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Division Spotlight
Thermal Hydraulics
The division provides a forum for focused technical dialogue on thermal hydraulic technology in the nuclear industry. Specifically, this will include heat transfer and fluid mechanics involved in the utilization of nuclear energy. It is intended to attract the highest quality of theoretical and experimental work to ANS, including research on basic phenomena and application to nuclear system design.
Meeting Spotlight
2025 ANS Annual Conference
June 15–18, 2025
Chicago, IL|Chicago Marriott Downtown
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
Jun 2025
Jan 2025
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Nuclear Science and Engineering
July 2025
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
Smarter waste strategies: Helping deliver on the promise of advanced nuclear
At COP28, held in Dubai in 2023, a clear consensus emerged: Nuclear energy must be a cornerstone of the global clean energy transition. With electricity demand projected to soar as we decarbonize not just power but also industry, transport, and heat, the case for new nuclear is compelling. More than 20 countries committed to tripling global nuclear capacity by 2050. In the United States alone, the Department of Energy forecasts that the country’s current nuclear capacity could more than triple, adding 200 GW of new nuclear to the existing 95 GW by mid-century.
Nathan Lau, Hao Wang (Virginia Tech), Shawn St. Germain, Andrea S. Harvey (INL), Matthew B. Weinger, Shilo Anders (Vanderbilt Univ Medical Center)
Proceedings | Nuclear Plant Instrumentation, Control, and Human-Machine Interface Technolgies (NPIC&HMIT 2019) | Orlando, FL, February 9-14, 2019 | Pages 664-673
Nuclear power plant (NPP) outage represents a major operational cost that must be minimized to sustain competitiveness in the US energy market. However, outage management can be challenging because myriad of interdependent activities may need adjustment over the course of the outage. We conducted a site vist to the Advanced Test Reactor at the Idaho National Laboratory and a literature review to identify general directions for innovations in interactive visualization for outage management. First, new approaches are needed to represent task and scheduling uncertainty to better support estimates of effort and cost overruns as tasks change during outages. This would allow staff to project the likelihood of overruns and reallocate resources as appropriate. Second, outage support software should facilitate visualization of resource constraints whether hard (e.g., regulatory requirements) or ‘soft’ (i.e., those with cost, morale, or other consequences). When responding to emergent issues or unplanned work, the outage staff must be aware of all potential alternatives (e.g., overtime, additional staff, deferrable tasks) and the short- and longer-term implications of each choice. Third, there is currently limited understanding of how best to support outage staff’s ability to simulate the impact of potential schedule adjustments in response to new or reallocated work. Graphical “what if” scenario depictions should be an important component of future visualization capabilities. To realize the potential of AOCC, interactive visualization for outage management must better support situation awareness, decision-making and planning.