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Division Spotlight
Operations & Power
Members focus on the dissemination of knowledge and information in the area of power reactors with particular application to the production of electric power and process heat. The division sponsors meetings on the coverage of applied nuclear science and engineering as related to power plants, non-power reactors, and other nuclear facilities. It encourages and assists with the dissemination of knowledge pertinent to the safe and efficient operation of nuclear facilities through professional staff development, information exchange, and supporting the generation of viable solutions to current issues.
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!
Latest Magazine Issues
Jun 2024
Jan 2024
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
August 2024
Nuclear Technology
July 2024
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
NRC engineers share their expertise at the University of Puerto Rico
Robert Roche-Rivera and Marcos Rolón-Acevedo are licensed professional engineers who work at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. They are also alumni of the University of Puerto Rico–Mayagüez (UPRM) and have been sharing their knowledge and experience with students at their alma mater since last year, serving as adjunct professors in the university’s Department of Mechanical Engineering. During the 2023–2024 school year, they each taught two courses: Fundamentals of Nuclear Science and Engineering, and Nuclear Power Plant Engineering.
Hongbin Zhang, Ronaldo Szilard, Ling Zou, Haihua Zhao
Nuclear Technology | Volume 205 | Number 1 | January-February 2019 | Pages 174-187
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2018.1496694
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is proposing a new rulemaking on emergency core system/loss-of-coolant accident (LOCA) performance analysis. In the proposed rulemaking, designated as 10 CFR 50.46c, the NRC puts forward an equivalent cladding oxidation criterion as a function of cladding pretransient hydrogen content. The proposed rulemaking imposes more restrictive and burnup-dependent cladding embrittlement criteria; consequently, more fuel rods need to be analyzed under LOCA conditions to maintain the safety margin, in contrast to the current practice for which only one hot rod needs to be analyzed. New multiphysics analysis methods are required to provide a thorough characterization of the reactor core in order to identify the locations of the limiting rods and quantify safety margins under LOCA conditions. The U.S. Department of Energy’s Light Water Reactor Sustainability Program has initiated a project to develop multiphysics analytical capabilities, called LOTUS, to support the industry in the transition to the proposed rule. An approach to uncertainty quantification and sensitivity analysis with LOTUS was developed. A typical four-loop pressurized water reactor plant model was developed for RELAP5-3D simulations with inputs generated from core design and fuel performance analyses, and uncertainty quantification and sensitivity analysis were performed with 17 uncertain input parameters. The maximum equivalent cladding reacted ratio and peak clad temperature ratio were selected as the figures of merit (FOMs). Pearson, Spearman, partial correlation coefficients, and Sobol indices were considered for all of the FOMs in the sensitivity analysis.