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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
Conference on Nuclear Training and Education: A Biennial International Forum (CONTE 2023)
February 6–9, 2023
Amelia Island, FL|Omni Amelia Island Resort
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!
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February 2023
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January 2023
Latest News
Nuclear energy: enabling production of food, fiber, hydrocarbon biofuels, and negative carbon emissions
In the 1960s, Alvin Weinberg at Oak Ridge National Laboratory initiated a series of studies on nuclear agro-industrial complexes1 to address the needs of the world’s growing population. Agriculture was a central component of these studies, as it must be. Much of the emphasis was on desalination of seawater to provide fresh water for irrigation of crops. Remarkable advances have lowered the cost of desalination to make that option viable in countries like Israel. Later studies2 asked the question, are there sufficient minerals (potassium, phosphorous, copper, nickel, etc.) to enable a prosperous global society assuming sufficient nuclear energy? The answer was a qualified “yes,” with the caveat that mineral resources will limit some technological options. These studies were defined by the characteristic of looking across agricultural and industrial sectors to address multiple challenges using nuclear energy.
Ziping Liu, Yu Ji, Han Zhang, Jun Sun
Nuclear Technology | Volume 208 | Number 8 | August 2022 | Pages 1337-1351
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2022.2031498
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Composite materials are essential in various energy fields owing to their improved heat transfer characteristics. Due to their inhomogeneous structure, it is difficult to obtain the heat transfer details. Effective thermal conductivity (ETC) is an important lumped thermal parameter used to analyze the heat transfer process in composite materials. Existing ETC models are derived by applying a temperature difference (TD) on two opposite boundaries of the composite material to induce heat flow. However, for some composite materials, such as nuclear fuels, the effect of the inner heat source (IHS) is typically ignored. Thus, the suitability of using ETC models based on a TD scheme for composite materials with IHS still requires further investigation. In this study, first the conserved quantities of ETC of the TD and IHS schemes were determined. For normal materials of the TD scheme, the conserved quantity of ETC can be selected as heat flow, whereas for nuclear fuels of the IHS scheme, the average temperatures are recommended as the conserved quantity. Then the general ETC models for composite plate were derived considering both the TD and IHS schemes and special cases with either TD or IHS were also analyzed. Finally, based on the results of this study, the idea of studying the ETC of tristructural-isotropic or TRISO particle-based nuclear fuels is proposed.