Every workday, Sarah Ansari strives to ensure that the nuclear power plant where she works is operating safely. The IEEE member is an electrical design engineer at , in Russellville. The pressurized-water plant provides electricity to the majority of the state’s businesses and residents and to customers beyond Arkansas. “Our nuclear plant is like a river that meets the ocean, supplying power to the larger electric power grid that provides electricity across North America,” Ansari says. “These systems are robust, and we can’t make mistakes.” The risk with any nuclear facility, of course, is that if it isn’t managed properly, radiation leaks could endanger employees and people living nearby. Ansari’s responsibilities include ensuring the plant is operating safely, complying with regulations, and using up-to-date technology. Her work at the plant, her academic research, and her involvement in IEEE have helped Ansari build her community within the global nuclear industry. A day in the life of an electrical design engineer Since childhood, Ansari says, she knew that she wanted to work in physics or in power engineering. She was inspired by her parents, who worked in biology, and by her reading of physics journals and engineering and science magazines. Ansari entered the field of power engineering during her final semester as a Ph.D. student at the University of Arkansas in Little Rock, when she interned at Arkansas Nuclear One. “While I was a graduate student, I was also this company’s customer,” she recalls, “and now I was going to be working there behind the scenes.” U.S. nuclear power plants use reactors to create heat that boils water and produces steam. The steam is routed through the reactor system to spin large turbine blades that drive magnetic generators to produce electricity. During her internship, Ansari says, what stood out to her […]
Click here to visit source. Arkansas Nuclear One