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Sample records for generator replacement outage

  1. Radiological protection for the ANGRA 1 steam generator replacement outage

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Oliveira, Magno Jose de; Amaral, Marcos Antonio do; Minelli, Edson; Ferreira, William Alves

    2009-01-01

    The Angra 1 Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) is a Westinghouse two-loop plant with net output before its 1P16 Outage of 632 MWe, with the Old Steam Generators (OSG) type model D3, which were replaced by two new Steam Generators with feed water-ring system. Localized in Angra dos Reis, Rio de Janeiro - Brazil, Angra 1 started in commercial operation in 1985 and, from the beginning problems related to corrosion have appeared in the Inconel 600 alloy of the tubes. The corrosion problems indicated the necessity for a strong control of the tubes thicknesses and, after a time, the ELETRONUCLEAR decided to replace the OSG. In 2009, ELETRONUCLEAR initiated in January 24, the actions for the Steam Generators Replacement - SGR. During the SGR process, several controls were applied in field, which made possible to have no radiological accidents, no dose limits exceeded, and permitted to achieve a very good result in terms of Collective Dose. This paper describes the radiological controls applied for the Angra 1 Steam Generator Replacement Outage, the radiological protection team sizing and distribution and the obtained results. (author)

  2. Steam generator replacement: a story of continuous improvement

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Sills, M.S.; Wilkerson, R.

    2009-01-01

    This paper provides a review of the history of steam generator replacement in the US focusing on the last five years. From the early replacements in the 1980s, there have been major technology improvements resulting in dramatically shorter outages and reduced radiological exposure for workers. Even though the changes for the last five years have been less dramatic, the improvement trend continues. No two steam generator replacement (SGR) projects are the same and there are some major differences including; the access path for the components to containment (is a construction opening in containment required), type of containment, number of steam generators, one piece or two piece replacement, plant type (Westinghouse, CE or B and W) and plant layout. These differences along with other variables such as delays due to plant operations and other activities not related to the steam generator replacement make analysis of performance data difficult. However, trends in outage performance and owner expectations can be identified. How far this trend will go is also discussed. Along with the trend of improved performance, there is also a significant variation in performance. Some of the contributors to this variation are identified. This paper addresses what is required for a successful outage, meeting the increasing expectations and setting new records. The authors will discuss various factors that contribute to the success of a steam generator replacement. These factors include technical issues and, equally important, organizational interface and the role the customer plays. Recommendations are provided for planning a successful steam generator replacement outage. (author)

  3. Steam-generator replacement sets new marks

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Beck, R.L.

    1995-01-01

    This article describes how, in one of the most successful steam-generator replacement experiences at PWRs worldwide, the V C Summer retrofit exceeded plant goals for critical-path duration, radiation, exposure, and radwaste generation. Intensive planning and teamwork, combined with the firm support of station management and the use of mockups to prepare the work crews for activity in a radiological environment, were key factors in the record performance achieved by South Carolina Electric and Gas Co (SCE and G) in replacing three steam generators at V C Summer nuclear station. The 97-day, two-hour breaker-to-breaker replacement outage -- including an eight-day delay for repair of leak in a small-bore seal-injection line of a reactor coolant pump (unrelated to the replacement activities) -- surpassed the project goal by over one day. Moreover, the outage was only 13 hours shy of the world record held by Virginia Power Co's North Anna Unit 1

  4. Outage planning in Japan

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Nedderman, John.

    1997-01-01

    Nuclear plant operators in Japan are constrained to keep refuelling and maintenance outages to a minimum by the regulation limiting operating cycles to no longer than 13 months. Outage planning by two contrasting operators is described. Hokkaido Electric, which operates only one plant, Tomari, with two PWRs, plans to reduce outage time from the present 65 days in two stages. Detailed review of previous outage schedules has shown that a reduction to 59 days should be achievable by careful planning without any fundamental changes. The second reduction to 49 days will require such measures as relaxing water purity standards, rescheduling fuel unloading and loading shifts and speeding up eddy current testing of primary equipment by using steam generator nozzle dams. Kansai Electric, operating 11 PWRs at three plants, has scope for reducing outages at all of its units using a range of measures. Steam generator replacement in the seven oldest reactors, completed in July 1997, is by far the most significant of these and is expected to save 64 days repair time in a previous average outage time of 131 days. (UK)

  5. Extended layup of steam generators during a refurbishment outage

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Marks, C.R.; Little, M.D.; Slade, J.; Gendron, T.

    2009-01-01

    In May 2008, Point Lepreau Generating Station (PLGS), owned and operated by New Brunswick Power Nuclear (NBPN), entered an extended refurbishment outage initially expected to last approximately 18 months. NBPN had the two inter-related goals with respect to layup of the steam generators during this period: equipment preservation and inspection interval modification. The steam generators were to be preserved such that there was no loss of operating life due to corrosion of either the tubing (Alloy 800NG) or other internal components (with carbon steel being the limiting material with respect to corrosion). Additionally, NBPN desired that the time in layup not count as operating time in setting the schedule for future inspections. That is, a key goal of the steam generator layup is that the future inspection interval be based on operating time, not calendar time. The NBPN approach consists of the following four steps: A review of industry operating experience with long outages (including both PWRs and PHWRs); The development of technically based layup strategies and procedures; A mid-outage review of the implementation of the layup strategies and procedures; and A post-outage review to determine if the actual conditions in the steam generators will support modification of the inspection interval. This paper discusses the results of the first three of these steps. At this time, the plant is still in the refurbishment outage. Throughout the outage evaluation process, the following issues have been the main focus of the reviews: The potential for degradation (pitting and cracking) of steam generator tubes; The potential for general corrosion of carbon and low alloy steel internals; Oxidation of deposits (which could subsequently lead to oxidizing conditions during operation, possibly leading to tube degradation). This paper discusses the industry operating experience reviewed, the pre-outage assessments, and the mid-outage assessments. Current outage planning places the

  6. Primary separator replacement for Bruce Unit 8 steam generators

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Roy, S.B.; Mewdell, C.G.; Schneider, W.G.

