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Conference Spotlight
Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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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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The RAIN scale: A good intention that falls short
Radiation protection specialists agree that clear communication of radiation risks remains a vexing challenge that cannot be solved solely by finding new ways to convey technical information.
Earlier this year, an article in Nuclear News described a new radiation risk communication tool, known as the Radiation Index, or, RAIN (“Let it RAIN: A new approach to radiation communication,” NN, Jan. 2025, p. 36). The authors of the article created the RAIN scale to improve radiation risk communication to the general public who are not well-versed in important aspects of radiation exposures, including radiation dose quantities, units, and values; associated health consequences; and the benefits derived from radiation exposures.
Sule Ergun, Jason G. Williams, Lawrence E. Hochreiter, Hergen Wiersema, Marcel Slootman, Marek Stempniewicz
Nuclear Technology | Volume 163 | Number 2 | August 2008 | Pages 273-284
Technical Paper | Thermal Hydraulics | doi.org/10.13182/NT08-A3987
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
In this study, calculations were performed to simulate a postulated large-break loss-of-coolant accident for the High Flux Reactor (HFR) cooling system using the COBRA-TF computer code. COBRA-TF has been chosen for this analysis since it has suitable and validated two-phase flow models and critical heat flux (CHF) correlations for channels having small hydraulic diameters. Calculations have been performed to determine the CHF margins for the HFR. Six types of calculations were performed to provide a range of CHF margins. All COBRA-TF calculations indicate that margin does exist to the CHF limit for the small-hydraulic-diameter highest-power HFR channel. The range of margin is 2.1 to 1.3 times the nominal power of the highest power channel, depending on the boundary conditions and CHF correlation used. The range of margin identified in the HFR analysis is consistent with the margin values used in commercial nuclear power plants.
