Human Reliability Analysis for Verification and Validation of New Designs

Abstract

As the commercial nuclear industry prepares to extend the life of existing power reactors and build new reactors, it becomes necessary to verify and validate the human-system interfaces found in the main control rooms and elsewhere at the plants. Verification has consisted of comparison of the system to human factors standards. Validation has consisted of operator-in-the-loop studies to identify potential shortcomings in the system design and establish the safety of operations of the system. The empirical studies in support of validation have typically been led by human factors experts, who treat the validation exercise as a type of detailed usability study to meet regulatory and internal quality standards. Human reliability analysis (HRA) has not held a prominent role in validation. In this paper, we explore the role of HRA to augment human factors studies. It is suggested that HRA can serve as an important driver in the design of validation studies by identifying those critical performance shaping factors known to lead to decreased operator reliability. Additionally, HRA can support verification by serving as a standard checklist against which to base expected operator performance.