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Division Spotlight
Education, Training & Workforce Development
The Education, Training & Workforce Development Division provides communication among the academic, industrial, and governmental communities through the exchange of views and information on matters related to education, training and workforce development in nuclear and radiological science, engineering, and technology. Industry leaders, education and training professionals, and interested students work together through Society-sponsored meetings and publications, to enrich their professional development, to educate the general public, and to advance nuclear and radiological science and engineering.
Meeting Spotlight
International Conference on Mathematics and Computational Methods Applied to Nuclear Science and Engineering (M&C 2025)
April 27–30, 2025
Denver, CO|The Westin Denver 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!
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Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
May 2025
Latest News
Argonne’s METL gears up to test more sodium fast reactor components
Argonne National Laboratory has successfully swapped out an aging cold trap in the sodium test loop called METL (Mechanisms Engineering Test Loop), the Department of Energy announced April 23. The upgrade is the first of its kind in the United States in more than 30 years, according to the DOE, and will help test components and operations for the sodium-cooled fast reactors being developed now.
H. Weisen, P. Blanchard, M. Vallar, A. N. Karpushov, J. Dubray, A. Merle, B. P. Duval, J. Cazabonne, D. Testa, H. Hamac Elaian, the TCV Team, A. Žohar, L. Snoj, B. Kos, M. Fortuna, A. Čufar, F. Tesse, F. Fontana, C. Gloor, R. Iannarelli, H. Palacios, C. Tille, M. Molteni
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 80 | Number 2 | February 2024 | Pages 143-155
Research Article | doi.org/10.1080/15361055.2023.2209490
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The Tokamak à Configuration variable (TCV) is equipped with two neutral beam injection (NBI) systems delivering up to 1.2 MW each for pulse durations of up to 2 s. The first system (NBI1), designed for an injection energy in the range of 25 to 30 keV has been operational since 2016. The existing concrete neutron shielding of the experimental hall proved insufficient for fully protecting human accessible areas, limiting the number of daily plasma pulses using NBI1. The recently commissioned second system (NBI2) is designed for injection synergies in the range 50 to 60 keV. Both systems are tangentially oriented in opposite directions in order to permit experiments with low or no net torque.
Calculations with the TRANSP and ORBIS heating codes show that neutron rates from deuterium-deuterium fusion reactions may be as high as 1014 n/s, up to 10 times higher than with the lower energy beam only. This is due both to the ~five times larger beam-plasma neutron rates from the higher energy beam and to an exceptionally high contribution from beam-beam reactions between the opposing beams. The radiation protection policy at the Swiss Plasma Center is that all staff members be considered as members of the general public, limiting the daily personal dose to 4 µSv. This is also the maximum admissible daily dose in any publicly accessible zone, whether occupied or not.
Currently, with only the lower energy beam, this limit can be attained in the control room adjacent to the device hall after only five NBI pulses out of a possible 30 daily pulses. To allow for exploitation of the two beams at full specifications, the source side of the existing barite concrete walls of the 15 × 20 × 8 m large TCV hall will be covered with 20-cm-thick polythene (PE) cladding and a ceiling made of 35-cm-thick PE will be added. The total mass of PE will be 200 tons. The usage of PE at this scale for neutron shielding is unprecedented at any fusion research facility.