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Nuclear Nonproliferation Policy
The mission of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Policy Division (NNPD) is to promote the peaceful use of nuclear technology while simultaneously preventing the diversion and misuse of nuclear material and technology through appropriate safeguards and security, and promotion of nuclear nonproliferation policies. To achieve this mission, the objectives of the NNPD are to: Promote policy that discourages the proliferation of nuclear technology and material to inappropriate entities. Provide information to ANS members, the technical community at large, opinion leaders, and decision makers to improve their understanding of nuclear nonproliferation issues. Become a recognized technical resource on nuclear nonproliferation, safeguards, and security issues. Serve as the integration and coordination body for nuclear nonproliferation activities for the ANS. Work cooperatively with other ANS divisions to achieve these objective nonproliferation policies.
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ANS Student Conference 2025
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General Kenneth Nichols and the Manhattan Project
Nichols
The Oak Ridger has published the latest in a series of articles about General Kenneth D. Nichols, the Manhattan Project, and the 1954 Atomic Energy Act. The series has been produced by Nichols’ grandniece Barbara Rogers Scollin and Oak Ridge (Tenn.) city historian David Ray Smith. Gen. Nichols (1907–2000) was the district engineer for the Manhattan Engineer District during the Manhattan Project.
As Smith and Scollin explain, Nichols “had supervision of the research and development connected with, and the design, construction, and operation of, all plants required to produce plutonium-239 and uranium-235, including the construction of the towns of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and Richland, Washington. The responsibility of his position was massive as he oversaw a workforce of both military and civilian personnel of approximately 125,000; his Oak Ridge office became the center of the wartime atomic energy’s activities.”
Cliff B. Davis
Nuclear Technology | Volume 133 | Number 2 | February 2001 | Pages 187-193
Technical Paper | Thermal Hydraulics | doi.org/10.13182/NT01-A3168
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Lead-bismuth is currently being considered as a coolant for fast reactors designed to produce low-cost electricity as well as burn actinides. Lead-bismuth fluid properties have been added to the ATHENA code so that it can be used in the thermal-hydraulic analysis of lead-bismuth-cooled reactors. The capability of ATHENA to calculate the void fraction of a two-component, two-phase mixture of liquid lead-bismuth and steam in cocurrent upflow was assessed using the El-Boher and Lesin void correlation. The assessment showed that the drift flux correlations currently available in the code predicted trends that were in reasonable agreement with the El-Boher and Lesin void correlation, but the predicted void fractions were significantly too high. For example, the Kataoka-Ishii correlation, which was the best of the available correlations, predicted void fractions that were up to 30% greater than the values from the El-Boher and Lesin correlation. Consequently, the El-Boher and Lesin correlation was implemented in a modified version of ATHENA. The implementation was complicated by the fact that the El-Boher and Lesin correlation was an explicit correlation for void fraction rather than a drift flux correlation. An approach was developed so that the code's basic drift flux formulation could be used to easily implement an explicit void correlation. The predictions of the modified code were in excellent agreement with the El-Boher and Lesin void correlation.
