• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• 제47권2호
• /
• pp.157-164
• /
• 2015

Nuclear power plants have logical loop structures in their system configuration. This paper explains the method to solve a loop structure in reliability analysis. As examples of loop structured systems, the reactor core isolation cooling system and high-pressure core injection system of a boiling water reactor are considered and analyzed under a station blackout accident condition. The analysis results show the important role of loop structures under severe accidents. For the evaluation of the safety of nuclear power plants, it is necessary to accurately evaluate a loop structure's reliability.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• 제51권8호
• /
• pp.1939-1950
• /
• 2019

The MELCOR code useful for a plant-specific hydrogen risk analysis has inevitable limitations in prediction of a turbulent flow of a hydrogen mixture. To investigate the accuracy of the hydrogen risk analysis by the MELCOR code, results for the turbulent gas behavior at pipe rupture accident were compared with CFX results which were verified by the American National Standard Institute (ANSI) model. The postulated accident scenario was selected to be surge line failure induced by station blackout of an Optimized Power Reactor 1000 MWe (OPR1000). When the surge line failure occurred, the flow out of the surgeline was strongly turbulent, from which the MELCOR code predicted that a substantial amount of hydrogen could be released. Nevertheless, the results indicated nonflammable mixtures owing to the high steam concentration released before the failure. On the other hand, the CFX code solving the three-dimensional fluid dynamics by incorporating the turbulence closure model predicted that the flammable area continuously existed at the jet interface even in the rising hydrogen mixtures. In conclusion, this study confirmed that the MELCOR code, which has limitations in turbulence analysis, could underestimate the existence of local combustible gas at pipe rupture accident. This clear comparison between two codes can contribute to establishing a guideline for computational hydrogen risk analysis.

• 한국원자력학회:학술대회논문집
• /
• 한국원자력학회 1997년도 춘계학술발표회논문집(1)
• /
• pp.587-591
• /
• 1997

The DGs (Diesel Generators) in NPP (Nuclear Power Plant) has been used for the emergency electric power source to shut down the nuclear reactor safely in case of station blackout. The RCM (Reliability Centered Maintenance) has been applied to DGs for increasing the safety of NPP. The structured defects of DG were not remedied by the improvement of maintenance method. As the first stage of RCM, to find the structured defects, its failure modes were searched and analyzed through the ten year maintenance information. The structured defects such as the air compressor, the lubricating oil pressure, and the insufficient load were the root causes of main failures. The air reservoir reinstallation, the lubricating oil tube modification, the load bank installation, and the qualitative instrumentation were the solutions for the hardware oriented RCM of DGs. There remains the software oriented RCM such as the rejection of useless maintenance, the preventive maintenance, the database of maintenance information, and the predictive maintenance.

• 한국압력기기공학회 논문집
• /
• 제16권1호
• /
• pp.11-21
• /
• 2020

This study aims to develop and advance the evaluation technology for assessing PHWR safety. For this purpose, the complete loss of AC power or station blackout (SBO) was selected as a target accident scenario and the analysis model to evaluate the plant responses was envisioned into the MARS-KS input model. The model includes the main features of the primary heat transport system with a simplified model for the horizontal fuel channels, the secondary heat transport system including the shell side of steam generators, feedwater and main steam line, and moderator system. A steady state condition was achieved successfully by running the present model to check out the stable convergence of the key parameters. Subsequently, through the SBO transient analyses two cases with and without the coolant leakage via the PHTS pumps were simulated and the behaviors of the major parameters were compared. The sensitivity analysis on the amount of the coolant leakage by varying its flow area was also performed to investigate the effect on the system responses. It is expected that the results of the present study will contribute to upgrading the evaluation technology of the detailed thermal hydraulic analysis on the SBO transient of the operating PHWRs.

• 품질경영학회지
• /
• 제25권3호
• /
• pp.108-118
• /
• 1997

A commercial nuclear power station contains at least two emergency diesel generates(EDG) to control the risk of severe core demage during the station blackout accidents. Therefore the reliability of the EDG's to start and load-run on demend must be maintained at a sufficiently high level. Until now, a simple assessment of start and load-run success rates was used to calculate the EDG's reliability. However, this method has been found to contain many defects. Recently, the work of Martz et al.(1996) proposed the use of the Bayes estimator to find the EDG's reliability. In this paper, we will propose confidence interval for the Bayes estimator, compare the above two methods and, using practical examples, illustrate why the Bayes estimator method is more reasonable in our situation.

