No abstract available

[en] This document provides an engineering tracer study final report for the determination of contact time for the disinfection process at Group A Nontransient Noncommunity water treatment plant for the 100- N Water Plant (located on the Hanford Site in Richland, Washington). The purpose of this study is to determine the actual detention time within the plant clearwell, and the disinfection contact time at several clearwell effluent flow rates

[en] Highlights: • A RANS CFD computation of almost all of the EPR reactor primary circuit is demonstrated. • Comparison with experimental data of the obtained results is carried out. • Hydraulic decoupling between main vessel elements in normal operation is pointed out. • Promising results are found out with regards to nuclear plants’ safety demonstration. - Abstract: The present paper deals with the feasibility of a RANS CFD computation of almost all of the primary circuit of a EPR PWR reactor. The developed model includes the vessel, the core, the steam generators and the associated piping. The flow in the primary circuit is studied under normal operations with balanced flow rates between loops. The k–ε realizable model is retained for the turbulence modeling, and standard wall functions are used as wall treatment. The constructed grid contains about 181,000,000 elements, mainly hexahedrons. The computation is performed with the commercial CFD code STAR-CD, and despite the relatively large amount of cells, such kind of computation is fully accessible at an industrial scale with today available computational resources. A comparison with experimental data of the obtained results is carried out. The simulation results in the vessel are confronted to measurements issued from JULIETTE and ROMEO mock-ups, representative of the EPR lower and upper internals respectively. Regarding the steam generators, a benchmark with the dedicated code GENEPI is also performed. An overall good agreement with the reference data is underlined. The potential up-and-downstream effects of the different modeled components brought interesting knowledge, especially with regards to safety issues. These encouraging results allow in testing, in a near future, this model in other configurations such as unbalanced operation or accidental transients

[en] In March 2001, the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) completed the replacement of 720 radioactively contaminated HEPA filters for $5.7M. This project was completed five months ahead of schedule and $6.0M under budget with no worker injuries or contaminations. Numerous health and safety, environmental, and waste disposal problems were overcome, including having to perform work in a radioactively contaminated work environment, that was also contaminated with perchlorates (potential explosive). High waste disposal costs were also an issue. A project risk analysis and government cost estimate determined that the cost of performing the work would be $11.8M. To reduce risk, a $1.2M comprehensive condition assessment was performed to determine the degree of toxic and radioactive contamination trapped on the HEPA filters; and to determine whether explosive concentrations of perchlorates were present. Workers from LANL and personnel from Waldheim International of Knoxville, TN collected hundreds of samples wearing personnel protective gear against radioactive, toxic, and explosive hazards. LANL also funded research at the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology to determine the explosivity of perchlorates. The data acquired from the condition assessment showed that toxic metals, toxic organic compounds, and explosive concentrations of perchlorates were absent. The data also showed that the extent of actinide metal contamination was less than expected, reducing the potential of transuranic waste generation by 50%. Consequently, $4.2M in cost savings and $1.8M in risk reduction were realized by increased worker productivity and waste segregation

[en] Bechtel Hanford, Inc. will prepare an Engineering Tracer Study Protocol for the determination of contact time for the disinfection process at Group A Non-transient Non-community water treatment plant for the 100-N Water Plant at the Hanford Site in Richland, Washington. Included in this report are the results of a study that determine the actual detention time within the plant clearwell, and thus the disinfection contact time at several clearwell effluent flow rates

[en] The current research carried out it the El Berrocal Test Site belong to the ''Caracterizacion y validacion de los procesos de migracion de radionucleidos bajo condiciones reales en un medio granitico fracturado Project'', which is integrated in the ENRESA and EE R+D Programs aimed to establish the structural, lithological, geochemical, hydrochemical and hydrogeological aspects of the granite-Uranium mineralization system, to approach modelling of the U-Migration. The geometry and kinematics of fracturing which affect the El Berroal granite are shown in this paper. The kinematics of Late-Hercynian fractures is consistent with the development of an extension dilation zone off-set between the Meridional of Central System and Navamorcuente major faults, in a continued right-lateral shearing, accompanying E-W shortening in prolonged transpression. An statistical analysis of 1264 joints have been carried out. Joint spacing and aperture were also measured in profiles around the El Berrocal Test Site showing that joints may be grouped in three groups with orientations following Fisher distributions. Joint spacing shows fractal behaviour with a significant superimposed ramdon element (negative-exponential distribution) which is at present being evaluated. Finally, fracture trace mapping and detected fracture zones in boreholes from TLV data have been geometrically correlated and utilized to asses fracture connectivity. Connected networks of fractures have been obtained, which is a support fort further hydraulic tests carried out in the Porject. (Author) 53 refs

[en] The southern cool Ap star HD 116763 has recently been proposed by Matthews et al. (1988 Publs. astr. Soc. Pacif., 100,255) to be a possible rapidly oscillating Ap star. We present 11.2 hr of high-speed photometric observations obtained on four nights in 1988 July which fail to confirm the presence of oscillations. We present an independent frequency analysis of the data of Matthews et al. which leads to the conclusion that the proposed pulsation frequencies are probably spurious. (author)

[en] We study the properties of discrete breathers, also known as intrinsic localized modes, in the one-dimensional Frenkel-Kontorova lattice of oscillators subject to damping and external force. The system is studied in the whole range of values of the coupling parameter, from C=0 (uncoupled limit) up to values close to the continuum limit (forced and damped sine-Gordon model). As this parameter is varied, the existence of different bifurcations is investigated numerically. Using Floquet spectral analysis, we give a complete characterization of the most relevant bifurcations, and we find (spatial) symmetry-breaking bifurcations that are linked to breather mobility, just as it was found in Hamiltonian systems by other authors. In this way moving breathers are shown to exist even at remarkably high levels of discreteness. We study mobile breathers and characterize them in terms of the phonon radiation they emit, which explains successfully the way in which they interact. For instance, it is possible to form 'bound states' of moving breathers, through the interaction of their phonon tails. Over all, both stationary and moving breathers are found to be generic localized states over large values of C, and they are shown to be robust against low temperature fluctuations

[en] Recent studies point to climate change being one of the long-term drivers of agricultural market uncertainty. To advance in the understanding of the influence of climate change on future agricultural market developments, we compared a baseline scenario for the year 2030 with alternative simulation scenarios that differ regarding: (1) emission scenarios; (2) climate projections; and (3) the consideration of carbon fertilization effects on crop growth. For each simulation scenario, the CAPRI model provides global and EU-wide impacts of climate change on agricultural markets. Results showed that climate change would considerably affect agrifood markets up to 2030. Nevertheless, market-driven adaptation strategies (production intensification, trade adjustments) would soften the impact of yield shocks on supply and demand. As a result, regional changes in production would be lower than foreseen by other studies focused on supply effects.

[en] The discovery is announced of low-amplitude light variations with periods between 8.8 and 9.1 min in the cool magnetic Ap star HD 166473. 51 hr of high-speed photometric observations obtained on eight nights in 1986 from the South African Astronomical Observatory are presented. A frequency analysis of these observations shows that at least three frequencies are present in the light variations. The frequencies are not equally split and hence are not due to rotational amplitude modulation in an oblique pulsator. (author)