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Division Spotlight
Fuel Cycle & Waste Management
Devoted to all aspects of the nuclear fuel cycle including waste management, worldwide. Division specific areas of interest and involvement include uranium conversion and enrichment; fuel fabrication, management (in-core and ex-core) and recycle; transportation; safeguards; high-level, low-level and mixed waste management and disposal; public policy and program management; decontamination and decommissioning environmental restoration; and excess weapons materials disposition.
Meeting Spotlight
Utility Working Conference and Vendor Technology Expo (UWC 2024)
August 4–7, 2024
Marco Island, FL|JW Marriott Marco Island
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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Nuclear Science and Engineering
September 2024
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
August 2024
Latest News
DARPA wants to bypass the thermal middleman in nuclear power systems
Nuclear power already has an energy density advantage over other sources of thermal electricity generation. But what if nuclear generation didn’t require a steam turbine? What if the radiation from a reactor was less a problem to be managed and more a source of energy? And what if an energy conversion technology could scale to fit nuclear power systems ranging from miniature batteries to the grid? The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Defense Sciences Office (DSO) is asking these types of questions in a request for information on High Power Direct Energy Conversion from Nuclear Power Systems, released August 1.
C. Jong, J. Knaster, C. Sborchia
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 56 | Number 2 | August 2009 | Pages 666-671
ITER | Eighteenth Topical Meeting on the Technology of Fusion Energy (Part 2) | doi.org/10.13182/FST09-A8985
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The Toroidal Field (TF) system of ITER consists of 18 coils in which the winding pack (WP) is formed by 7 stacked double pancakes (DP). The conductors in the TF coil are operated in steady state mode with a current of 68 kA providing a flux of 5.4 T at the plasma axis. The conductors are wrapped with turn insulation and embedded in grooves manufactured in so called radial plates. The grooves are closed with covers, wrapped with glass and polyimide tapes and vacuum impregnated. This layout of the TF WP prevents the accumulation of stresses in the turn insulation, making unlikely the occurrence of a turn-to-turn short circuit. The insulation of the WP will undergo during ITER design lifetime fast neutron fluencies up to 3.2x1021n/m2, which is equivalent to 10 MGy. Standard epoxies degrade if submitted to such doses, developing mechanical properties that would not withstand the estimated operation in-plane shear stress in the range of 45 MPa. The use of a radiation-hard thermoset for glass-fiber composites (cyanate ester) is considered and the on-going extensive qualification work will be presented. The technical solution of how to isolate critical High Voltage (HV) areas like the joint connections or voltage taps is also discussed.