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Division Spotlight
Materials Science & Technology
The objectives of MSTD are: promote the advancement of materials science in Nuclear Science Technology; support the multidisciplines which constitute it; encourage research by providing a forum for the presentation, exchange, and documentation of relevant information; promote the interaction and communication among its members; and recognize and reward its members for significant contributions to the field of materials science in nuclear technology.
Meeting Spotlight
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.”
Francisco Martín-Fuertes, Juan Manuel Martín-Valdepeñas, José Mira, María Jesús Sánchez
Nuclear Technology | Volume 144 | Number 1 | October 2003 | Pages 34-48
Technical Paper | Thermal Hydraulics | doi.org/10.13182/NT03-A3427
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The MELCOR 1.8.4 code Bottom Head package has been applied to simulate two reactor cavity flooding scenarios for when the corium material relocates to the lower-plenum region in postulated severe accidents. The applications were preceded by a review of two main physical models, which highly impacted the results. A model comparison to available bibliography models was done, which allowed some code modifications on selected default assumptions to be undertaken. First, the corium convective heat transfer to the wall when it becomes liquid was modified, and second, the default nucleate boiling regime curve in a submerged hemisphere was replaced by a new curve (and, to a much lesser extent, the critical heat flux curve was slightly varied).The applications were devoted to two prototypical light water reactor nuclear power plants, a 2700-MW(thermal) pressurized water reactor (PWR) and a 1381-MW(thermal) boiling water reactor (BWR). The main conclusions of the cavity flooding simulations were that the PWR lower-head survivability is extended although it is clearly not guaranteed, while in the BWR sequence the corium seems to be successfully arrested in the lower plenum.Three applications of the CFX 4.4 computational fluid dynamics code were carried out in the context of the BWR scenario to support the first modification of the aforementioned two scenarios for MELCOR.Finally, in the same BWR context, a statistic predictor of selected output parameters as a function of input parameters is presented, which provides reasonable results when compared to MELCOR full calculations in much shorter CPU processing times.