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Materials Science & Technology
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2025 ANS Annual Conference
June 15–18, 2025
Chicago, IL|Chicago Marriott Downtown
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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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High-temperature plumbing and advanced reactors
The use of nuclear fission power and its role in impacting climate change is hotly debated. Fission advocates argue that short-term solutions would involve the rapid deployment of Gen III+ nuclear reactors, like Vogtle-3 and -4, while long-term climate change impact would rely on the creation and implementation of Gen IV reactors, “inherently safe” reactors that use passive laws of physics and chemistry rather than active controls such as valves and pumps to operate safely. While Gen IV reactors vary in many ways, one thing unites nearly all of them: the use of exotic, high-temperature coolants. These fluids, like molten salts and liquid metals, can enable reactor engineers to design much safer nuclear reactors—ultimately because the boiling point of each fluid is extremely high. Fluids that remain liquid over large temperature ranges can provide good heat transfer through many demanding conditions, all with minimal pressurization. Although the most apparent use for these fluids is advanced fission power, they have the potential to be applied to other power generation sources such as fusion, thermal storage, solar, or high-temperature process heat.1–3
C. J. Kiger, C. D. Sexton, H. M. Hashemian, R. D. O’Hagan, L. Dormann, W. Wasfy
Nuclear Technology | Volume 200 | Number 2 | November 2017 | Pages 93-105
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2017.1360716
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
This paper reports the results of in situ cable testing performed at the Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station in September 2016 to assess the aging condition of a number of cables as installed in the plant. Despite having been in service for over 40 years, our results found that these cables still met their qualification criteria, were in good working condition, and could continue to serve the plant for the foreseeable future. Some degradation in the cable insulation was noted but not as much as one would expect after more than 40 years of service in a nuclear power plant. Specifically, test results revealed that 10% of cables exhibited a noticeable degree of degradation, 30% were only slightly degraded, and the remaining 60% were essentially unaffected by aging. In the case of jacketed cables, which were assessed using walkdowns performed by the plant’s personnel, almost all aging and degradation were limited to the jacket material while the underlying cable insulation was largely unaffected. This is consistent with laboratory test results, which have shown that jacket material, especially Neoprene and Hypalon, degrade much faster than cross-linked polyethylene (XLPE) and other materials that are used for primary cable insulation.