NRC rigs its "ground testing" MORE LATER

Shifting Sands For Boeing's Dreamliner

Boeing has scrubbed its schedule for the production of its all-composite 787 Dreamliner as it works to reinforce the aircraft's wing section while customers have scrubbed orders for about 72 of the jets this year, including 15 dropped by Qantas last week. Still the order book for the untested, unfinished aircraft stands at roughly 850 for a list price total of more than $151 billion. The aircraft's first flight has seen four delays that have so far put the jet two years behind schedule, and the cascade of reactions to that reality include Boeing's bartering with carriers who still hold orders for the aircraft. Among those, All Nippon Airways has actually added five more of the jetliners to its orders, which may give a glimpse into the complicated contracts that manufacturers create with their clients. Media reports say some customers are seeking compensation for the delays as Boeing's delays disrupt their strategic operating plans amid volatile oil costs and a depressed economy. On the upside, Boeing has the opportunity to avoid penalties with remaining customers as they gain some flexibility in delivery schedules among fewer buyers. On the downside, the jet hasn't flown yet and after extensive computer modeling, ground tests have detected structural flaws that require structural changes.

NRC stays fat via obfuscation of ECCS.

So, I've just copied this from NRC's ADAMS. More featherbedding and obfuscation by our well-fed feds.

n a May 13, 2008, memorandum from R. W. Borchardt entitled, “Updated Schedule for Rulemaking—Emergency Core Cooling System Acceptance Criteria” (Agencywide Documents Access and Management System (ADAMS) Accession No. ML081260311), the staff informed the Commission of the status of the 10 CFR 50.46(b) rulemaking activities and outlined a rulemaking approach that included a decision point about the adequacy of the technical basis (WITS No. 200800238). Based on comments received from public stakeholders and internal discussions, the staff identified further research to enhance the existing technical basis. The staff outlined these additional research activities as well as a revised rulemaking plan and schedule in a December 19, 2008, memorandum entitled, “Status of Rulemaking on Emergency Core Cooling System Acceptance Criteria” (ADAMS Accession No. ML083440156 [?] ).

The technical basis supporting a revision to the 10 CFR 50.46(b) ECCS acceptance criteria is complete, and the rulemaking is progressing in accordance with the schedule outlined in the memorandum dated December 19, 2008. The staff completed the additional research activities outlined in that memorandum on schedule (ADAMS Accession Nos. ML090690711 and ML090700193). These items supplement the technical basis, which can be found in the following two documents: (1) NRC Research Information Letter 0801, “Technical Basis for Revision of Embrittlement Criteria in 10 CFR 50.46,” dated May 30, 2008 (ADAMS Accession No. ML081350225); and (2) M. Billone, Y. Yan, T. Burtseva, and R. Daum, “Cladding Embrittlement during Postulated Loss-of-Coolant Accidents,” NUREG/CR-6967 (ANL-07/04), July 2008 (ADAMS Accession No. ML082130389). Staff members from the Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation and the Office of New Reactors are working with the Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research (RES) to develop an acceptable regulatory framework for the comprehensive laboratory testing requirements developed by RES. Once completed, the staff will issue these testing procedures for public comment as part of an advance notice of proposed rulemaking scheduled for publication in August 2009. This memorandum satisfies the requirements of WITS No. 200800238.
cc: SECY

CRUD 1982 and 2006

Of course, crud has been around prior to 1982 and it will be around a long time after 2006. This snapshot is revealing. Click to enlarge. I may elaborate later.

The Westinghouse presentation to the ACRS refers to, "boron induced power shift." When this phenomenon was first experienced it was referred to as "Axial Offset Anomaly" (AOA).

NRC should learn, June 25, 2009

Boeing's Latest Dreamliner Setback

Boeing said on Tuesday that first flight of the 787 Dreamliner will be postponed again, due to a need to reinforce an area within the side-of-body section of the aircraft, and it will be several weeks before a new first flight or delivery date will be announced. Boeing officials had said as recently as last week at the Paris Air Show that the Dreamliner's first flight would take place by the end of this month, and deliveries would start by next March. The need to modify the aircraft raised questions about whether the computer models that are used to design aircraft and predict performance are adequate, especially when using advanced composite materials, but officials at Boeing said the process is working as it should: Computer models predict how the design will behave, but extensive real-world testing is always required to validate those predictions and, if necessary, modify the models.

NRC claims that its code, TRACE, is ready for licensing. That is false.

Obama crook Wall Street Journal

This recent letter to the Wall Street Journal briefly covers a lot of ground.

Kangaroo Court and the National Science Foundation

Here is a definition I copied: More later.

Kangaroo courts are sham legal proceedings which are set-up in order to give the impression of a fair legal process. In fact, they offer no impartial justice as the verdict, invariably to the detriment of the accused, is decided in advance.

Blastout during scram with leaking oxide fuel at high power density

So it does not happen often, but it has happened. At a recent meeting of the NRC's ACRS, one member wondered if a rapid shutdown could induce a PCI failure and the expert replied that, "We've never seen that."

Of course, the expert is likely correct that a PCI cladding opening has never been induced by a reactor scram. However, a reactor scram has induced severe additional failure of defected fuel that was operating at high power density. The readers who have the patience may scroll down to my entry of June 13, 2008, in which I detail events at GETR on July 12, 1959, along with hot cell photographs of blasted fuel.

Here are a few sentences from the recent meeting of the ACRS subcommittee:

ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS
SUBCOMMITTEE ON MATERIALS, METALLURGY AND
REACTOR FUELS
+ + + + +
TUESDAY
MARCH 3, 2009
+ + + + +
ROCKVILLE, MARYLAND

MEMBER RAY: Is there -- everything you talked about, Sam, had to do with raising power, ramp rate, increasing power. I just kept thinking to myself is there symmetrical problem on the downside with a unit trip or something like that in terms of stress levels?

CHAIR ARMIJO: No. Actually, I have never known a fuel rod to fail when you reduce power. You reduce power as a result of failure, that's typical. Actually it unloads. Everything unloads. As you drop power the pellets contract thermally so the stresses, whatever stresses are there and there is just no -- this is stress corrosion cracking mechanism. Unless there is a mechanism to put stress on the cladding, it just won't happen.

MEMBER RAY: Well, that's what I was thinking about. Is there a mechanism on a down-power, rapid down-power that has the same affect?

CHAIR ARMIJO: We've never seen that.

Well, during summer 1959, GETR had a wild time with blastout of a leaking oxide fuel element that had center melting. On July 20, 1962, a recurrence was avoided by by complying with the following Leyse procedure. I addressed this note to Kornblith with a copy to Thorburn. Thorburn sent it to O’Rourke who sent it to Akin who returned it to O’Rourke with this note. The copy came back to me and I filed it.

This procedure made life a lot easier at GETR on July 20, 1962, when test fuel operating at very high power density developed a leak. When the fuel was removed from the PWL, a large blasted zone was not present, although the some fission products were released during removal of the fuel.

As usual, the regulators (then the AEC) did not appreciate initiative from the GETR staff as they followed this guidance. An inspector asked, “Are the operators afraid to scram this reactor?” Click on each slide to enlarge and use the return arrow to get back here.