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Reactor Physics
The division's objectives are to promote the advancement of knowledge and understanding of the fundamental physical phenomena characterizing nuclear reactors and other nuclear systems. The division encourages research and disseminates information through meetings and publications. Areas of technical interest include nuclear data, particle interactions and transport, reactor and nuclear systems analysis, methods, design, validation and operating experience and standards. The Wigner Award heads the awards program.
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2024 ANS Annual Conference
June 16–19, 2024
Las Vegas, NV|Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino
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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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Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
Bipartisan Fusion Energy Act pushes for regulatory clarity
Padilla
Sen. Alex Padilla (D., Calif.) introduced the Fusion Energy Act (S. 4151) last month with a bipartisan group of cosponsors—John Cornyn (R., Texas), Cory Booker (D., N.J.), Todd Young (R., Ind.), and Patty Murray (D., Wash.). The legislation would codify the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s regulatory authority over commercial fusion energy systems to streamline the creation of clear federal regulations that will support the development of commercial fusion power plants—and would require a report within one year on a study of risk- and performance-based, design-specific licensing frameworks for “mass-manufactured fusion machines.
“Congress must do everything in its power to ensure continued U.S. leadership in developing commercial fusion energy facilities,” said Padilla as he introduced the bill. “The Fusion Energy Act would provide regulatory certainty for investors as the NRC develops and streamlines frameworks for such facilities.”
Jennifer S. Butler, Darvin Kapitz, Robert P. Martin, Farrokh Seifaee, Ramu K. Sundaram
Nuclear Technology | Volume 170 | Number 1 | April 2010 | Pages 244-260
Technical Paper | Special Issue on the 2008 International Congress on Advances in Nuclear Power Plants / Reactor Safety | doi.org/10.13182/NT10-A9462
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
AREVA NP's U.S. EPR is a 4590-MW(thermal) evolutionary pressurized water reactor that incorporates proven technology with an innovative system architecture to provide an unprecedented level of safety. One of the measures of safety is provided by probability risk assessment (PRA). PRA Level 1 concerns the evaluation of core damage frequency based on various initiating events and the success or failure of various plant event mitigation features. Determination of this measure requires mission success criteria, which are used to build the logic that makes up the fault trees and event trees of the Level 1 PRA. Developing mission success criteria for the wide variety of accident sequences modeled in the PRA Level 1 model requires a large number of thermal-hydraulic calculations. AREVA selected the MAAP4 code to perform these calculations because of its fast computation times relative to more sophisticated thermal-hydraulic codes. This is a unique application of the MAAP4 code, which was developed specifically for severe accident and PRA Level 2 analysis. As such, a study was performed to assess MAAP4's thermal-hydraulic response capabilities against AREVA's S-RELAP5 best-estimate integral systems thermal-hydraulic analysis code.