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Nuclear Criticality Safety
NCSD provides communication among nuclear criticality safety professionals through the development of standards, the evolution of training methods and materials, the presentation of technical data and procedures, and the creation of specialty publications. In these ways, the division furthers the exchange of technical information on nuclear criticality safety with the ultimate goal of promoting the safe handling of fissionable materials outside reactors.
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2022 ANS Annual Meeting
June 12–16, 2022
Anaheim, CA|Anaheim Hilton
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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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A passionate call to save Diablo Canyon
In a recent opinion piece for the San Luis Obispo Tribune, Heather Hoff describes her conversion from nuclear energy skeptic to advocate and lays out the case for keeping the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant open beyond its planned closure in 2025.
Hoff, who is an operations procedure writer at Diablo Canyon, tells how she spent years "excessively and sometimes annoyingly" investigating her concerns about the safety of nuclear after she was first hired at Diablo Canyon. She adds that she almost quit her job after the Fukushima accident until realizing that many concerns about that event were triggered by "fear of nuclear, rather than nuclear itself.”
Yuchuan Guo, Guanbo Wang, Dazhi Qian, Heng Yu, Bo Hu, Xiangmiao Mi, Simao Guo
Nuclear Technology | Volume 204 | Number 1 | October 2018 | Pages 15-24
Technical Paper | dx.doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2018.1469345
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A flow blockage analysis model of a single channel is established using the best-estimate code RELAP5/MOD3.4. The reactor core is divided into seven hot channels, one average channel, one bypass channel, and corresponding fuel plates to take into account the interaction between the obstructed channel and adjacent channels. The coolant system is also modeled in detail to perform a better estimation. As a typical pool-type research reactor, JRR-3M is chosen for the analysis. The results indicate that the model can effectively simulate a single-channel blockage accident using the RELAP5/MOD3.4 code. Also, the thermal-hydraulic parameters in the blocked channel would be significantly affected if bubbles are generated as the blockage ratio continues to increase, which may damage the integrity of the fuel plate. Meanwhile, as for flow blockage of a single channel, the effect on adjacent channels is limited, even under high-blockage-ratio conditions.