    2000-01-01

    During a scheduled maintenance outage of Bruce Unit 8 in 1998, it was discovered that the majority of the original primary steam separators were damaged in two steam generators. The Bruce B steam generators are equipped with GXP type primary cyclone separators of B and W supply. There were localized perforations in the upper part of the separators and large areas of generalized wall thinning. The degradation was indicative of a flow related erosion corrosion mechanism. Although the unit- restart was justified, it was obvious that corrective actions would be necessary because of the number of separators affected and the extent of the degradation. Repair was not considered to be a practical option and it was decided to replace the separators, as required, in Unit 8 steam generators during an advanced scheduled outage. GXP separators were selected for replacement to minimize the impact on steam generator operating characteristics and analysis. The material of construction was upgraded from the original carbon steel to stainless steel to maximize the assurance of full life. The replacement of the separators was a first of a kind operation not only for Ontario Power Generation and B and W but also for all CANDU plants. The paper describes the degradations observed and the assessments, the operating experience, manufacture and installation of the replacement separators. During routine inspection in 1998, many of the primary steam separators in two of steam generators at Bruce Nuclear Division B Unit 8 were observed to have through wall perforations. This paper describes assessment of this condition. It also discusses the manufacture and testing of replacement primary steam separators and the development and execution of the replacement separator installation program. (author)

  7. Steam generator replacement at Kansai Electric Power Co., Inc

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kimura, S.; Dodo, Takashi; Negishi, Kazuo

    1995-01-01

    Eleven nuclear units are in operation at the Kansai Electric Power Co., Inc.. In seven of them, Mihama-1·2·3, Takahama-1·2, and Ohi-1·2, comparatively long duration for tube inspection and repair have been required during late annual outages. KEPCO decided to replace all steam generators in these 7 units with the latest model which was improved upon the past degradation experiences, as a result of comprehensive considerations including public confidence in nuclear power generation, maintenability, and economic efficiency. This report presents the design improvements in new steam generators, replacement techniques, and so on. (author)

  8. Outage management

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Anonymous

    2006-01-01

    Since constructing Japan's first PWR plant, Mihama Unit 1, MHI has been working to upgrade its technologies. The ongoing goal is to provide PWR nuclear power plants with levels of reliability, safety, economy operation and maintainability unparalleled in the world market. To fulfill its obligations and responsibility as an integrated plant manufacturer in the nuclear industry, MHI keeps a close eye on every facility, component, device and sub-component from the viewpoint of its customers. Backed by its rich experience and advanced technology, MHI continues to enhance the safety, reliability and economy of nuclear plants introducing improvements at every level. MHI continues to develop and improve diagnostic and inspection technologies based on its more than 30 years of experience in inspection and servicing the major and auxiliary facilities within nuclear power plants. MHI secures the integrity of components by developing and deploying technologies to minimize the wear of components and to repair and replace parts either degraded by age or unduly susceptible to wear. MHI backs its development of these technologies with its comprehensive technical capabilities in the design of remote operation equipment and electro mechanics as well as its expertise in basic technologies such as welding and machining. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd. is not only a PWR plant constructor, but also offers complete outage support and component services. In partnership with our customers, MHI is helping to reduce outage duration, radiation exposure and costs, by providing its state of the art engineering knowledge, advanced non-destructive examination, inspection, maintenance and repair technologies mentioned above. MHI is performing large equipment refurbishment such as Steam Generator Replacement, Reactor Vessel Head Replacement, LP/HP turbine replacement, and recently completed the first Core Internal Replacement in the world. The following activities are part of the outage

  9. Replacement power costs due to nuclear-plant outages: a higher standard of care

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Gransee, M.F.

    1982-01-01

    This article examines recent state public utility commission cases that deal with the high costs of replacement power that utilities must purchase after a nuclear power plant outage. Although most commissions have approved such expenses, it may be that there is a trend toward splitting the costs of such expenses between ratepayer and stockholder. Commissions are demanding a management prudence test to determine the cause of the outage and whether it meets the reasonable man standard before allowing these costs to be passed along to ratepayers. Unless the standard is applied with flexibility, however, utility companies could invoke the defenses covering traditional common law negligence

  10. North Anna Power Station - Unit 1: Overview of steam generator replacement project activities

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Gettler, M.W.; Bayer, R.K.; Lippard, D.W.

    1993-01-01

    The original steam generators at Virginia Electric and Power Company's (Virginia Power) North Anna Power Station (NAPS) Unit 1 have experienced corrosion-related degradation that require periodic inspection and plugging of steam generator tubes to ensure their continued safe and reliable operation. Despite improvements in secondary water chemistry, continued tube degradation in the steam generators necessitated the removal from service of approximately 20.3 percent of the tubes by plugging, (18.6, 17.3, and 25.1 for steam generators A, B, and C, respectively). Additionally, the unit power was limited to 95 % during, its last cycle of operation. Projections of industry and Virginia Power experience indicated the possibility of mid-cycle inspections and reductions in unit power. Therefore, economic considerations led to the decision to repair the steam generators (i.e., replace the steam generator lower assemblies). Three new Model 51F Steam Generator lower assembly units were ordered from Westinghouse. Virginia Power contracted Bechtel Power Corporation to provide the engineering and construction support to repair the Unit 1 steam generators. On January 4, 1993, after an extended coastdown period, North Anna Unit 1 was brought off-line and the 110 day (breaker-to-breaker) Steam Generator Replacement Project (SGRP) outage began. As of this paper, the outage is still in progress

  11. Outages planning

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Blanquer, N.

    2010-01-01

    The reason of a nuclear power plant outage seems easy. Replace 1/3 of the total core fuel inside reactor for a new, store the old one in a pool and shuffle the rest 2/3 in other positions in the core to optimize fuel burn up. Also is needed to make the preventive, corrective and conservative maintenance, the selected design changes and the regulatory and technical requirements for equipment and systems. To make the plant outage strategy for all the above pack with nuclear safety not challenged is the objective of this article for the Spanish Nuclear Society magazine. (Author)

  12. Reactor refurbishment in an outage environment

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Gowthorpe, P.; Hoare, R.

    2012-01-01

    Reactor life extension has typically been performed during specific refurbishment outages. These outages are long and costly due to the sheer complexity of the scope, not to mention the ever present discovery work. A scope of this size requires a huge labour force to execute, which poses significant challenges. The work is difficult to staff with qualified people able to execute the work smoothly and managing the required labour pool problematic. Cost and time overruns are inevitable in that environment. Reducing the cost and schedule is critical to the long term viability of reactor refurbishment projects. With planning, the total cost of the refurbishment can be reduced by managing the inspection and repairs during normal outages. Identifying what activities need to be done each outage for the life of the reactor and bringing the latest technology can make this viable. Tightly planned outages with a small well trained labour force will go a long way to reducing costs. The suite of services and tooling available to the utilities to manage their reactor integrity has improved significantly in recent years and continues to evolve. New feeder inspection technologies can provide improved inspection results for the complex feeder geometry. These improvements lead to more accurate wear rates and better predictions of component life. Feeders that need replacement based on improved inspection techniques can be replaced systematically during regular outages rather than specific refurbishment outages. Targeting areas rather than entire feeders reduces time, dose and cost. In cases where feeder replacement isn't feasible or where unpredicted wear is found, a feeder weld overlay process can be used. To manage the reactor work, new data systems are under development that allow for effective tracking of each activity performed and outcomes in a single package. (author)

  13. Driving for shorter outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Tritch, S.

    1996-01-01

    Nuclear plant outages are necessary to complete activities that cannot be completed during the operating cycle, such as steam generator inspection and testing, refueling, installing modifications, and performing maintenance tests. The time devoted to performing outages is normally the largest contributor to plant unavailability. Similarly, outage costs are a sizable portion of the total plant budget. The scope and quality of work done during outages directly affects operating reliability and the number of unplanned outages. Improved management and planning of outages enhances the margin of safety during the outage and results in increased plant reliability. The detailed planning and in-depth preparation that has become a necessity for driving shorter outage durations has also produced safer outages and improved post-outage reliability. Short outages require both plant and vendor management to focus on all aspects of the outage. Short outage durations, such as 26 days at South Texas or 29 days at North Anna, require power plant inter-department and intra-department teamwork and communication and vendor participation. In this paper shorter and safer outage at the 3-loop plants in the United States are explained. (J.P.N.)

