The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management celebrated a major milestone for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant last week, marking the 25th anniversary of the receipt of the first waste shipment at the disposal facility in New Mexico’s Chihuahuan Desert.

Christensen

John Christensen, president and chief executive officer of Utilities Service Alliance (USA), has announced his retirement effective at the end of 2024. His career spans more than 41 years in the nuclear industry.

“The last 17 years have been some of the most challenging and gratifying years in my career,” he said. “The people I’ve had the opportunity to work with have been a great inspiration. I am extremely proud of everything we have accomplished since I joined USA.”

Ken Peters, USA’s chair of the board, noted, “John’s service and drive in helping the members of USA improve safety, plant operations and financial performance is a testament to his commitment to our industry. We wish John the very best in his retirement.”

Ken Petersen
president@ans.org

Nuclear has been on a good roll lately and it is getting better. The 2022 Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) provides a nuclear power production tax credit. This has stopped the early retirement of deregulated units. The IRA also provides a benefit for the clean production of hydrogen. Many utilities have committed to a net-zero goal by 2050. Duke and other utilities have plans to transition coal plants to nuclear with small modular reactors.

And now, nuclear has a new supporter—tech companies.

The big U.S. utility companies (like Exelon, Duke, Dominion, Southern, and Entergy) are all projecting growth in electricity demand—primarily in the commercial sector but some residential growth is also expected. Commercial growth is being driven by new factories (thank you, IRA and CHIPS, that is, the Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors and Science Act). It is also being driven by data centers.

The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals has vacated Holtec International’s license to build and operate a consolidated interim storage facility (CISF) for spent nuclear fuel near the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in southeastern New Mexico. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission granted the license for the Holtec facility, called the HI-STORE CISF in May 2023.

The Department of Energy issued new guidance this week for converting coal-fired plants to nuclear units—an idea that has gained traction in recent years as the United States looks to cut carbon emissions.

A 2022 DOE study found potential for more than 300 coal-to-nuclear conversions across the country. While the process is complex, it would result in significant environmental and reliability benefits to the grid.

The American Nuclear Society is now accepting applications for knowledge managers to work during the 2024 Utility Working Conference and Vendor Technology Expo. This year’s UWC, “Nuclear Momentum: Advancing Our Clean Energy Future,” will be held August 4–7, 2024, at the JW Marriott Marco Island Beach Resort on Marco Island, Fla.

ANS’s Operations & Power Division is sponsoring up to six knowledge managers by covering the registration fee and a three-night stay at the resort.

Further details on the conference are available online.

In an effort to accelerate development of low- and zero-carbon electricity, three companies have launched the Advanced Clean Electricity initiative—and are seeking information about advanced technology pilot projects.

Faculty and staff from Winthrop University recently toured the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site as part of a workforce development partnership.

Rishi Sunak, U.K. prime minister, announced plans this week to boost Britain’s nuclear workforce by 40,000 to support submarine building and developing other aspects of the nuclear energy industry.

“In a more dangerous and contested world, the United Kingdom’s continuous at-sea nuclear deterrent is more vital than ever,” Sunak said in a statement. “Today we usher in the next generation of our nuclear enterprise, which will keep us safe, keep our energy secure, and keep our bills down for good.”

More information about the government’s plans are laid out in the Defence Nuclear Enterprise Command policy paper.

We welcome ANS members who have careered in the community to submit their own Nuclear Legacy stories, so that the personal history of nuclear power can be captured. For information on submitting your stories, contact nucnews@ans.org.

The James Wm. Behrens family legacy in America starts with Henry H. Behrens, who came across the pond from Germany in 1857. He was later joined by Wilhelmina, also from Germany, and they were married in Alton, Ill., in about 1862. One of their sons, George Wm. Sr., was my grandfather. He and his wife, Frances Walker (of Irish and English descent), had three sons, one of whom (George Wm. Jr.) was my father. I was born in 1947 and raised in the small country town of Bunker Hill, Ill. I attended Bunker Hill elementary and high schools, graduating from the latter in 1965.

The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management announced the signing of a project labor agreement (PLA) between Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (OREM) contractor UCOR and North America’s Building Trades Unions (NABTU). The agreement, which allows for flexibility in wage increases and other incentives, is expected to help recruit and retain skilled construction trade workers at the DOE site in Tennessee.

The U.S. Department of Energy is constructing the Electron-Ion Collider (EIC) at Brookhaven National Laboratory to explore the boundaries of nuclear physics—both for the sake of science and to support diverse applications, including in nuclear medicine, radiation safety, and nuclear energy. The project, already supported by international collaborators in 40 countries, just secured a significant commitment from the United Kingdom.

