Publications related to Nuclear power debate

Innovative thermophysical characterization of an ATF composite cladding: the case of silicon carbide

Nuclear power is a powerful technology that plays an important role in the fight against climate change, and research is continuously engaged in studies that could further improve its safety. After the Fukushima accident, Accident Tolerant Fuels research h ...

EPFL2024

Design of an Open-Loop Pile-Oscillation Program in the CROCUS Reactor

Andreas Pautz, Vincent Pierre Lamirand, Thomas Jean-François Ligonnet, Axel Guy Marie Laureau

As a follow-up to the CEA-EPFL PETALE experimental program on stainless steel nuclear data, the EPFL initiated an open-loop pile-oscillation experimental program in the CROCUS reactor: BLOOM. A reproduction of the critical experiments of PETALE, the progra ...

2024

Thermo-hydro-mechanical behaviour of the Callovo-Oxfordian claystone under thermal changes

Héloïse Manon Fuselier

Underground storage of radioactive waste is consensually recognised as the safest storage solution by European and worldwide countries relying mainly or partially on nuclear energy production. Over twenty years of research led by the French national agency ...

EPFL2024

Overview on the Applicability of the ITER/NPP-Like Technologies to the DEMO Plant Electrical System and Promising Alternatives

Damien Fasel, Zhe Chen, Hanwen Zhang, Elena Gaio, Alberto Ferro, Francesco Santoro

The Plant Electrical System (PES) of the European DEMOnstration fusion power plant (DEMO), presently under conceptual design, shall supply power to the loads and deliver net power to the Power Transmission Grid (PTG). Starting from the available requiremen ...

Ieee-Inst Electrical Electronics Engineers Inc2024

Microbial hydrogen sinks in the sand-bentonite backfill material for the deep geological disposal of radioactive waste

Rizlan Bernier-Latmani, Manon Frutschi, Nicolas Louis Maurice Jacquemin, Simiao Wang, Camille Aude Rolland, Niels Burzan, Aislinn Ann Boylan

The activity of subsurface microorganisms can be harnessed for engineering projects. For instance, the Swiss radioactive waste repository design can take advantage of indigenous microorganisms to tackle the issue of a hydrogen gas (H2) phase pressure build ...

Frontiers Media SA2024

Extension, validation, and optimization of Serpent/DYN3D/ATHLET code system for SFR applications

Vincenzo Anthony Di Nora

The sequence of codes Serpent/DYN3D has been developed by the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf and successfully applied to core static and transient analyses of sodium-cooled fast reactors (SFRs). The successful application of the sequence to SFRs was ...

EPFL2023

Analysis of the preliminary campaign for the PETALE program

Andreas Pautz, Vincent Pierre Lamirand, Thomas Jean-François Ligonnet, Axel Guy Marie Laureau

The PETALE program aims to provide new experimental data to constrain the stainless steel nuclear data. In this frame, a preliminary measurement campaign has been performed to characterize the neutron flux in key positions of the CROCUS reactor and to deve ...

EDP SCIENCES S A2023

Miniature and Minimalistic Neutron Detectors for Online High-Resolution Experiments in the Zero-Power Reactor CROCUS

Fanny Vitullo

The continuous strive for more efficient and reliable nuclear power plants is leading to increasing complexity in the design and operations of reactors. As a consequence, comprehensive analyses are required to assess the reactor's safety during normal and ...

EPFL2022

Understanding JET-C quiescent phases with edge harmonic magnetohydrodynamic activity and comparison with behaviour under ITER-like wall conditioning

Wilfred Anthony Cooper, Jonathan Graves, Daniele Brunetti, Alberto Mariani, Andreas Kleiner, Guillermo Bustos Ramirez

An analysis of edge localised mode-free (quiescent) H-mode discharges exhibiting edge harmonic magnetoydrodynamic activity in the JET-carbon wall machine is presented. It is observed that the otherwise quiescent pulses with multiple-n harmonic oscillations ...

IOP Publishing Ltd2022

Advanced methodologies for modeling and assessment of SFR safety functions

Janos Bodi

The present doctoral work was performed to contribute to the conceptual design development and safety assessment of a Generation IV Sodium Fast Reactor (SFR) in the frame of the European Sodium Fast Reactor Safety Measures Assessment and Research Tools (ES ...