  14. Olkiluoto 1 and 2 - Plant efficiency improvement and lifetime extension-project (PELE) implemented during outages 2010 and 2011

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Kosonen, M.; Hakola, M. [Teollisuuden Voima Oyj, F- 27160 Eurajoki (Finland)

    2012-07-01

    Teollisuuden Voima Oyj (TVO) is a non-listed public company founded in 1969 to produce electricity for its stakeholders. TVO is the operator of the Olkiluoto nuclear power plant. TVO follows the principle of continuous improvement in the operation and maintenance of the Olkiluoto plant units. The PELE project (Plant Efficiency Improvement and Lifetime Extension), mainly completed during the annual outages in 2010 and 2011, and forms one part of the systematic development of Olkiluoto units. TVO maintains a long-term development program that aims at systematically modernizing the plant unit systems and equipment based on the latest technology. According to the program, the Olkiluoto 1 and Olkiluoto 2 plant units are constantly renovated with the intention of keeping them safe and reliable, The aim of the modernization projects is to improve the safety, reliability, and performance of the plant units. PELE project at Olkiluoto 1 was done in 2010 and at Olkiluoto 2 in 2011. The outage length of Olkiluoto 1 was 26 d 12 h 4 min and Olkiluoto 2 outage length was 28 d 23 h 46 min. (Normal service-outage is about 14 days including refueling and refueling-outage length is about seven days. See figure 1) The PELE project consisted of several single projects collected into one for coordinated project management. Some of the main projects were as follows: - Low pressure turbines: rotor, stator vane, casing and turbine instrumentation replacement. - Replacement of Condenser Cooling Water (later called seawater pumps) pumps - Replacement of inner isolation valves on the main steam lines. - Generator and the generator cooling system replacement. - Low voltage switchgear replacement. This project will continue during future outages. PELE was a success. 100 TVO employees and 1500 subcontractor employees participated in the project. The execution of the PELE projects went extremely well during the outages. The replacement of the low pressure turbines and seawater pumps improved the

  15. Olkiluoto 1 and 2 - Plant efficiency improvement and lifetime extension-project (PELE) implemented during outages 2010 and 2011

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kosonen, M.; Hakola, M.

    2012-01-01

    Teollisuuden Voima Oyj (TVO) is a non-listed public company founded in 1969 to produce electricity for its stakeholders. TVO is the operator of the Olkiluoto nuclear power plant. TVO follows the principle of continuous improvement in the operation and maintenance of the Olkiluoto plant units. The PELE project (Plant Efficiency Improvement and Lifetime Extension), mainly completed during the annual outages in 2010 and 2011, and forms one part of the systematic development of Olkiluoto units. TVO maintains a long-term development program that aims at systematically modernizing the plant unit systems and equipment based on the latest technology. According to the program, the Olkiluoto 1 and Olkiluoto 2 plant units are constantly renovated with the intention of keeping them safe and reliable, The aim of the modernization projects is to improve the safety, reliability, and performance of the plant units. PELE project at Olkiluoto 1 was done in 2010 and at Olkiluoto 2 in 2011. The outage length of Olkiluoto 1 was 26 d 12 h 4 min and Olkiluoto 2 outage length was 28 d 23 h 46 min. (Normal service-outage is about 14 days including refueling and refueling-outage length is about seven days. See figure 1) The PELE project consisted of several single projects collected into one for coordinated project management. Some of the main projects were as follows: - Low pressure turbines: rotor, stator vane, casing and turbine instrumentation replacement. - Replacement of Condenser Cooling Water (later called seawater pumps) pumps - Replacement of inner isolation valves on the main steam lines. - Generator and the generator cooling system replacement. - Low voltage switchgear replacement. This project will continue during future outages. PELE was a success. 100 TVO employees and 1500 subcontractor employees participated in the project. The execution of the PELE projects went extremely well during the outages. The replacement of the low pressure turbines and seawater pumps improved the

  16. Optimization of costs for the DOEL 3 steam generator replacement

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Leblois, C.

    1994-01-01

    Several aspects of steam generator replacement economics are discussed on the basis of the recent replacement carried out in the Doel 3 unit. The choice between repair of replacement policies, as well as the selection of the intervention date were based on a comparison of costs in which various possible scenarios were examined. The contractual approach for the different works to be performed was also an important point, as well as the project organization in which CAD played an important role. This organization allowed to optimize the outage duration and to realize numerous interventions in the reactor building in parallel with the replacement itself. A last aspect of the optimization of costs is the possibility to uprate the plant power. In the case of Doel 3, the plant restarted with a nominal power increased by 10%, of which 5,7% were possible by the increase of the SG heat transfer area. (Author) 6 refs

  17. Wolsong Unit 1 restart chemistry procedures during retubing outage

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Yun, Hyunran; Lee, Sarang; Moon, Yunyong; Kim, Seoyul

    2015-01-01

    Lay-up is aimed at protecting systems from degradation during outage, mainly by minimizing corrosion and particularly, when the outage is longer than 16 weeks. Due to the intrinsic design of CANDU reactors, their horizontal fuel channels should be replaced for another service life time. This poster presents the lay-up guidelines and methods recommended for re-tubing outage based on the first re-tubing operation made in Korea (at the Wolsung Unit 1). It is shown that dry lay-up with specific gas blanket was the sole choice for the primary heat transfer system, the moderator system and the steam cycle system while wet lay-up under circulation was recommended for the end shield cooling system and the liquid zone control system. The water filled part of steam generators, of the liquid zone control system and of the end shield cooling system was maintained normal

  18. Framatome ANP outage optimization support solutions

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Bombail, Jean Paul

    2003-01-01

    Over the last several years, leading plant operators have demonstrated that availability factors can be improved while safety and reliability can be enhanced on a long-term basis and operating costs reduced. Outage optimization is the new term being used to describe these long-term initiatives through which a variety of measures aimed at shortening scheduled plant outages have been developed and successfully implemented by these leaders working with their service providers who were introducing new technologies and process improvements. Following the leaders, all operators now have ambitious outage optimization plans and the median and average outage duration are decreasing world-wide. Future objectives are even more stringent and must include plant upgrades and component replacements being performed for life extension of plant operation. Outage optimization covers a broad range of activities from modifications of plant systems to faster cool down rates to human behavior improvements. It has been proven to reduce costs, avoid unplanned outages and thus support plant availability and help to ensure the utility's competitive position in the marketplace

  19. 35/30 outage improvement project

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Clewett, L.

