A multidisciplinary, multi-organization team led by Nuclear Engineering faculty, Dr. Nam Dinh , has been awarded funding from the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) program, Modeling-Enhanced Innovations Trailblazing Nuclear Energy Reinvigoration (MEITNER), for $3,386,834.
The project, Development of a Nearly Autonomous Management and Control System for Advanced Reactors, seeks to develop a highly automated management and control system for advanced nuclear reactors. The system will provide recommendations to plant operators and will use artificial intelligence and continuous data monitoring to predict future plant status through machine learning. Ultimately, the team seeks to enable a significantly smaller operational staff to manage the plant, assisted by instrumentation, operator training, and smart procedures, reducing overall operational cost.
The team includes NC State faculty, Dr. Avramova and Dr. Bui from Nuclear Engineering, Dr. Chi from Computer Science, and Dr. Gupta from the department of Civil, Construction and Environmental Engineering. In addition, other collaborators included in the team are Ohio State University, New Mexico State University, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Idaho National Laboratory, Zachry Nuclear, and TerraPower.