO made with kernels of thorium rather than the usual uranium. LLNL and Ampera will evaluate and optimize liquid metal–jetting technology to produce highly uniform, spherical kernels of thorium-232 for later processing into TRISO fuel.
J. M. O. Pinto, P. F. Frutuoso E Melo, P. L. C. Saldanha
Nuclear Technology | Volume 188 | Number 1 | October 2014 | Pages 20-33
Technical Paper | Fission Reactors | doi.org/10.13182/NT13-48
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A methodology comprising Dynamic Flowgraph Methodology (DFM) and A Technique for Human Error Analysis (ATHEANA) is applied to a digital control system proposed for the pressurizer of current pressurized water reactor plants. The methodology consists of modeling this control system and its interactions with the controlled process and operator through an integrated DFM/ATHEANA approach. The results were complemented by the opinions of experts in conjunction with fuzzy theory. In terms of human reliability, DFM, along with ATHEANA, can model equipment failure modes, operator errors (omission/commission), and human factors that, combined with plant conditions, influence human performance. The results show that the methodology provides an efficient fault analysis of digital systems identifying all possible interactions among components. Through prime implicants, the methodology shows the event combinations that lead to system failure. Quantitative results obtained are in agreement with literature data, with a few percentage value discrepancies.