ANS is committed to advancing, fostering, and promoting the development and application of nuclear sciences and technologies to benefit society.
Explore the many uses for nuclear science and its impact on energy, the environment, healthcare, food, and more.
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
Conference on Nuclear Training and Education: A Biennial International Forum (CONTE 2025)
February 3–6, 2025
Amelia Island, FL|Omni Amelia Island Resort
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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Jan 2025
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Nuclear Science and Engineering
February 2025
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
“Summer time” again? Santee Cooper thinks so
South Carolina public utility Santee Cooper and its partner South Carolina Electric & Gas (SCE&G) called a halt to the Summer-2 and -3 AP1000 construction project in July 2017, citing costly delays and the bankruptcy of Westinghouse. The well-chronicled legal fallout included indictments and settlements, and ultimately left Santee Cooper with the ownership of nonnuclear assets at the construction site in Jenkinsville, S.C.
Nathan Lau, Hao Wang (Virginia Tech), Shawn St. Germain, Andrea S. Harvey (INL), Matthew B. Weinger, Shilo Anders (Vanderbilt Univ Medical Center)
Proceedings | Nuclear Plant Instrumentation, Control, and Human-Machine Interface Technolgies (NPIC&HMIT 2019) | Orlando, FL, February 9-14, 2019 | Pages 664-673
Nuclear power plant (NPP) outage represents a major operational cost that must be minimized to sustain competitiveness in the US energy market. However, outage management can be challenging because myriad of interdependent activities may need adjustment over the course of the outage. We conducted a site vist to the Advanced Test Reactor at the Idaho National Laboratory and a literature review to identify general directions for innovations in interactive visualization for outage management. First, new approaches are needed to represent task and scheduling uncertainty to better support estimates of effort and cost overruns as tasks change during outages. This would allow staff to project the likelihood of overruns and reallocate resources as appropriate. Second, outage support software should facilitate visualization of resource constraints whether hard (e.g., regulatory requirements) or ‘soft’ (i.e., those with cost, morale, or other consequences). When responding to emergent issues or unplanned work, the outage staff must be aware of all potential alternatives (e.g., overtime, additional staff, deferrable tasks) and the short- and longer-term implications of each choice. Third, there is currently limited understanding of how best to support outage staff’s ability to simulate the impact of potential schedule adjustments in response to new or reallocated work. Graphical “what if” scenario depictions should be an important component of future visualization capabilities. To realize the potential of AOCC, interactive visualization for outage management must better support situation awareness, decision-making and planning.