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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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ANS Student Conference 2025
April 3–5, 2025
Albuquerque, NM|The University of New Mexico
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Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
Norway’s Halden reactor takes first step toward decommissioning
The government of Norway has granted the transfer of the Halden research reactor from the Institute for Energy Technology (IFE) to the state agency Norwegian Nuclear Decommissioning (NND). The 25-MWt Halden boiling water reactor operated from 1958 to 2018 and was used in the research of nuclear fuel, reactor internals, plant procedures and monitoring, and human factors.
J. Sheffield, R. A. Dory, S. M. Cohn, J. G. Delene, L. Parsly, D. E. T. F. Ashby, W. T. Reiersen
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 9 | Number 2 | March 1986 | Pages 199-249
Overview | Economic | doi.org/10.13182/FST9-2-199
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A generic reactor model is used to examine the economic viability of electricity generation by magnetic fusion. The simple model uses components that are representative of those used in previous reactor studies of deuterium-tritium burning tokamaks, stellarators, bumpy tori, reversed-field pinches, and tandem mirrors. Conservative costing assumptions are made. The generic reactor is not a tokamak but rather it is intended to emphasize what is common to all magnetic fusion reactors. The reactor uses a superconducting toroidal coil set to produce the dominant magnetic field. To this extent, it is not as good an approximation to systems, such as the rev er sed-field pinch, in which the main field is produced by a plasma current. The main output of the study is the cost of electricity as a function of the weight and size of the fusion core — blanket, shield, structure, and coils. The model shows that a 1200-MW(electric) power plant with a fusion core weight of ∼10000 tonnes should be competitive in the future with fission and fossil plants. Sensitivity studies that vary the assumptions show that this result is not sensitively dependent on any given assumption. Of particular importance is the result that this scale of fusion reactor may be realized with only moderate advances in physics and technology capabilities.