ANS is committed to advancing, fostering, and promoting the development and application of nuclear sciences and technologies to benefit society.
Explore the many uses for nuclear science and its impact on energy, the environment, healthcare, food, and more.
Division Spotlight
Decommissioning & Environmental Sciences
The mission of the Decommissioning and Environmental Sciences (DES) Division is to promote the development and use of those skills and technologies associated with the use of nuclear energy and the optimal management and stewardship of the environment, sustainable development, decommissioning, remediation, reutilization, and long-term surveillance and maintenance of nuclear-related installations, and sites. The target audience for this effort is the membership of the Division, the Society, and the public at large.
Meeting Spotlight
2024 ANS Annual Conference
June 16–19, 2024
Las Vegas, NV|Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino
Standards Program
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!
Latest Magazine Issues
Apr 2024
Jan 2024
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
May 2024
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
Framatome signs contracts with Sizewell C
French nuclear developer Framatome is slated to deliver key equipment for Sizewell C Ltd.’s two large reactors planned for the United Kingdom’s Suffolk coast.
The agreement, reportedly worth multiple billions of euros, was announced this week and will involve Framatome from the design phase until commissioning. The company also agreed to a long-term fuel supply deal. Framatome is 80.5 percent owned by France’s EDF and 19.5 percent owned by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries.
Vinod Mubayi, Robert Youngblood
Nuclear Technology | Volume 207 | Number 3 | March 2021 | Pages 406-412
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2020.1775452
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The safety goals adopted by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) consist of two qualitative safety goals backed up by two quantitative health objectives (QHOs). The QHOs establish risk limits for severe accidents in terms of their radiological consequences to affected individuals, in particular, the average individual health risks of early fatality and latent cancers from radiation exposure of members of the public living in the vicinity of a nuclear power plant. This paper is devoted to a reexamination of the coverage of the current safety goals as they constrain (or fail to constrain) the total (radiological and nonradiological) risk posed by nuclear power plant operation. Specifically, we suggest the need to address societal consequences. By societal consequences, we mean measures of consequences that reflect the number of people affected and the offsite effects both radiological and nonradiological, not just the individual risks. Recent Level 3 probabilistic risk assessments suggest that given a high likelihood of evacuation of the close-in population before any release occurs the current QHOs are satisfied by large margins, and the experience of an actual severe accident at Fukushima showed that actual human health effects from released radiation were not the dominant consequences, as there were no early fatalities and no measurable increases expected in cancer rates above the baseline rates in the Japanese population. Hence, regardless of accident probability, Fukushima-type accidents with evacuation would satisfy the NRC’s health-related safety goals. However, there were very significant societal costs in that large numbers of people were relocated for long periods and there was substantial property damage and community disruption along with the costs of recovery and decontamination. We argue that, in addition to the risks addressed in the current safety goals, societal risk should also be considered. This paper discusses specific possibilities for a goal and an associated quantitative objective.