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Conference Spotlight
2025 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 9–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
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Latest News
IAEA again raises global nuclear power projections
Noting recent momentum behind nuclear power, the International Atomic Energy Agency has revised up its projections for the expansion of nuclear power, estimating that global nuclear operational capacity will more than double by 2050—reaching 2.6 times the 2024 level—with small modular reactors expected to play a pivotal role in this high-case scenario.
IAEA director general Rafael Mariano Grossi announced the new projections, contained in the annual report Energy, Electricity, and Nuclear Power Estimates for the Period up to 2050 at the 69th IAEA General Conference in Vienna.
In the report’s high-case scenario, nuclear electrical generating capacity is projected to increase to from 377 GW at the end of 2024 to 992 GW by 2050. In a low-case scenario, capacity rises 50 percent, compared with 2024, to 561 GW. SMRs are projected to account for 24 percent of the new capacity added in the high case and for 5 percent in the low case.
Masaaki Uchida, Michio Ichikawa
Nuclear Technology | Volume 51 | Number 1 | November 1980 | Pages 33-44
Technical Paper | Fuel | doi.org/10.13182/NT80-A32554
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Three Zircaloy-clad UO2 test fuel rods were irradiated at 50 kW/m to a burnup of 15 000 MWd/MTU with an in-pile rod diameter scanning device, and cladding deformations were measured at various power and bumup levels. Major mode of deformation was ridging at pellet interface positions. Magnitude and relevant power levels for various modes of cladding deformation were found to be strongly dependent on initial pellet-cladding gap size. During the first approach to power, smaller gap size caused larger cladding deformation; however, the effect was reversed at higher burnup. Cladding diametral deformation was found to be dictated not only by local thermal expansion of a single pellet, but also by long-range axial force in the pellet stack. In the first power cycle, cladding deformations caused by power ramp were found to decrease during subsequent power holding, but their rate was much reduced at high burnup.