    2011-01-01

    , every 30 months. This will also by direct correlation reduce outage costs and radiation exposure, while maximizing the revenue stream from safe, reliable generation. (author)

  20. 35/30 outage improvement project

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Clewett, L. [Bruce Power, Tiverton, Ontario (Canada)

    2011-07-01

    outages, every 30 months. This will also by direct correlation reduce outage costs and radiation exposure, while maximizing the revenue stream from safe, reliable generation. (author)

  1. Guidelines for Implementation of an Advanced Outage Control Center to Improve Outage Coordination, Problem Resolution, and Outage Risk Management

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    St. Germain, Shawn W. [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States); Farris, Ronald K. [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States); Whaley, April M. [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States); Medema, Heather D. [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States); Gertman, David I. [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States)

    2014-09-01

    This research effort is a part of the Light-Water Reactor Sustainability (LWRS) Program, which is a research and development (R&D) program sponsored by Department of Energy (DOE) and performed in close collaboration with industry R&D programs that provide the technical foundations for licensing and managing the long-term, safe, and economical operation of current nuclear power plants. The LWRS program serves to help the U.S. nuclear industry adopt new technologies and engineering solutions that facilitate the continued safe operation of the plants and extension of the current operating licenses. The purpose of this research is to improve management of nuclear power plant (NPP) outages through the development of an advanced outage control center (AOCC) that is specifically designed to maximize the usefulness of communication and collaboration technologies for outage coordination and problem resolution activities. This technical report for industry implementation outlines methods and considerations for the establishment of an AOCC. This report provides a process for implementation of a change management plan, evaluation of current outage processes, the selection of technology, and guidance for the implementation of the selected technology. Methods are presented for both adoption of technologies within an existing OCC and for a complete OCC replacement, including human factors considerations for OCC design and setup.

  2. Prediction of power system frequency response after generator outages using neural nets

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Djukanovic, M B; Popovic, D P [Electrotechnicki Inst. ' Nikola Tesla' , Belgrade (Yugoslavia); Sobajic, D J; Pao, Y -H [Case Western Reserve Univ., Cleveland, OH (United States)

    1993-09-01

    A new methodology is presented for estimating the frequency behaviour of power systems necessary for an indication of under-frequency load shedding in steady-state security assessment. It is well known that large structural disturbances such as generator tripping or load outages can initiate cascading outages, system separation into islands, and even the complete breakup. The approach provides a fairly accurate method of estimating the system average frequency response without making simplifications or neglecting non-linearities and small time constants in the equations of generating units, voltage regulators and turbines. The efficiency of the new procedure is demonstrated using the New England power system model for a series of characteristic perturbations. The validity of the proposed approach is verified by comparison with the simulation of short-term dynamics including effects of control and automatic devices. (author)

  3. Benchmark Report on Key Outage Attributes: An Analysis of Outage Improvement Opportunities and Priorities

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Germain, Shawn St. [Idaho National Laboratory (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States); Farris, Ronald [Idaho National Laboratory (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States)

    2014-09-01

    Advanced Outage Control Center (AOCC), is a multi-year pilot project targeted at Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) outage improvement. The purpose of this pilot project is to improve management of NPP outages through the development of an AOCC that is specifically designed to maximize the usefulness of communication and collaboration technologies for outage coordination and problem resolution activities. This report documents the results of a benchmarking effort to evaluate the transferability of technologies demonstrated at Idaho National Laboratory and the primary pilot project partner, Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station. The initial assumption for this pilot project was that NPPs generally do not take advantage of advanced technology to support outage management activities. Several researchers involved in this pilot project have commercial NPP experience and believed that very little technology has been applied towards outage communication and collaboration. To verify that the technology options researched and demonstrated through this pilot project would in fact have broad application for the US commercial nuclear fleet, and to look for additional outage management best practices, LWRS program researchers visited several additional nuclear facilities.

  4. Outages planning; Planificacion de recargas

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Blanquer, N.

    2010-07-01

    The reason of a nuclear power plant outage seems easy. Replace 1/3 of the total core fuel inside reactor for a new, store the old one in a pool and shuffle the rest 2/3 in other positions in the core to optimize fuel burn up. Also is needed to make the preventive, corrective and conservative maintenance, the selected design changes and the regulatory and technical requirements for equipment and systems. To make the plant outage strategy for all the above pack with nuclear safety not challenged is the objective of this article for the Spanish Nuclear Society magazine. (Author)

  5. Partnership - the heart of integrated outage management

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Robinson, F.T.

    1995-01-01

    Changes in the power generating industry continue apace. The effects of privatisation are widely visible: nowhere more so than in the growing national and international competition facing the generators around the world. A successful, long-term marriage between generator and contractor on power station outage management offers significant scope for cost reduction, shortening annual plant downtime and generating more megawatts, all within a safety environment of continuous improvement. Working in close partnership, Nuclear Electric and Rolls-Royce Nuclear Engineering Services have remodelled the whole contractor/client strategy. The new discipline, known as integrated outage management and partnering, is already producing shorter outage periods at Bradwell, a Magnox Station in Essex. (author)

  6. Management techniques that keep outages on schedule

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Taylor, R.B.

    1987-01-01

    During the immature operation of the Pickering Units 5 through 8, significant numbers of outages have been required to deal with warranty inspections and equipment problems. Techniques have been developed to ensure that outages are properly planned and managed so that outage time is minimized, overtime is minimized, and capacity factor is maximized, while ensuring that personnel safety is not compromised. Successful outage planning and execution requires the commitment of many on-station and off-station resources groups. Coordination of all of these groups is required both before and during the outage to ensure outage time is not lost due to unavailability of men or equipment at the time they are required. This paper details the control processes that must be used prior to, during, and after an outage to ensure that time is not lost unnecessarily during outages. Successful outage management at Pickering Nuclear Generating Station can be subdivided into three stages; preoutage planning, outage execution, and postoutage review

  7. Darlington Station outage - a maintenance perspective

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Plourde, J.; Marczak, J.; Stone, M.; Myers, R.; Sutton, K.

