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Aerospace Nuclear Science & Technology
Organized to promote the advancement of knowledge in the use of nuclear science and technologies in the aerospace application. Specialized nuclear-based technologies and applications are needed to advance the state-of-the-art in aerospace design, engineering and operations to explore planetary bodies in our solar system and beyond, plus enhance the safety of air travel, especially high speed air travel. Areas of interest will include but are not limited to the creation of nuclear-based power and propulsion systems, multifunctional materials to protect humans and electronic components from atmospheric, space, and nuclear power system radiation, human factor strategies for the safety and reliable operation of nuclear power and propulsion plants by non-specialized personnel and more.
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2024 ANS Winter Conference and Expo
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Orlando, FL|Renaissance Orlando at SeaWorld
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New laws offer nuclear industry incentives for existing power plant uprates
This year, the U.S. nuclear industry received a much-needed economic boost that could help preserve operating nuclear power plants and incentivize upgrades that extend their lifespan and power output.
Signed into law in 2022, the Inflation Reduction Act offers production tax credits (PTCs) for existing nuclear power plants and either PTCs or investment tax credits (ITCs) for new carbon-free generation. These credits could make power uprates—increasing the maximum power level at which a commercial plant may operate—a much more appealing option for utilities.
P. B. Abramson, H. H. Hummel, E. M. Gelbard, P. A. Pizzica, J. J. Sienicki
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 66 | Number 1 | April 1978 | Pages 14-23
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE78-A15184
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
In the use of large computers to analyze severe accidents in liquid-metal fast breeder reactors (LMFBRs), it has long been recognized that many of the fundamental phenomena cannot be precisely predicted because of uncertainty in the parameters that govern them. As a direct result, mechanistic analysis of such accidents has proceeded along a parametric path in which these variables are fixed at a certain constant value for the entire calculation: The influence of variation of this value is assessed by making a series of complete calculations with the parameter set at a different value for each such element of the series. While some parameters may be thought of as “correlated” or fixed for an entire calculation, very few are in fact constant throughout a reactor, and many are (for practical purposes) nearly completely uncorrected, either in space or time, during the hypothetical accident. Thus, such analysis has created a set of results that are not indicative or representative of an accident involving uncorrected or only partially correlated variable parameters. We describe here a methodology for dealing with various degrees of uncertainty or incoherence in these parameters. By using two very different mechanistic codes (FX2-POOL and EPIC), we demonstrate that the treatment of uncorrected parameters, such as droplet/particle size in a hypothetical core disruptive accident, as random variables with a certain probability distribution during each complete calculation of a series of calculations produces as much as an order of magnitude less uncertainty in the end result than had been obtained assuming perfect correlation. Finally, we categorize a small list of parameters as either correlated or uncorrected for some of the other LMFBR accident analysis codes. The technique we demonstrate can be easily implemented in a broad spectrum of accident analysis codes with similar benefits.