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2025 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 9–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
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NNSA awards BWXT $1.5B defense fuels contract
The Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration has awarded BWX Technologies a contract valued at $1.5 billion to build a Domestic Uranium Enrichment Centrifuge Experiment (DUECE) pilot plant in Tennessee in support of the administration’s efforts to build out a domestic supply of unobligated enriched uranium for defense-related nuclear fuel.
A. D. Vaughn, R. I. Smith
Nuclear Technology | Volume 14 | Number 2 | May 1972 | Pages 146-152
Technical Paper | Fuel Cycle | doi.org/10.13182/NT72-A31129
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The plutonium concentrations in mixed-oxide fuel rods containing distinct sizes of particulate plutonium oxide have been determined using high resolution gamma-ray spectrometry. The fuel rod enrichments were in the range 2 to 2.5 wt% in natural UO2. Individual rod enrichments were determined to within ±0.1 wt% by comparison with a known standard. Differences in plutonium iso-topic composition were discemable also, in addition to the differences in plutonium enrichment. The technique provides an inexpensive nondestructive method of determining in situ plutonium composition and content of assembled fuel rods, for purposes of quality assurance and accountability control.