EPFL2022

Comprehensive analysis of the circadian nuclear and cytoplasmic transcriptome in mouse liver

Felix Naef, Cédric Gobet, Benjamin Dieter Weger, Clémence Yumie Syloun Hurni

In eukaryotes, RNA is synthesised in the nucleus, spliced, and exported to the cytoplasm where it is translated and finally degraded. Any of these steps could be subject to temporal regulation during the circadian cycle, resulting in daily fluctuations of ...

PUBLIC LIBRARY SCIENCE2022

Data-Driven Predictive Models: Calculational Bias in Characterization of Spent Nuclear Fuel

Characteristics of the spent nuclear fuel (SNF) are typically calculated, requiring validation a priori. The validation process relies on the difference between calculations and measurements, namely the bias. Usually, predicting the bias based on benchmark ...

EPFL2022

Insights into the microbial reduction of pentavalent and hexavalent uranium species by Shewanella oneidensis MR-1

Margaux Camille Andréa Molinas

Decades of uranium-related activities such as ore mining, nuclear power generation, weapon manufacture, storage of nuclear wastes, have contributed to the release of U in the environment. U occurrence is concerning, since in surface environments, U is typi ...

EPFL2021

Uncertainty analyses of spent nuclear fuel decay heat calculations using SCALE modules

Andreas Pautz, Dimitri Rochman, Stefano Caruso

Decay heat residuals of spent nuclear fuel (SNF), i.e., the differences between calculations and measurements, were obtained previously for various spent fuel assemblies (SFA) using the Polaris module of the SCALE code system. In this paper, we compare dec ...

2021

Improved methodology for analysis and design of Molten Salt Reactors

Rodrigo Gonzalez Gonzaga De Oliveira

Molten Salt Reactors is a class of advanced reactors that is typically characterised by the presence of a molten inorganic salt of a fissile material as fuel. At the moment, this class of reactors is considered one of the promising options in the long run ...

EPFL2021

Swiss Potential for Hydropower Generation and Storage - Synthesis report

François Avellan, Pedro Filipe De Almeida Manso, Martin Schmid, Paolo Burlando, David Felix

Hydropower (HP) is the backbone of the Swiss electricity system providing around 60 % (36 TWh/a) of the total electricity generated on a yearly average. With the planned phase-out of nuclear power plants, HP and other Renewable Energy Sources (RES) will ne ...

ETH Zurich2021

A Wearable Low-Power Sensing Platform for Environmental and Health Monitoring: The Convergence Project

Mihai Adrian Ionescu, Thomas Ernst

The low-power sensing platform proposed by the Convergence project is foreseen as a wireless, low-power and multifunctional wearable system empowered by energy-efficient technologies. This will allow meeting the strict demands of life-style and healthcare ...

2021

Uncertainty and sensitivity analysis of PWR mini-core transients in the presence of nuclear data uncertainty using non-parametric tolerance limits

Andreas Pautz, Winfried Zwermann, Alexander Aures

The impact of nuclear data uncertainties is studied for the reactor power and the reactivity during control rod withdrawal transients with reactivity insertions of 0.5

and 0.97

, respectively, for a PWR mini-core model. Multi-group cross sections, the mul ...

PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD2020

Review of kinetic modulation experiments in low power nuclear reactors

Vincent Pierre Lamirand

The safety improvement of nuclear reactors requires continuous efforts in understanding the fundamental physical quantities related to the fission process. In neutronic models, the reactor dynamics is covered by the kinetic parameters to characterize the t ...

2020

Assessment of representativity of the PETALE experiments for validation of Swiss LWRs ex-core dosimetry calculations

Andreas Pautz, Vincent Pierre Lamirand, Hakim Ferroukhi, Axel Guy Marie Laureau, Dimitri Rochman, Alexander Vasiliev

The international experimental program PETALE will be carried out at the CROCUS research reactor of EPFL. The program aims at measuring neutron penetration in slabs made of materials composing typical LWR reactor pressure vessel. The measurements will be u ...

E D P SCIENCES2020