    1997-01-01

    Ontario Hydro's Darlington Nuclear Generating Station (4x881MW(e)net) has carried out its first station outage since full commercial operation. The outage presented challenges to the organization in terms of outage planning, support, management, and safe execution within the constraints of schedule, budget and resources. This paper will focus on the success of the outage maintenance program, identifying the major work programs - a vacuum structure and containment outage, an emergency service water system outage, an emergency coolant injection system outage, intake channel inspections, low pressure service water inspections, and significant outage maintenance work on each of the four reactor units. Planning for the outage was initiated early in anticipation of this important milestone in the station's life. Detailed safety reviews - nuclear, radiation, and conventional - were conducted in support of the planned maintenance program. System lineup and work protection were provided by the Station Operator work group. Work protection permitry was initiated well in advance of the outage. Station maintenance staff resources were bolstered in support of the outage to ensure program execution could be maintained within the schedule. Training programs were in place to ensure that expectations were clear and that high standards would be maintained. Materials management issues in support of maintenance activities were given high priority to ensure no delays to the planned work. Station management review and monitoring in preparation for and during the outage ensured that staff priorities remained focused. Lessons learned from the outage execution are being formalized in maintenance procedures and outage management procedures, and shared with the nuclear community. (author)

  8. Nuclear Plant Integrated Outage Management

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Gerstberger, C. R.; Coulehan, R. J.; Tench, W. A.

    1992-01-01

    This paper is a discussion of an emerging concept for improving nuclear plant outage performance - integrated outage management. The paper begins with an explanation of what the concept encompasses, including a scope definition of the service and descriptions of the organization structure, various team functions, and vendor/customer relationships. The evolvement of traditional base scope services to the integrated outage concept is addressed and includes discussions on changing customer needs, shared risks, and a partnership approach to outages. Experiences with concept implementation from a single service in 1984 to the current volume of integrated outage management presented in this paper. We at Westinghouse believe that the operators of nuclear power plants will continue to be aggressively challenged in the next decade to improve the operating and financial performance of their units. More and more customers in the U. S. are looking towards integrated outage as the way to meet these challenges of the 1990s, an arrangement that is best implemented through a long-term partnering with a single-source supplier of high quality nuclear and turbine generator outage services. This availability, and other important parameters

  9. The impact of steam generator replacement on PWR primary system contamination

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Dacquait, F.; Marteau, H.; Guinard, L.; Ranchoux, G.; Taunier, S.; Wintergerst, M.; Bretelle, J.L.; Rocher, A.

    2010-01-01

    This paper analyses the impact of Steam Generator Replacement (SGR) on PWR primary circuit contamination. It presents a comparison of the activities deposited inside the primary system and released during refuelling outages after SGR with three different SG tube alloys (600, 690 and 800) and different SG tube manufacturing processes. A SGR has a great impact on the primary system contamination. After SGR, whatever the SG tube material is, the typical variations are the following: The 58 Co contamination increases for 1 to 3 cycles, and then decreases to very low levels in some cases, mainly depending on the manufacturing process of the replacement SG tubes; The 60 Co Co contamination tends to decrease on the primary coolant pipes and increases by a lower rate on the new SG tubes. This analysis highlights the importance on contamination levels after SGR of both the corrosion product deposits on the primary surfaces before SGR and the surface finish of the SG tubes related to their manufacturing process. (author)

  10. Nuclear power plant outage optimisation strategy

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2002-10-01

    Competitive environment for electricity generation has significant implications for nuclear power plant operations, including among others the need of efficient use of resources, effective management of plant activities such as on-line maintenance and outages. Nuclear power plant outage management is a key factor for good, safe and economic nuclear power plant performance which involves many aspects: plant policy, co-ordination of available resources, nuclear safety, regulatory and technical requirements and, all activities and work hazards, before and during the outage. This technical publication aims to communicate these practices in a way they can be used by operators and utilities in the Member States of the IAEA. It intends to give guidance to outage managers, operating staff and to the local industry on planning aspects, as well as examples and strategies experienced from current plants in operation on the optimization of outage period. This report discusses the plant outage strategy and how this strategy is actually implemented. The main areas identified as most important for outage optimization by the utilities and government organizations participating in this report are: organization and management; outage planning and preparation, outage execution, safety outage review, and counter measures to avoid extension of outages and to easier the work in forced outages. This report was based on discussions and findings by the authors of the annexes and the participants of an Advisory Group Meeting on Determinant Causes for Reducing Outage Duration held in June 1999 in Vienna. The report presents the consensus of these experts regarding best common or individual good practices that can be used at nuclear power plants with the aim to optimize

  11. Outage risk reduction at Diablo Canyon

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Burnett, Tobias W.T.; Eugene Newman, C.

    2004-01-01

    A formal risk reduction program was conducted at the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Generating plant as part of EPRI's Outage Risk Assessment and Management Program. The program began with a probabilistic and deterministic assessment of the frequency of core coolant boiling and core uncovery during shutdown operations. This step identified important contributors to risk, periods of high vulnerability, and potential mechanisms for reducing risk. Next, recovery strategies were evaluated and procedures, training, and outage schedules modified. Twelve risk reduction enhancements were developed and implemented. These enhancements and their impact are described in this paper. These enhancements reduced the calculated risk of core uncovery by about a factor of four for a refueling outage without lengthening the outage schedule; increased the outage efficiency, contributing to completing 11 days ahead of schedule; and helped to earn the highest achievable SALP rating from the NRC. (author)

  12. Outage preparation milestones - A tool to improve planned outage performance

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Laplatney, Jere; Hwang, Euiyoub

    2006-01-01

    Sustainable development of Nuclear Energy depends heavily on excellent performance of the existing fleet which in turn depend heavily on the performance of planned outages. Nuclear Power Plants who have successfully undertaken outage optimization projects have demonstrated than an effective Outage Preparation Milestone program is a key component of their improvement programs. This paper will provide background into the field of 'Outage Optimization' including the philosophy, general approach, and results obtained in the U. S. industry. The significant safety improvements afforded by properly implementing outage improvement programs will be explained. Some specific examples of outage improvements will be given including the adoption of a strong Outage Preparation Milestone Program. The paper will then describe the attributes of an effective Outage Preparation Milestone Program and list a set of specific key milestones. The key milestones are defined and the reasons for each are explained. Suggested due dates for each key milestone relative to the outage start date are provided. Successful implementation of an Outage Preparation Milestone program depends heavily upon the management tools and methods used to assure that the organization meets the milestones on time and in a quality fashion. These include methods to handle cases where milestones are not met - either partially or fully. KHNP is investigating implementing an improved Outage Preparation Milestone program for its fleet of reactors as part of its overall program to improve its performance of planned outages

  13. Integrated outages increase Surry's availability

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Harms, S.R.; Downs, J.L.

