Modeling, Experimentation and Validation Summer School returns to Idaho Falls
– Edited by April Murelio –
The Modeling, Experimentation and Validation (MeV) Summer School at the Idaho State University (ISU) Center for Higher Education runs from July 20 to 29. It will feature lectures from experts in nuclear engineering and safety analysis. Professional nuclear engineers and college students come from all over the world in order to participate in the 10-day school.
Idaho National Laboratory — in conjunction with the Center for Advanced Energy Studies, ISU, Argonne National Laboratory and Oak Ridge National Laboratory — will be hosting the school in Idaho Falls. This will be the second year for the MeV Summer School, and the second year that INL has hosted it.
Forty-three students are signed up for MeV this year. A couple of the students who participated last year are returning. They will act as mentors for the new students, helping guide them through the process of developing their team projects, which will be evaluated on the last day of the school.
This year, MeV falls only weeks after the U.S. Department of Energy announced its creation of a multidisciplinary Nuclear Energy Modeling and Simulation Energy Innovation Hub, led by Oak Ridge and supported by universities, industry partners and other national labs including INL. The hub will be called the Consortium for Advanced Simulation of Light Water Reactors (CASL). The school's focus is very similar to what CASL will be doing, and one member of the consortium will give a presentation during the school.
"It's a really nice link," said Kimberlyn Mousseau of the MeV secretariat and deputy division director of Nuclear Science & Engineering at INL.
The school will be held at Argonne National Laboratory next year, she said.
The 2010 central theme is risk-informed safety margin characterization. The courses are designed to broaden student knowledge and equip them with modern approaches to safety analysis; emphasis is placed on anticipating future needs of the profession. Graduate credit will be awarded for the successful completion of the MeV Summer School.
Within the scope of the 10-day school, the following topics will be addressed in an integrated fashion:
•Reactor safety design and safety analysis methods;
•Basics and advances in probabilistic risk assessment;
•Multiphysics (thermal hydraulics, neutronics, materials, fuels, I&C) of plant dynamics in operational, abnormal transients and accidents;
•Basics and advances in nuclear energy systems modeling and simulation that encompasses critical review of equations, closures, and numerical methods;
•Experimentation including scaling, diagnostics, and data management;
•Sensitivity analysis, uncertainty quantification and data assimilation methods; and
•Advanced verification and validation methods.
Students are grouped in teams to work on course assignments that builds on the lecture materials and addresses challenging questions in reactor safety. Each team will be working closely with and mentored by senior scientists and professors who are leaders in the field. Successful students will take away a solid theoretical foundation, as well as a set of practical examples to guide their future work. Computer work on experimental design, model development and validation.
For more information on the school, visit www.mevschool.org.
INL is one of DOE's 10 multiprogram national laboratories. The laboratory performs work in each of DOE's strategic goal areas: energy, national security, science and environment. INL is the nation's leading center for nuclear energy research and development. Day-to-day management and operation of the laboratory is the responsibility of Battelle Energy Alliance.