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Division Spotlight
Decommissioning & Environmental Sciences
The mission of the Decommissioning and Environmental Sciences (DES) Division is to promote the development and use of those skills and technologies associated with the use of nuclear energy and the optimal management and stewardship of the environment, sustainable development, decommissioning, remediation, reutilization, and long-term surveillance and maintenance of nuclear-related installations, and sites. The target audience for this effort is the membership of the Division, the Society, and the public at large.
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
August 2024
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
ARPA-E announces $40 million to develop transmutation technologies for UNF
The Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy (ARPA-E) announced $40 million in funding to develop cutting-edge technologies to enable the transmutation of used nuclear fuel into less-radioactive substances. According to ARPA-E, the new initiative addresses one of the agency’s core goals as outlined by Congress: to provide transformative solutions to improve the management, cleanup, and disposal of radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel.
Ion Cristescu, F. Priester, D. Rapisarda, A. Santucci, M. Utili
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 76 | Number 4 | May 2020 | Pages 446-457
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/15361055.2020.1716456
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The development of commercial fusion power production using deuterium and tritium has been ongoing worldwide for decades and the European version of DEMO will undergo conceptual design between 2021 and 2027. Among the different ways to provide electrical power, nuclear fusion will be publicly accepted if the environmental impact is at tolerable levels. The auxiliary power requirements of fusion power reactors will need to be optimized, and heat will need to be efficiently converted to electrical power through the usage of high-temperature steam. On the other hand, heat might need to be intermittently stored to account for pulsed plasma operation, on the expense of the temperature level available for steam generation. Tritium is highly mobile and its management as far as containment and confinement are concerned becomes more difficult with the increasing temperatures of the structural materials; any effluents and releases should be kept to an absolute minimum. Therefore, tritium containment and confinement equipment and procedures need to be well integrated into the design and into the operation of fusion power reactors.
This paper focuses on the topics of the main tritium technologies under development in the EU DEMO Breeding Blanket Program, covering especially tritium breeding and extraction technologies. In addition, the identification of the main tritium sources as far as permeation and escape into the environment are concerned and the main barriers for the mitigation of tritium release into the environment are introduced.