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Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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The Frisch-Peierls memorandum: A seminal document of nuclear history
The Manhattan Project is usually considered to have been initiated with Albert Einstein’s letter to President Franklin Roosevelt in October 1939. However, a lesser-known document that was just as impactful on wartime nuclear history was the so-called Frisch-Peierls memorandum. Prepared by two refugee physicists at the University of Birmingham in Britain in early 1940, this manuscript was the first technical description of nuclear weapons and their military, strategic, and ethical implications to reach high-level government officials on either side of the Atlantic. The memorandum triggered the initiation of the British wartime nuclear program, which later merged with the Manhattan Engineer District.
Stanley J. Green, J. Peter N. Paine
Nuclear Technology | Volume 55 | Number 1 | October 1981 | Pages 10-29
Technical Paper | Materials Performance in Nuclear Steam Generator / Material | doi.org/10.13182/NT81-A32828
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The nuclear industry has had a variety of reliability problems with pressurized water reactor steam generators. Most of these problems have been associated with corrosion and mechanically induced damage, including secondary water intergranular corrosion and stress corrosion cracking (SCC), primary water SCC, wastage, high cycle fatigue, and fretting and wear of the Inconel 600 or Incoloy 800 tubes, plus accelerated corrosion of carbon steel tube support structures in crevice regions. Corrosion and mechanically induced damage are caused by complex interactions of water chemistry, thermal-hydraulic design, materials design choices, fabrication methods, and secondary plant materials, design, and operations. Corrosion has affected almost 90% of steam generators operational prior to 1977, resulting in forced and scheduled outages to plug or sleeve tubes and repair or replace generators. Utility operators have begun to respond vigorously with improved operating and maintenance procedures that reduce air and cooling water inleakage; with installation of full-flow condensate polishers, titanium or stainless steel condensers, retubed feedwater heaters, and moisture separater reheaters; and with modifications to makeup water and blowdown systems. The Steam Generator Owners’ Group continues to provide a focus for development work to understand damage mechanisms, provide remedial actions, and effect transfer of technology to the utility operators