    1995-01-01

    This article describes how, through Virginia Power's and Westinghouse's goal-oriented planning philosophy, teamwork and commitment, average outage duration has decreased significantly. During the past 10 years Virginia Power and its nuclear steam supply system (NSSS) services vendor, Westinghouse Electric Corp., have developed a working partnership with one goal in mind: increasing the availability and capacity factors of the North Anna and Surry nuclear power stations while driving down the operating costs of the plants. The outage integration program, steam generator maintenance agreement (SGMA), and integrated radiological services program form the core of this relationship and helped Virginia Power complete one of the most successful outages in Surry Power Station's operating history

  14. Development of Methodologies for Technology Deployment for Advanced Outage Control Centers that Improve Outage Coordination, Problem Resolution and Outage Risk Management

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Shawn St. Germain; Ronald Farris; Heather Medeman

    2013-09-01

    This research effort is a part of the Light-Water Reactor Sustainability (LWRS) Program, which is a research and development (R&D) program sponsored by Department of Energy (DOE) and performed in close collaboration with industry R&D programs that provides the technical foundations for licensing and managing the long-term, safe, and economical operation of current nuclear power plants. The LWRS program serves to help the U.S. nuclear industry adopt new technologies and engineering solutions that facilitate the continued safe operation of the plants and extension of the current operating licenses. The long term viability of existing nuclear power plants in the U.S. will depend upon maintaining high capacity factors, avoiding nuclear safety issues and reducing operating costs. The slow progress in the construction on new nuclear power plants has placed in increased importance on maintaining the output of the current fleet of nuclear power plants. Recently expanded natural gas production has placed increased economic pressure on nuclear power plants due to lower cost competition. Until recently, power uprate projects had steadily increased the total output of the U.S. nuclear fleet. Errors made during power plant upgrade projects have now removed three nuclear power plants from the U.S. fleet and economic considerations have caused the permanent shutdown of a fourth plant. Additionally, several utilities have cancelled power uprate projects citing economic concerns. For the past several years net electrical generation from U.S. nuclear power plants has been declining. One of few remaining areas where significant improvements in plant capacity factors can be made is in minimizing the duration of refueling outages. Managing nuclear power plant outages is a complex and difficult task. Due to the large number of complex tasks and the uncertainty that accompanies them, outage durations routinely exceed the planned duration. The ability to complete an outage on or near

  15. Power Outages

    Science.gov (United States)

    ... Publications Emergency Alerts Preparedness Portal Preparedness Messaging Calendar Social Media Preparedness Toolkits Preparedness News Languages About Us Build a Kit Close Search Enter Search Term(s): Main Content Home Be Informed Power Outages Power Outages Extended power outages may impact ...

  16. How individual traces and interactive timelines could support outage execution - Toward an outage historian concept

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Parfouru, S.; De-Beler, N.

    2012-01-01

    In the context of a project that is designing innovative ICT-based solutions for the organizational concept of outage management, we focus on the informational process of the OCR (Outage Control Room) underlying the execution of the outages. Informational process are based on structured and unstructured documents that have a key role in the collaborative processes and management of the outage. We especially track the structured and unstructured documents, electronically or not, from creation to sharing. Our analysis allows us to consider that the individual traces produced by an individual participant with a specific role could be multi-purpose and support sharing between participants without creating duplication of work. The ultimate goal is to be able to generate an outage historian, that is not just focused on highly structured information, which could be useful to improve the continuity of information between participants. We study the implementation of this approach through web technologies and social media tools to address this issue. We also investigate the issue of data access through interactive visualization timelines coupled with other modality's to assist users in the navigation and exploration of the proposed historian. (authors)

  17. Improving nuclear utility generation capacity, understanding the sources of forced outage and learning how to prevent them

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Brodeur, D.L.; Todreas, N.E.; Angus, V.T.

    1998-01-01

    MIT and PECO Energy have completed a detailed examination of the sources of forced outages at the Limerick Generating Station (LGS) Boiling Water Reactor Class IV (BWR IV) site over a five year period and contrasted that information to similar BWR IV utilities in the United States over the same period. Each forced outage was attributed to one system and assigned causal codes of equipment versus human factors and failure attributes such as weak design, poor craftsmanship, and worn parts. It was found that fifty four percent of the lost power at LGS was the result of Balance of Plant failures. Industry wide data identifies fifty nine percent of the lost power as attributed to Balance of Plant failures. Balance of Plant systems are those systems not included in the primary and safety related system category. Considering failure causal factors, forty six percent of the lost power at the utility under study was the result of equipment factors such as weak design or worn parts. Significantly, the study showed a high variance between those systems which caused significant forced outage at the two sister LGS units. This demonstrated the infrequent nature of plant forced outages within a given system. This was supported by the observation that dominant systems attributing to forced outage at LGS were not equally represented in industry data. It is suggested that for individual utilities to dramatically improve unit capability factors with regard to Balance of Plant systems, they must learn from industry wide experiences and develop cooperative means of exchanging lessons learned among similarly designed plants and systems. With the broad knowledge base of system failures, current designs must be frequently assessed and altered until each system poses an acceptable level of risk to generation capacity. (author)

  18. Evaluation of the Planned Outage Durations in EU-APR

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Jung, Byung Joon; Lee, Keun Sung [KHNP CRI, Daejeon (Korea, Republic of)

    2016-10-15

    EU-APR has been designed to comply with European Utility Requirements (EUR) and nuclear design requirements of the European countries. And it is modified and improved from its original design of APR1400. The whole duration varies depending on items for additional process. Refueling and regular maintenance outage is comprised of basic processes and Main turbine-generator outage includes dismantling inspection of main generator and high pressure turbine as a critical path in addition to basic processes. In-Service Inspection Outage includes Automatic ultrasonic inspection on the upper side/lower side of a nuclear reactor as a critical path in addition to basic processes. The planned outage durations of EU-APR are optimized according to the above results. And they are complied with EUR Requirement (EUR 2.2.7.2.2 B), respectively. In addition, outage duration can be reduced with improved operating technology and more maintenance friendly environment including betterment of filling, drain and ventilation.

  19. Evaluation of the Planned Outage Durations in EU-APR

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Jung, Byung Joon; Lee, Keun Sung

    2016-01-01

    EU-APR has been designed to comply with European Utility Requirements (EUR) and nuclear design requirements of the European countries. And it is modified and improved from its original design of APR1400. The whole duration varies depending on items for additional process. Refueling and regular maintenance outage is comprised of basic processes and Main turbine-generator outage includes dismantling inspection of main generator and high pressure turbine as a critical path in addition to basic processes. In-Service Inspection Outage includes Automatic ultrasonic inspection on the upper side/lower side of a nuclear reactor as a critical path in addition to basic processes. The planned outage durations of EU-APR are optimized according to the above results. And they are complied with EUR Requirement (EUR 2.2.7.2.2 B), respectively. In addition, outage duration can be reduced with improved operating technology and more maintenance friendly environment including betterment of filling, drain and ventilation

  20. Shortened outage duration and increased safety with head assembly upgrade packages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Leanne, M.; Lisien, P.E.; Plute, K.; Duran, J.