The spent fuel pool at TVA’s Watts Bar nuclear power plant near Spring City, Tenn. (Photo: TVA)

Neutron absorber materials are used by nuclear power plants to maintain criticality safety margins in their spent nuclear fuel pools. These materials are typically in the form of fixed panels of a neutron-absorbing composite material that is placed within the fuel pools. (A comprehensive review of such materials used in wet storage pools and dry storage has been provided by the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) [1]).

With increasing plant life, there is a need to maintain or establish a monitoring program for neutron absorber materials—if one is not already in place—as part of aging management plans for reactor spent fuel pools.

Such monitoring programs are necessary to verify that the neutron absorbers continue to provide the criticality safety margins relied upon in the criticality analyses of a reactor’s spent fuel pool. To do this, the monitoring program must be capable of identifying any changes to the material and quantifying those changes. It should be noted that not all the changes (for example minor pitting and blistering of the absorber material) will result in statistically or operationally significant impact on the criticality safety margins.

For monitoring neutron absorber materials in spent fuel pools, until recently, two alternatives existed—coupon testing and in situ measurements. A third option, called industry-wide learning aging management program (i-LAMP), was proposed by EPRI and is currently in the final stages of the regulatory review. The following sections describe these monitoring approaches.

TerraPower today submitted its formal construction permit application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for the Natrium reactor demonstration project—a milestone submission for the nation’s first commercial advanced reactor of its kind.

Joseph M. Hendrie

To those of us who knew Joe, even prior to his appointment as chair of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, it is an understatement to say that he was a larger-than-life member of the nuclear science and technology enterprise. He was best known to the broader community for two major accomplishments: the design and construction of the High Flux Beam Reactor (HFBR) at Brookhaven National Laboratory and the creation of the standard review plan (SRP) for the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission.

In addition to the products of these endeavors becoming major fundaments to their respective communities, they were uniquely Joe. The safety analysis report for the HFBR was written essentially single-handedly by him. This was true of the SRP as well, which became the key safety review document for the NRC as it performed safety reviews for the growing number of power reactor applications in the United States. His deep technical knowledge of nuclear engineering and his extraordinary management skills made this possible.

The Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management’s liquid waste contractor at the Savannah River Site this month marked the first direct transfer of decontaminated waste from the Salt Waste Processing Facility (SWPF) to the Saltstone Production Facility (SPF). This is a new step in optimizing waste processing, according to the DOE.

Let’s face it: The global economy should be powered primarily by nuclear power. And it probably will by the end of this century, with a still-significant assist from renewables and hydro. Once nuclear systems are dominant, the costs come down to where gas is now; and when carbon emissions are reduced to a small portion of their present state, it will become obvious that most other sources are only good in niche settings. I mean, why use small modular reactors to load-follow when they can just produce that power instead of buffering it?

The Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute has developed a high-density uranium silicide fuel designed to replace high-enriched uranium in research reactors. Recent irradiation tests appear to be successful, KAERI reports, which means the fuel could be commercialized to continue a key global nuclear nonproliferation effort—converting research reactors to run on low-enriched uranium fuel.

Charles E. Till

Charles E. Till, an ANS member since 1963 and Fellow since 1987, passed away on March 22 at the age of 89. He earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Saskatchewan and a Ph.D. in nuclear engineering from Imperial College, University of London. Till initially worked for the Civilian Atomic Power Department of the Canadian General Electric Company, where he was the physicist in charge of the startup of the first prototype CANDU reactor in Canada.

Till joined Argonne National Laboratory in 1963 in the Applied Physics Division, where he worked as an experimentalist in the Fast Critical Experiments program. He then moved to additional positions of increasing responsibility, becoming division director in 1973. Under his leadership, the Applied Physics Division established itself as one of the elite reactor physics organizations in the world. Both the experimental (critical experiments and nuclear data measurements) and nuclear analysis methods work were internationally recognized. Till led Argonne’s participation in the International Nuclear Fuel Cycle Evaluation (INFCE), and he was the lead U.S. delegate to INFCE Working Group 5, Fast Breeders.

Kentucky’s Republican-majority legislature passed a bill this past week that could bring nuclear energy to the “coal-is-king” state as lawmakers broadly seek solutions to reduce carbon emissions. The bill went to Democratic Gov. Andrew Beshear on Monday for final approval.