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Human Factors, Instrumentation & Controls
Improving task performance, system reliability, system and personnel safety, efficiency, and effectiveness are the division's main objectives. Its major areas of interest include task design, procedures, training, instrument and control layout and placement, stress control, anthropometrics, psychological input, and motivation.
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2024 ANS Winter Conference and Expo
November 17–21, 2024
Orlando, FL|Renaissance Orlando at SeaWorld
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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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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.
Edward L. H. Tang
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 69 | Number 1 | January 1979 | Pages 65-75
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE79-A21286
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The rod-drop experiment has been studied for the purpose of predicting reactor resonance power level. A simplified model, referred to here as the “collective model,” is introduced for experimental analysis of the rod-drop transient response. The mathematical description of this model is formulated by describing the experimentally observed oscillatory response by an overall damping factor and an overall oscillatory frequency. Based on this model, it is found that the overall damping factor is approximately a linear function of the reactor power. Accordingly, we propose an experimental procedure, the method of least-squares approach, which provides an exponential approach to the resonance power level as a function of the number of rod drops. It is shown that the accuracy of measurement in the rod-drop experiment greatly affects this technique for core dynamic analysis. The present results show that for an experiment of negligible experimental error, only two or three rod drops are needed to predict the resonance power level up to an accuracy of 0.2%, while for an experiment of ±5% in error, it requires four to five rod drops to reach an accuracy of 0.8%.