Functional testing and performance assessment of smart pressure transmitters used in NPPs

Abstract

Nuclear power plants require continuous processing of various process parameters for their proper functioning, of which temperature and pressure levels are of prime importance. This is where transmitters or sensors are used and therefore it is important to measure the reliability and conduct failure testing of the components of the smart pressure transmitter. With the advent of technology ‘smart’ transmitters are increasingly in use in the recent years. A transmitter is described as ‘smart’ if it incorporates signal conditioning and processing functions, carried out by embedded microprocessors. As for the term ‘intelligent’, for transmitters this concept may refer to the faculty for knowing (with the use of sensors), adapting to situations (with the use of processing units), and communicating. These characteristics form the bases for intelligent transmitter architecture. In this paper, Functional testing analysis of the smart pressure transmitters is carried out according to IEC-60770, and also to perform failure mode and effects analysis (FMEA) of a smart pressure transmitters was carried out by MIL-STD-1629A and analyzing which failure modes will affect the transmitter performance and which failure modes will cause safe failure.