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Division Spotlight
Operations & Power
Members focus on the dissemination of knowledge and information in the area of power reactors with particular application to the production of electric power and process heat. The division sponsors meetings on the coverage of applied nuclear science and engineering as related to power plants, non-power reactors, and other nuclear facilities. It encourages and assists with the dissemination of knowledge pertinent to the safe and efficient operation of nuclear facilities through professional staff development, information exchange, and supporting the generation of viable solutions to current issues.
Meeting Spotlight
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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Nuclear Science and Engineering
September 2024
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
August 2024
Latest News
Nuclear new build procurement considerations
It may seem counterintuitive, but the best time to enhance the ability to support operations and maintenance for a new plant is before construction starts. This is one of many lessons learned by the currently operating nuclear fleet. As construction and startup of many nuclear facilities was completed, it quickly became evident that the ability to efficiently support operations and maintenance was limited. Most of the information necessary to establish and manage procurement of spare and replacement items, maintenance, and configuration of the facilities was unavailable and had to be gathered on a case-by-case, “on-demand” basis. Absence of necessary information and the associated challenges resulted in the need for staff augmentation and multiyear-long projects to develop equipment bills of material and maintenance programs and to perform technical evaluations for the huge quantities of spare and replacement items being requested.
Thomas M. Sutton
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 197 | Number 2 | February 2023 | Pages 164-175
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295639.2022.2065872
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The results of neutron Monte Carlo (MC) transport calculations are subject to random fluctuations about their expected values. The term “neutron clustering” refers to situations in which these fluctuations exhibit particularly strong spatial correlations in iterated-fission-source calculations. Various idealized models of the MC process have been developed to study this phenomenon. Over time, these models have evolved to more realistically reflect the algorithms used in MC codes. This paper continues along this path by including the possibility that some neutrons will not terminate in an event that can potentially produce new neutrons and by considering an algorithm without replacement (WOR) for selecting the neutron source sites. It is shown that sampling source sites WOR versus with replacement can greatly reduce the degree of clustering.