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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.
Donald J. Dudziak
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 47 | Number 2 | February 1972 | Pages 230-234
Technical Note | doi.org/10.13182/NSE72-A22402
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A derivation of the time-dependent forward stochastic equation is sketched for a point reactor with linear feedback and an arbitrary finite fission neutron frequency distribution. Certain pathological characteristics of possible stochastic trajectories are discussed, and limiting conjectures are made based on physical considerations. The time-independent forward stochastic equation with negative reactivity feedback is solved in the classical manner, leading to a recursion relation for the long-run probabilities. Next, all factorial moments of the long-run distribution are shown to be finite, and the corresponding probabilities, P(N,∞), are thus o(N-k) for any integer k. Following this, a more tractable recursion relation is presented for the simpler case of binary fission. For this simpler model, the equivalence to an independent analysis of the Kolmogorov forward matrix equations, as presented in a previous paper, is demonstrated. Finally, a simple recursion relation among factorial moments of the long-run distribution is derived for the binary fission model.