Nuclear Energy Agency Online Bulletin

NEA provides support for new stage of nuclear safety initiative

The OECD Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) is supporting a new stage of an important international initiative, the Multinational Design Evaluation Programme (MDEP). The MDEP was set up to share the resources and knowledge accumulated by national nuclear regulatory authorities during their assessment of new reactor designs, with the aim of improving both the efficiency and the effectiveness of the process. More information is available at www.nea.fr/html/general/press/2006/2006-05.html.

New publications

Publications on sale can be ordered at the OECD bookshop: www.oecd.org/scripts/publications/bookshop/redirect.asp.

Nuclear Power Plant Life Management and Longer-term Operation
ISBN 92-64-02924-9. Price: €30, US$40, £21, ¥4 100. 60 pages.

Vient de paraître en français :
Gestion et prolongation de la durée de vie des centrales nucléaires
ISBN 92-64-02926-5. Prix : €30, US$40, £21, ¥4 100. 65 pages.

Free publications are available at www.nea.fr/html/pub/webpubs/. Paper copies may be requested by sending an e-mail to neapub@nea.fr.

International Evaluation Co-operation
Volume 7: Nuclear Data Standards
ISBN 92-64-02313-5. 39 pages (445 kb).

International Evaluation Co-operation
Volume 22: Nuclear Data for Improved LEU-LWR Reactivity Predictions
ISBN 92-64-02317-8. 43 pages (617 kb).

The JEFF-3.1 Nuclear Data Library
JEFF Report 21
ISBN 92-64-02314-3. 140 pages (933 kb).

Nuclear safety

A specialist meeting on seismic probabilistic safety assessment of nuclear facilities was held on 6-8 November 2006 on Jeju Island, Republic of Korea. The meeting provided an opportunity to review recent advances in the methodology and practical application of seismic probabilistic safety assessments and seismic margin analyses to nuclear installations. The workshop outcomes will be described in a forthcoming technical report. More information is available at www.nea.fr/html/nsd/workshops/seismicrisk/index.html.

Related links

Documents from the Committee on the Safety of Nuclear Installations (CSNI)
Documents from the Committee on Nuclear Regulatory Activities (CNRA)
Forthcoming workshops and seminars

Nuclear science

An NEA expert group formed to review the current status of nuclear science research and test facilities and the likely future requirements worldwide for such facilities met on 30-31 October 2006 at NEA headquarters in Paris, France. During their meeting the expert group examined the new research and test facilities database (RTFDB) and discussed a draft version of the group's final report. A test version of the database has been installed on the NEA website to allow members of the NEA Nuclear Science Committee and facility owners to review the data and to provide feedback. More information is available at www.nea.fr/html/science/egrfs/.

Data Bank

Participants in the Joint Evaluated Fission and Fusion File (JEFF) project met to evaluate the progress of the JEFF, European Fusion File (EFF) and European Activation File (EAF) projects on 20-22 November 2006 at NEA headquarters in Paris, France. Nearly 60 participants, mostly from Europe, discussed the current status of ongoing nuclear data benchmarks, processing initiatives and decay data and fission yield libraries. A meeting of the processing code NJOY user group was also held in connection with the JEFF meetings. More information is available at www.nea.fr/html/dbdata/projects/nds_jef.htm.

All four main reviews included in the third phase of the TDB project continue to make steady progress. The review of thorium is currently being peer reviewed and is expected to be ready for publication in early 2007. The state-of-the-art report on the thermodynamics of solid solutions will be ready for publication in the first half of 2007. The review of tin is well advanced and sections on solid and gases are now ready for peer review. The review of iron, covering the key species for Fe(II) and Fe(III), is expected to be ready for peer review by September 2007.

During its meeting on 26-27 October 2006 at NEA headquarters in Paris, France, the management board of the third phase of the TDB project approved a one-year extension (from 1 February 2007 to 31 January 2008) of the current TDB project agreement and to begin planning during 2007 for a new phase of the project. The tentative start date for the new phase of the project is 1 February 2008. More information is available at www.nea.fr/html/dbtdb/.

A page listing all new programs in the last 12 months can be found at: www.nea.fr/html/dbprog/cpsnew.html. Detailed news concerning the computer program service is available at: www.nea.fr/html/dbprog/Newsletter/Whatsnew.htm.

Instructions on retrieving material from the NEA may be found at www.nea.fr. Please note that scientific database access is only available to residents of OECD/NEA Data Bank member countries.