NEA Mandates and Structures

NUCLEAR SCIENCE COMMITTEE (NSC)

Mandate (Document reference):

• Terms of Reference for the Committee and an Executive Group [NEA/SEN/NSC(91)1]
• Review of the NEA Committee Structure [NEA/NE(2000)11/REV1]
• Review of Mandates of the NEA Standing Technical Committees [NEA/NE(2005)2]
• Summary of Decisions Taken at the 117th Session of the Steering Committee for Nuclear Energy [NEA/SUM/DEC(2008)2]
• Review of the NEA Standing Technical Committee Mandates [NEA/NE(2010)7]
• Summary of Decisions Taken at the 121st Session of the Steering Committee for Nuclear Energy [NEA/SUM/DEC(2010)2]
• Review of the Mandates of NEA Bodies Reporting Directly to the Steering Committee [NEA/NE(2016)5]
• Summary of Decisions Taken at the 133rd Session of the Steering Committee for Nuclear Energy [NEA/SUM/DEC(2016)2] 
• Report on the Prioritisation of Activities by the NEA Standing Technical Committees and the Management Board for the Development, Application and Validation of Nuclear Data and Codes (MBDAV) [NEA/NE(2020)15]
• Summary Record of the 31^st meeting of the Nuclear Science Committee [NEA/SEN/NSC(2020)20] 
• Summary Record of the Remote 140^th Session of the Steering Committee for Nuclear Energy held from 28 to 30 October 2020 [NEA/SUM(2020)3] 
• Mandate of the Nuclear Science Committee (NSC) approved under the written procedure on 18 December 2020 by the Steering Committee members [NEA/NE(2020)23]
• Mandate approved under the written procedure by the NSC members [NEA/SEN/NSC(2022)4/FINAL]
• Review of Mandates of the NEA Standing Technical Committees and the Management Board for the Development, Application and Validation of Nuclear Data and Codes (MBDAV) [NEA/NE(2022)20]
• Summary of Decisions Taken at the 144th Session of the Steering Committee for Nuclear Energy (Item 10) [NEA/SUM/DEC(2022)2]

Mandate (Document extract):

Extract from document NEA/NE(2022)20

Mandate:

The general objective of the NSC is to help member countries identify, collect, compile, develop, preserve and disseminate the basic scientific and technical knowledge required to ensure the safe, reliable and economic operation of current and next-generation nuclear systems and to promote innovation.

Research capabilities and technical expertise in basic disciplines, such as nuclear data, reactor physics, thermal hydraulics, neutronics, fuel thermo-mechanical behaviour, fuel cycle physics and chemistry, material science and radiation physics, are needed to develop nuclear programmes and to maintain and enhance a high level of performance and safety. Advancing this body of knowledge is central to addressing issues of importance for the current generation of nuclear facilities, and it is essential to the design, construction and operation of new reactors, fuel cycles and other nuclear facilities. Future nuclear technologies will greatly benefit from the systematic accumulation of knowledge in these areas.

Fostering the active identification, collection, compilation, preservation, and development of this scientific knowledge in an international framework and, enhancing the dissemination of the results is vital to the effective performance of nuclear activities. The shared analysis of this information and data in an international framework contributes to the identification of promising new technical options, the acceleration of innovation deployment, and the building of a robust skills capability across the nuclear science community.

To further these objectives, the NSC will:

• organise international standard problem (benchmark) exercises, with a view to arriving at a consensus on the preferred state-of-the-art modelling and computation methods to be used in different application areas;
• support the identification, evaluation and collection of integral experiment data and development of relational databases to be used for validation purposes in different application areas;
• support the preservation of and generational transfer of essential knowledge in the field of nuclear science;
• support the maintenance and development of skills capabilities in the nuclear energy sector;
• disseminate and communicate the work of the NSC bodies through the publication of workshop proceedings, technical reports, articles, international standards, reports directed at a wide audience, webinars and social media content in a variety of networking platforms;
• where appropriate, promote the establishment of joint undertakings;
• support the co-sponsorship of international scientific workshop and conferences;

Advancing existing knowledge and expertise through innovative collaborative research is a critical element of the NSC’s mission. The areas of activity will cover, but not be limited to:

• nuclear physics, nuclear data measurements and evaluations;
• mathematical models and computation science including multi-physics and multi-scale modelling approaches;
• reactor systems (critical and sub-critical) physics, including neutronics, thermal-hydraulics, chemistry, structural mechanics and material science;
• criticality safety issues;
• fuel cycle, including fuel backend, physics, chemistry, material science and scenarios;
• nuclear fuels and core materials, including multi-scale modelling and new irradiation experiments in material test reactors;
• radiation shielding and dosimetry;
• nuclear energy deployment and integration;
• preservation and renewal of expertise in nuclear science, education and training;
• co-ordination of efforts to preserve and develop research infrastructure;
• advanced instrumentation, measurement methods and techniques;
• Big Data and Machine Learning in nuclear science; and
• distillation of lessons from non-nuclear high-technology domains, such as predictive maintenance and advanced manufacturing.

In the fulfilment of its mandate, the NSC will interact with other NEA standing technical committees in matters of common interest, particularly with the NEA Management Board for the Development, Application and Validation of Nuclear Data and Codes (MBDAV) and the NEA Data Bank, as well as with NEA divisions and other international organisations, as appropriate.