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Conference Spotlight
Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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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The RAIN scale: A good intention that falls short
Radiation protection specialists agree that clear communication of radiation risks remains a vexing challenge that cannot be solved solely by finding new ways to convey technical information.
Earlier this year, an article in Nuclear News described a new radiation risk communication tool, known as the Radiation Index, or, RAIN (“Let it RAIN: A new approach to radiation communication,” NN, Jan. 2025, p. 36). The authors of the article created the RAIN scale to improve radiation risk communication to the general public who are not well-versed in important aspects of radiation exposures, including radiation dose quantities, units, and values; associated health consequences; and the benefits derived from radiation exposures.
13th Nuclear Plant Instrumentation, Control & Human-Machine Interface Technologies (NPIC&HMIT 2023)
Technical Session|Panel
Monday, July 17, 2023|3:15–5:00PM EDT|301B
Session Chair:
Paul J. Hunton (INL)
Alternate Chair:
Mark Samselski (Constellation Energy)
Session Organizer:
Craig Primer (INL)
Constellation Energy and the United States Department of Energy have established a partnership through the Light Water Reactor Sustainability Program to implement a pilot safety-related digital instrumentation and control (DI&C) upgrade for industry benefit. This DI&C upgrade replaces legacy analog reactor protection and emergency safety feature actuation systems (RPS/ESFAS) with modern digital systems. It also implements related main control room modifications. This upgrade is occurring at Constellation's Limerick Generating Station. This project is being performed in accordance with industry processes that have been adapted to better support DI&C upgrades. These processes include IP-ENG-001, Standard Design Process, NISP-EN-04, Standard Digital Engineering Process, and Electric Power Research Institute Report 3002011816, Digital Engineering Guide. This effort is a large-scale demonstration of the application of the alternate review process provided in NRC DI&C interim staff guidance (DI&C-ISG-06), Licensing Process. The alternate review process supports more timely NRC processing of license amendment requests associated with safety-related DI&C equipment modifications in operating plants and in new plants once they become operational. This panel discussion will facilitate a dialog with regard to engineering (both I&C and HFE), licensing, and project activities as well as lessons learned during project execution to date. Constellation is also developing a systematic modernization roadmap for safety-related reactor I&C systems with Limerick as part of this pilot. This panel discussion follows the presentation of three related papers on the Safety-Related I&C Upgrade Pilot Project during the Control Room Modernization Technical Session: (1) Conceptual and Design Phase Lessons Learned, (2) NUREG-0711 Process Development, Planning and Analysis Activities, and Lessons Learned, and (3) 3D Main Control Room Modeling.
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