• 품질경영학회지
• /
• 제26권4호
• /
• pp.265-276
• /
• 1998

A commercial nuclear power station contains at least two emergency diesel generators(EDG) to control the risk of severe core damage during station blackout accidnets. Therefore, thereliability of the EDG's to start and load-run on demand must be maintained at a sufficiently high level. Until now, a simple assessment of start and load-run success rates was used to calculate the EDG reliability. However, this method has been found to contain many defects. Recently, the work of Martz et al.(1996) proposed the use of the Bayes estimator to find EDG reliability. Shim(1996) proposed a confidence interval for the Bayes estimator, compare the above two methods. In this paper, we introduce the notion of "Composite Reliablility" to estimate the reliability of nuclear-power plant EDG, and using practical examples, illustrate which method is more a, pp.opriate in our situation.situation.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• 제53권10호
• /
• pp.3236-3246
• /
• 2021

Lessons learned from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant accident directed that multiple failures should be considered more seriously rather than single failure in the licensing bases and safety cases because attempts to take accident management measures could be unsuccessful under the high radiation environment aggravated by multiple failures, such as complete loss of electric power, uncontrollable loss of coolant inventory, failure of essential safety function recovery. In the case of the complete loss of electric power called station blackout (SBO), if there is no mitigation action for recovering safety functions, the reactor core would be overheated, and severe fuel damage could be anticipated due to the failure of the active heat sink. In such a transient condition at CANDU-6 plants, the seal failure of the primary heat transport (PHT) pumps can facilitate a consequent increase in the fuel sheath temperature and eventually lead to degradation of the fuel integrity. Therefore, it is necessary to specify the regulatory guidelines for multiple failures on a licensing basis so that licensees should prepare the accident management measures to prevent or mitigate accident conditions. In order to explore the efficiency of implementing accident management strategies for CANDU-6 plants, this study proposed a realistic accident analysis approach on the SBO transient with multiple-failure sequences such as seal failure of PHT pumps without operator's recovery actions. In this regard, a comparative study for two PHT pump seal failure modes with and without coolant seal leakage was conducted using a best-estimate code to precisely investigate the behaviors of thermal-hydraulic parameters during transient conditions. Moreover, a sensitivity analysis for different PHT pump seal leakage rates was also carried out to examine the effect of leakage rate on the system responses. This study is expected to provide the technical bases to the accident management strategy for unmitigated transient conditions with multiple failures.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• 제45권4호
• /
• pp.459-468
• /
• 2013

During a station blackout (SBO), the initiating event is a loss of Class IV and Class III power, causing the loss of the pumps, used in systems such as the primary heat transporting system (PHTS), moderator cooling, shield cooling, steam generator feed water, and re-circulating cooling water. The reference case of the SBO case does not credit any of these active heat sinks, but only relies on the passive heat sinks, particularly the initial water inventories of the PHTS, moderator, steam generator secondary side, end shields, and reactor vault. The reference analysis is followed by a series of sensitivity cases assuming certain system availabilities, in order to assess their mitigating effects. This paper also establishes the strategies to mitigate SBO accidents. Current studies and strategies use the computer code of the Integrated Severe Accident Analysis Code (ISAAC) for Wolsong plants. The analysis results demonstrate that appropriate strategies to mitigate SBO accidents are established and, in addition, the symptoms of the SBO processes are understood.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• 제52권12호
• /
• pp.2812-2820
• /
• 2020

House load operation (HLO) occurs when the generator supplies power to the house load without triggering reactor trips during grid disturbances. In Korea, the HLO capability of optimized power reactor 1000 (OPR1000) plants has prevented several reactor trips. Operational experiences demonstrate the difference in the reactor trip incidence due to grid disturbances between OPR1000 plants and Westinghouse plants in Korea, attributable to the availability of the HLO capability. However, probabilistic safety assessments (PSAs) for OPR1000 plants have not considered their specific design features in the initiating event analyses. In an at-power PSA, the HLO capability can affect the initiating event frequencies of general transients (GTRN) and loss of offsite power (LOOP), resulting from transients within the grid system. The initiating event frequencies of GTRN and LOOP for an OPR1000 plant are reduced by 17.7% and 78.7%, respectively, compared to the Korean industry-average initiating event frequencies, and its core damage frequency from internal events is reduced by 15.2%. The explicit consideration of the HLO capability in initiating event analyses makes significant changes in the risk contributions of the initiating events. Consequently, for more realistic at-power PSAs in Korea, we recommend incorporating plant-specific HLO-related design features when estimating initiating event frequencies.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• 제53권9호
• /
• pp.2859-2865
• /
• 2021

One of the important issues raised from the Fukushima-Daiichi accident is the safety of multi-unit sites when simultaneous accidents occur at the site and recently a multi-unit PSA methodology is being developed worldwide. Since all operation modes of the plant should be considered in the multi-unit PSA, the accident analysis needs to be performed for shutdown operation modes, too. In this study, a station blackout during the mid-loop operation is selected as a reference scenario. The overall accident progression for the mid-loop operation is slower than that for the full-power operation because the residual heat per mass of coolant is about 6 times lower than that in the mid-loop scenario. Though the fractions of Cs released from the core to the RCS in both operation modes are almost the same, the amount of Cs delivered to the containment atmosphere is quite different due to the chemisorption in the RCS. While 45.5% of the initial inventory is chemisorbed on the RCS surfaces during the full-power operation, only 2.2% during the mid-loop operation. The containment remains intact during the mid-loop operation, though 83.9% of Cs is delivered to the containment.