Abstract
The test and maintenance activities are conducted in the nuclear power plants in order to prevent or limit failures resulting from the ageing or deterioration. The components and systems are partially or fully unavailable during the maintenance activities. This is especially important for the safety systems and corresponding equipment because they are important contributors to the overall nuclear power plant safety. A novel method for optimization of the maintenance activities in the nuclear power plant considering the plant safety is developed and presented. The objective function of the optimization is the mean value of the selected risk measure. The risk measure is assessed from the minimal cut sets identified in the Probabilistic Safety Assessment. The optimal solution of the objective function is estimated with genetic algorithm. The proposed method is applied on probabilistic safety analysis model of the selected safety system of the reference nuclear power plant. Obtained results show that optimization of maintenance decreases the risk and thus improves the plant safety. The implications of the consideration of different constraints on the obtained results are investigated and presented. The future prospects for the optimization of the maintenance activities in the nuclear power plants with the presented method are discussed.
Highlights
Nuclear power plant (NPP) comprises multiple components and systems, which are maintained in order to limit or prevent failures resulting from the ageing or deterioration
Results obtained for case scenario 2 with consideration of the time interval T in addition to the constraints for ΔSET and Qlimit are given in Table 9 and Figure 7
The developed method optimizes test placement times of the components going under maintenance considering the selected risk measure calculated from the results of the Probabilistic Safety Assessment
Summary
Nuclear power plant (NPP) comprises multiple components and systems, which are maintained in order to limit or prevent failures resulting from the ageing or deterioration. The test and maintenance activities of safety systems components are especially important considering their dominant, but not exclusive, contribution to the NPP safety. The test and maintenance activities of the NPP safety systems are conducted in order to verify and improve their availability. These safety systems are partially or fully unavailable. In order to ensure availability and the operability of the safety systems and the safety of the corresponding plant, the surveillance requirements (SR) together with the limiting conditions for operation (LCO) are included within technical specifications (TS) of the NPP [1]. The SR define the periodic surveillance tests including the type of surveillance test, test strategy, and frequency
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