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Division Spotlight
Fuel Cycle & Waste Management
Devoted to all aspects of the nuclear fuel cycle including waste management, worldwide. Division specific areas of interest and involvement include uranium conversion and enrichment; fuel fabrication, management (in-core and ex-core) and recycle; transportation; safeguards; high-level, low-level and mixed waste management and disposal; public policy and program management; decontamination and decommissioning environmental restoration; and excess weapons materials disposition.
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2024 ANS Winter Conference and Expo
November 17–21, 2024
Orlando, FL|Renaissance Orlando at SeaWorld
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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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.
S. J. Board, R. B. Duffey, C. L. Farmer, D. H. Poole
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 52 | Number 4 | December 1973 | Pages 433-438
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE73-A23309
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The use of equilibrium models for the analysis of metal-water explosions is examined. A theoretical thermal interaction model is then developed that uses the results of basic experiments on transient energy transfer from hot surfaces under water to predict the pressures produced in a metal-water thermal explosion. The model calculates the pressure resulting from energy transfer to a nonequilibrium two-phase coolant expanding in a shock-tube geometry. It is shown that the pressure depends greatly on the distribution of energy between vapor and liquid phases of the coolant and that, in the range of experimentally determined distributions where ∼10% of the flux produces evaporation, the pressure is more sensitive to the effective vapor generation rate than to the total flux. Using experimental energy distributions as input data and assuming that the interaction surface area is that determined from analysis of explosion debris, it is shown that the model predicts successfully the peak pressures resulting from two aluminum-water explosions. The results give some confidence that the surface area present at the time of an interaction is of the same order as that of the solidified debris. To predict the results of a thermal interaction in other fluids, however, in addition to the surface-area problem it may be necessary to obtain experimental information about the distribution of energy in the coolant, particularly the effective rate of vapor generation.