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Fusion Energy
This division promotes the development and timely introduction of fusion energy as a sustainable energy source with favorable economic, environmental, and safety attributes. The division cooperates with other organizations on common issues of multidisciplinary fusion science and technology, conducts professional meetings, and disseminates technical information in support of these goals. Members focus on the assessment and resolution of critical developmental issues for practical fusion energy applications.
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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
Wei Xu, Jianhua Xia, Xiaojing Liu, Xu Cheng, Wei Zeng
Nuclear Technology | Volume 205 | Number 1 | January-February 2019 | Pages 281-296
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2018.1457887
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Bottom reflooding is the third phase when a large-break loss-of-coolant accident occurs. Due to the complexity and importance, especially in a distinct narrow rectangular channel, various research methods can be utilized to understand the whole process. Test facility is established to figure out the thermal-hydraulic behaviors during bottom reflooding, and the acquisition of accurate solid temperature is essential. The inverse heat transfer problem method is applied to take full advantage of experimental data. In addition, a bottom reflooding transient (BRT) code is utilized to calculate various parameters conveniently. A three-dimensional heat conduction equation for a transient state is solved implicitly to obtain solid temperature distribution, surface heat flux, and heat transfer coefficient at the cooling surface. The simulation results of the BRT code are compared with that of RELAP5, an available system code, and the experimental results. A conclusion that can be derived is that the BRT code shows good applicability of simulating bottom reflooding in a narrow rectangular channel.