    2007-01-01

    To significantly reduce outage critical path duration and personnel radiation exposure, and to increase personnel safety, Westinghouse Electric Co., LLC has designed and installed upgrades to the existing head assemblies of operating pressurized water reactors. These upgrades are known as Head Assembly Upgrade Packages (HAUPs) or Simplified Head Assemblies (SHAs). Custom configurations are created from a set of standard elements to optimize the design for each unique containment, head assembly configuration, and licensing basis. Two primary options are available for implementation: a full HAUP or targeted component and system upgrades. Plants may achieve much of the outage savings, dose reduction, and safety improvements even with a more limited hardware scope. A range of improvements can be offered from integral missile shields, to redesigned duct work, radiation shields, and cable layout and connection optimization. The hardware changes are customized to target the scope that adds the most value for a given plant. While combining upgrades with a reactor vessel head (RVH) replacement adds some flexibility, it is not necessary. Some plants have chosen to implement targeted upgrades prior to a replacement RVH outage and then complete the remainder of the full HAUP during the replacement RVH outage. Three-dimensional computer aided design tools are used in the conceptual and detailed design phases to identify and avoid interferences between existing and replacement plant components. State-of-the-art computational fluid dynamics models for control drive mechanism (CDM) cooling systems are used to demonstrate the ability to maintain or improve the original design performance while greatly simplifying the disassembly/re-assembly activities. Likewise, state-of-the-art finite element analysis methods allow optimization of structural components while meeting code limits for design basis accident conditions. (authors)

  1. Qualification of FFA treatment for the water-steam cycle as an innovative lay-up strategy for the long term outage of a CANDU-6 reactor

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Ramminger, Ute; Fandrich, Jörg; Sainz, Ricardo; Ovando, Luis; Herrera, Cecilia; Mendizabal, Maribel; Dumon, Adriana; Chocron, Mauricio

    2014-01-01

    The majority of worldwide operating Nuclear Power Plants is older than 25 years, which is accompanied with extended outage duration due to large refurbishment and upgrade programs, e.g. Steam Generator Replacement and other large component replacement. For these long term outages adequate and cost effective preservation methods are required. Normally during outages, systems and components are drained and opened to atmosphere whereas wet surfaces and moisture condensation can result in uniform corrosion of carbon steel and eventually other materials; superimposed localized corrosion is possible in presence of impurities. For those systems there are in general two different lay-up methods possible. Dry lay-up by removing all water and humidity from the components or wet lay-up with demineralized and oxygen free water and additional corrosion inhibitors. Disadvantages of these lay-up methods are: High man power and hardware efforts for performing dry lay-up. Usage of hazardous chemicals like Hydrazine. Insufficient results of both lay-up methods in case of switching between dry and wet lay-up. To improve the lay-up concept for long term outages, AREVA GmbH developed an innovative concept using FFA (Film-Forming Amines) for secondary side system lay-up. The entire water-steam cycle including the Steam Generators is treated in one step without any negative impact on the treated structural materials. This technology has been applied for the first time at NPP Embalse. Embalse Nuclear Power Station consists of a CANDU-6 reactor of 648 MWe electrical output. It is in commercial operation since 1984. The shutdown for refurbishment and preparation for the second cycle of operation that includes among other tasks the replacement of the existing steam generators and power uprating has been scheduled for 2014, which causes the necessity of a lay-up optimization in the plant. This paper deals in detail with the qualification process of the FFA treatment considering the specifics

  2. Long-term optimization of outage performance

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Huemmeler, Alexander; Jakobs, Norbert; Seifert, Siegfried

    2003-01-01

    Deregulation of the power markets and the accompanying pressure on electricity prices have forced all electric utilities to reduce their power generating costs in order to be able to hold their own in the new market environment. This has also particularly affected the operators of nuclear power plants since they have to compete against the lower power generating costs of fossil-fired combined-cycle power plants and, in Germany are faced with a difficult political climate. The areas identified as having the greatest cost-cutting potential were fuel costs, operating costs and measures to increase plant availability. The main objective behind increasing plant availability was not only to improve the already high standard of operational reliability and plant safety even further, but also to significantly shorten the downtime needed for annual refueling outages. A variety of measures aimed at shortening scheduled plant outages have thus been developed and successfully implemented by nuclear plant operators. At the same time, process improvements and new technologies have been introduced by the service providers. Both initiatives together have contributed towards substantially reducing outage time and cost. (author)

  3. Development of Improved Graphical Displays for an Advanced Outage Control Center, Employing Human Factors Principles for Outage Schedule Management

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    St Germain, Shawn Walter [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States); Farris, Ronald Keith [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States); Thomas, Kenneth David [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States)

    2015-09-01

    The long-term viability of existing nuclear power plants in the United States (U.S.) is dependent upon a number of factors, including maintaining high capacity factors, maintaining nuclear safety, and reducing operating costs, particularly those associated with refueling outages. Refueling outages typically take 20-30 days, and for existing light water NPPs in the U.S., the reactor cannot be in operation during the outage. Furthermore, given that many NPPs generate between $1-1.5 million/day in revenue when in operation, there is considerable interest in shortening the length of refueling outages. Yet refueling outages are highly complex operations, involving multiple concurrent and dependent activities that are somewhat challenging to coordinate; therefore, finding ways to improve refueling outage performance, while maintaining nuclear safety has proven to be difficult. The Advanced Outage Control Center (AOCC) project is a research and development (R&D) demonstration activity under the LWRS Program. LWRS is an R&D program that works closely with industry R&D programs to establish technical foundations for the licensing and managing of long-term, safe, and economical operation of current fleet of NPPs. As such, the LWRS Advanced Outage Control Center project has the goal of improving the management of commercial NPP refueling outages. To accomplish this goal, INL is developing an advanced outage control center (OCC) that is specifically designed to maximize the usefulness of communication and collaboration technologies for outage coordination and problem resolution activities. The overall focus is on developing an AOCC with the following capabilities that enables plant and OCC staff to; Collaborate in real-time to address emergent issues; Effectively communicate outage status to all workers involved in the outage; Effectively communicate discovered conditions in the field to the OCC; Provide real-time work status; Provide automatic pending support notifications

  4. Development of Improved Graphical Displays for an Advanced Outage Control Center, Employing Human Factors Principles for Outage Schedule Management

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    St Germain, Shawn Walter; Farris, Ronald Keith; Thomas, Kenneth David

