Balancing plant safety and outage optimization

Conference · Mon Dec 01 04:00:00 EST 1997

OSTI ID:552146

Oft, R R; Timmons, T F; Petras, D S ^[1]

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1. Westinghouse Electric Corp., Pittsburgh, PA (United States)

During recent years, nuclear utilities` initiatives have been aimed at increasing overall plant availability. One of the ways to accomplish this objective is to optimize activities during a plant`s scheduled refueling outage. However, industry experience also indicates that plants can be vulnerable to a variety of events that can challenge safety during shutdown. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has published NUREG-1449 (draft version), {open_quotes}Shutdown and Low-Power Operation at Commercial Nuclear Power Plants in the United States{close_quotes} and several information notices to address documented events and issues regarding safety during shutdown conditions. Also, the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI), formerly NUMARC, has issued NUMARC 91-06, {open_quotes}Guidelines for Industry Actions to Assess Shutdown Management{close_quotes} which provides guidance to utilities on assessing and enhancing their practices for planning and conducting outages. Therefore, it is essential for each utility to weigh the potential risks against the economic benefits when optimizing outage activities. This paper presents a description of the outage optimization evaluation process and how the process incorporates the necessary safety principles to manage shutdown risk and maintain plant safety while reducing outage length.

• Research Organization: American Nuclear Society, La Grange Park, IL (United States)
• OSTI ID: 552146
• Report Number(s): CONF-970607--Vol.2
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS
NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS
OPTIMIZATION
OUTAGES
RISK ASSESSMENT
SCHEDULES