Nuclear Regulatory Commission funds data-driven analysis framework for advanced nuclear reactors
Monday, Oct. 25, 2021
Hitesh Bindra, Steve Hsu keystone research scholar and associate professor of mechanical and nuclear engineering at Kansas State University. | Download this photo.
MANHATTAN — The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has awarded Hitesh Bindra, Steve Hsu keystone research scholar and associate professor in the Alan Levin Department of Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering at Kansas State University, a nearly $500,000 grant to develop data-driven computational models for safety analysis of advanced nuclear reactors for regulatory and licensing purposes.
Bindra will lead the three-year project, "Statistical learning based multiscale safety analysis framework for advanced reactors," for the Carl R. Ice College of Engineering alongside collaborator Lane Carasik of Virginia Commonwealth University.
The computational models will be developed using data generated from scaled-down experiments of liquid-metal-cooled and gas-cooled reactors. Experimental data and ab-initio models will be used to inform the system-level codes.
"This project will address a major technical gap in existing analysis codes to capture thermal fluctuations critical for reactor system health under transient conditions," Bindra said. "These tools will enable future integration of real-time nuclear plant data to project any safety-related event progression and can also be used for autonomous control of advanced reactors."
The project aims to improve regulatory tools for the licensing of advanced nuclear reactors while also reducing the uncertainties in modeling nuclear safety-related event progressions.
