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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.
Raymond E. Alcouffe
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 56 | Number 4 | April 1975 | Pages 321-339
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE75-A26680
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
We introduce a generalization of the neutron diffusion equation, the solution of which is an accurate approximation to the transport scalar Flux. In this generalization we utilize auxiliary transport calculations of the system of interest to compute an accurate, pointwise diffusion coefficient. We have specified a procedure to generate and improve this auxiliary information in a systematic way, leading to improvement in the calculated diffusion scalar flux. This improvement is shown to be contingent upon satisfying the condition of positive calculated-diffusion coefficients, and we present an algorithm that ensures this positivity. Our generalized diffusion theory is also shown to be compatible with conventional diffusion theory in the sense that the same methods and codes can be used to calculate a solution for both. The accuracy of the method compared to reference SN transport calculations is demonstrated for a wide variety of examples.