Developing consensus standards for advanced reactors

摘要

The modern automobile, Craig Piercy points out, has air bags, antilock brakes, collision avoidance and mitigation systems, and crumple zones, together designed to protect passengers in 40-mile-per-hour collisions. "So, should we also require that everyone in a car wears a helmet and a five-point racing seatbelt?" he asks rhetorically. Piercy was recently named executive director and chief executive officer of the American Nuclear Society, which in November published a special report titled Setting the Right Bar: How Consensus Standards Help Advanced Reactor Development. The ANS report isn't so presumptuous as to posit exactly where the safety bar should be set for the next generation of nuclear reactors; instead, it recommends a framework for how stakeholders can work together to determine the proper height.