Core Periphery Research Articles (Page 9)

Ports are crucial links in global economic exchange. Structural modifications in the global economy have necessitated sequential morphological transformations in third-world port landscapes to accommodate each new emphasis of production in hinterlands. A four-stage temporal and descriptive model is proposed to examine relationships between structural evolution of the global economy and port-landscape changes at Belawan, the busiest international outerisland port of Indonesia. AS nodes linking land and maritime transportation, and as points of interdependent economic articulation between the Western core and non-Western periphery, third-world port facilities develop and operate in a manner that reflects the long-term structural evolution of the global economy. Colonially induced, sequential structural changes in investment, production, division of labor, and trade have come in response to the progressive economic maturation of industrial countries (Wallerstein 1979). Each stage has been accompanied by innovations in transportation that allow for reduced costs, the subsequent spread of capitalist production, and the incorporation of peripheral regions into a single production system (Mandel 1978, 50-51). This article interprets the long-term evolution of port morphology as a landscape expression of global economic relationships. The premise is that each stage in the penetration by Western economic interests and accompanying transportation technologies into peripheral resource regions engenders parallel changes in the morphologies of third-world port landscapes. With the implicit assumption that economic growth in the core depended on materials and markets of the periphery and that economic growth there required capital investment from the core (King 1990, 45), the morphology of Western ports was reproduced in the third world to promote the efficient articulation of global transportation. Interpreting and understanding the continuum of port-landscape evolution at one node of the global transportation system are possible only with reference to the production system of which that port constitutes one element. The port of Belawan on the Indonesian island of Sumatra provides an instructive case study. Belawan functions as the primary outport for the most productive plantation region in the country (Fig. 1). From inauspicious beginnings in the mid-nineteenth century, northern Sumatra by the early 1900s became known as the East Coast Plantation District. More importantly, West* DR. AIRRIESS is an assistant professor of geography at Ball State University, Muncie, Indiana 47306-0470. This content downloaded from 207.46.13.149 on Wed, 28 Sep 2016 05:07:20 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms THE GEOGRAPHICAL REVIEW FIG. 1-Regional setting of Belawan. ern control, Western demand, and intimate industrial linkages with the West have characterized the history of plantation development. As a result, no regional economy in outer-island Indonesia is as externally oriented as that of northern Sumatra. 184 This content downloaded from 207.46.13.149 on Wed, 28 Sep 2016 05:07:20 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

Inspection of the Three Mile Island Unit 2 (TMI-2) reactor vessel has yielded a wealth of information on core melt debris thermal interactions with vessel internal structures. The observed damage state of such structures is summarized and an analysis is presented to further the understanding of governing physical processes. Specifically, thermal damage is assessed for the baffle plates surrounding the core periphery, the core former plates, the bottom head instrument penetrations, and the lower head. Analysis indicates that differences in damage characteristics to such structures are due largely to differences in contact time with molten corium, the heat capacity of the various structures, and exposure to coolant. Vessel and debris examinations corroborate the present understanding of melt debris/structural interactions during the melt relocation phase of the TMI-2 accident.

Boiling water reactor fuel channels bulge and bow because of pressure, temperature, fast neutron flux, and their gradients. Channel deformations can be calculated by means of the finite element technique. Calculated bulge and bow results for WNP-2 fuel channels in different core locations and at different power levels have been obtained as functions of core residence time. In general, channel bulge is largest at the core center and decreases toward the core periphery. Bulge increases with the power level and the core residence time. Channel bow is largest at the core periphery and decreases for the next two rows of channels radially inward. Bow rate is highest in the first reactor cycle and then decreases. After an initial period, bow ceases to increase with residence time and may even decrease. The analytical results are being used by the Channel Management Program at Washington Public Power Supply System to optimize the utilization of fuel channels.

A two-dimensional horizontal seismic experiment with single axis and simultaneous two-axes excitations was performed to obtain the core seismic design data on the block-type high temperature gas-cooled reactor. Effects of excitation directions and core side support stiffness on characteristics of core displacements and reaction forces of support were revealed. The values of the side reaction forces are the largest in the excitation of flat-to flat of hexagonal block. Preload from the core periphery to the core center are effective to decrease core displacements and side reaction forces.