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Division Spotlight
Nuclear Installations Safety
Devoted specifically to the safety of nuclear installations and the health and safety of the public, this division seeks a better understanding of the role of safety in the design, construction and operation of nuclear installation facilities. The division also promotes engineering and scientific technology advancement associated with the safety of such facilities.
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Utility Working Conference and Vendor Technology Expo (UWC 2024)
August 4–7, 2024
Marco Island, FL|JW Marriott Marco Island
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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Latest News
Vogtle-3 shuts down for valve issue
One of the new Vogtle units in Georgia was shut down unexpectedly on Monday last week for a valve issue that has since been investigated and repaired. According to multiple local news outlets, Georgia Power reported on July 17 that Unit 3 was back in service.
Southern Company spokesperson Jacob Hawkins confirmed that Vogtle-3 went off line at 9:25 p.m. local time on July 8 “due to lowering water levels in the steam generators caused by a valve issue on one of the three main feedwater pumps.”
Larry G. Blackwood, Yale D. Harker
Nuclear Technology | Volume 132 | Number 3 | December 2000 | Pages 366-374
Technical Paper | Reactor Safety | doi.org/10.13182/NT00-A3150
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Current nuclear criticality safety limit requirements for transporting TRUPACT-II waste containers to the U.S. Department of Energy's Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) specify that the 239Pu fissile gram equivalent (FGE) plus two times its measurement error must be 325 g for a payload of fourteen 55-gal drums. The authorized method for calculating a TRUPACT-II FGE measurement error value is to take the square root of the sum of the squared error values for the individual containers (often called root-sum-squares or simply RSS). However, to the extent that the individual drum measurements contain common bias effects (e.g., due to common calibration or other adjustment factors), the corresponding measurement errors are correlated, and simple RSS calculations will underestimate the true error in the TRUPACT-II FGE value.The RSS calculations assume independence, while common bias effects can induce strong correlations between the errors in measurements. Significant bias effects can occur when the matrix characteristics for a particular waste type are not fully accounted for in the measurement process. Depending on the relative size of the bias error compared to precision error, the true measurement error can be greater than twice that calculated by RSS. In such cases, the FGE shipping requirement may not be met. To avoid underestimating the error, bias components should be estimated and propagated separately (combined only at the final step in the TRUPACT-II FGE calculation), or the effect of bias on covariance between measurements must be calculated. These covariance terms then need to be included in the final uncertainty calculations.