    2015-01-01

    The long-term viability of existing nuclear power plants in the United States (U.S.) is dependent upon a number of factors, including maintaining high capacity factors, maintaining nuclear safety, and reducing operating costs, particularly those associated with refueling outages. Refueling outages typically take 20-30 days, and for existing light water NPPs in the U.S., the reactor cannot be in operation during the outage. Furthermore, given that many NPPs generate between $1-1.5 million/day in revenue when in operation, there is considerable interest in shortening the length of refueling outages. Yet refueling outages are highly complex operations, involving multiple concurrent and dependent activities that are somewhat challenging to coordinate; therefore, finding ways to improve refueling outage performance, while maintaining nuclear safety has proven to be difficult. The Advanced Outage Control Center (AOCC) project is a research and development (R&D) demonstration activity under the LWRS Program. LWRS is an R&D program that works closely with industry R&D programs to establish technical foundations for the licensing and managing of long-term, safe, and economical operation of current fleet of NPPs. As such, the LWRS Advanced Outage Control Center project has the goal of improving the management of commercial NPP refueling outages. To accomplish this goal, INL is developing an advanced outage control center (OCC) that is specifically designed to maximize the usefulness of communication and collaboration technologies for outage coordination and problem resolution activities. The overall focus is on developing an AOCC with the following capabilities that enables plant and OCC staff to; Collaborate in real-time to address emergent issues; Effectively communicate outage status to all workers involved in the outage; Effectively communicate discovered conditions in the field to the OCC; Provide real-time work status; Provide automatic pending support notifications

  5. Modernization of Kozloduy nuclear plant unit 5 and 6, implementation of measures to improve the reliability of the main generator system

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Stinshoff, H.

    2003-01-01

    To improve the reliability of Kozloduy Nuclear power plant several modernization measures will be implemented during the outages in the years 2003 to 2005. In the area of the main generator the following measures will be performed in unit 6 during 2003 outage: - Replacement of main generator circuit breaker by new SF6 cooled breaker type - Replacement of main generator excitation system by new two channel digital system - Replacement of main generator protection by new digital multi-purpose protections including digital fault recorders - Installation of radio frequency monitoring system of main generator circuit Starting from the present situation the new concept is explained. The project organization under consideration of large Bulgarian participation as well as the sequence and schedule of the implementation during the short outage time window is shown. These modernization measures lead to an increase of reliability and availability for the operation of the power plant and with this to increase power plant safety

  6. International examples of steam generator replacement

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Wiechmann, K.

    1993-01-01

    Since 1979-1980 a total of twelve nuclear power plants world-wide have had their steam generators replaced. The replacement of the Combustion steam generators in the Millstone-2 plant in the United States was completed very recently. Steam generator replacement activities are going on at present in four plants. In North Anna, the steam generators have been under replacement since January 1990. In Japan, preparations have been started for Genkai-1. Since January 1992, the two projects in Beznau-1, Switzerland, and Doel-3, Belgium, have bee planned and executed in parallel. Why steam generator replacement? There are a number of defect mechanisms which give rise to the need for early steam generator replacement. One of the main reasons is the use of Inconel-600 as material for the heating tubes. Steam generator heating tubes made of Inconel-600 have been known to exhibit their first defects due to stress corrosion cracking after less than one year of operation. (orig.) [de

  7. Inducement of IGA/SCC in Inconel 600 steam generator tubing during unit outages

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Durance, D.; Sedman, K. [Bruce Power, Tiverton, Ontario (Canada); Roberts, J. [CANTECH Associates Ltd., Burlington, Ontario (Canada); King, P. [Babcock and Wilcox Canada, Cambridge, Ontario (Canada); Gorman, J. [Dominion Engineering, Reston, VA (United States); Allen, R. [Kinectrics, Inc., Toronto, Ontario (Canada)

    2008-07-01

    The degradation of Unit 4 SG tubing by IGA/SCC has limited both the operating period and end of life predictions for Unit 4 since restart in late 2003. The circumferential IGA/SCC has been most significant in SG4 with substantial increases in both initiation and growth rates from 2005 through the spring of 2007. A detailed review of the occurrence of circumferential OD IGA/SCC at the RTZ in the HL TTS region of Bruce 4 steam generator tubes has led a conclusion that it is probable that the IGA/SCC has been the result of attack by partially reduced sulfur species such as tetrathionates and thiosulfates during periods of low temperature exposure. It is believed that attack of this type has mostly likely occurred during startup evolutions following outages as the result the development of aggressive reduced sulfur species in the TTS region during periods when the boilers were fully drained for maintenance activities. The modification of outage practices to limit secondary side oxygen ingress in the spring of 2007 has apparently arrested the degradation and has had significant affects on the allowable operating interval and end of life predictions for the entire unit. (author)

  8. Inducement of IGA/SCC in Inconel 600 steam generator tubing during unit outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Durance, D.; Sedman, K.; Roberts, J.; King, P.; Gorman, J.; Allen, R.

    2008-01-01

    The degradation of Unit 4 SG tubing by IGA/SCC has limited both the operating period and end of life predictions for Unit 4 since restart in late 2003. The circumferential IGA/SCC has been most significant in SG4 with substantial increases in both initiation and growth rates from 2005 through the spring of 2007. A detailed review of the occurrence of circumferential OD IGA/SCC at the RTZ in the HL TTS region of Bruce 4 steam generator tubes has led a conclusion that it is probable that the IGA/SCC has been the result of attack by partially reduced sulfur species such as tetrathionates and thiosulfates during periods of low temperature exposure. It is believed that attack of this type has mostly likely occurred during startup evolutions following outages as the result the development of aggressive reduced sulfur species in the TTS region during periods when the boilers were fully drained for maintenance activities. The modification of outage practices to limit secondary side oxygen ingress in the spring of 2007 has apparently arrested the degradation and has had significant affects on the allowable operating interval and end of life predictions for the entire unit. (author)

  9. Hybrid Cascading Outage Analysis of Extreme Events with Optimized Corrective Actions

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Vallem, Mallikarjuna R.; Vyakaranam, Bharat GNVSR; Holzer, Jesse T.; Samaan, Nader A.; Makarov, Yuri V.; Diao, Ruisheng; Huang, Qiuhua; Ke, Xinda

    2017-10-19

    Power system are vulnerable to extreme contingencies (like an outage of a major generating substation) that can cause significant generation and load loss and can lead to further cascading outages of other transmission facilities and generators in the system. Some cascading outages are seen within minutes following a major contingency, which may not be captured exclusively using the dynamic simulation of the power system. The utilities plan for contingencies either based on dynamic or steady state analysis separately which may not accurately capture the impact of one process on the other. We address this gap in cascading outage analysis by developing Dynamic Contingency Analysis Tool (DCAT) that can analyze hybrid dynamic and steady state behavior of the power system, including protection system models in dynamic simulations, and simulating corrective actions in post-transient steady state conditions. One of the important implemented steady state processes is to mimic operator corrective actions to mitigate aggravated states caused by dynamic cascading. This paper presents an Optimal Power Flow (OPF) based formulation for selecting corrective actions that utility operators can take during major contingency and thus automate the hybrid dynamic-steady state cascading outage process. The improved DCAT framework with OPF based corrective actions is demonstrated on IEEE 300 bus test system.

  10. BINARY PARTICLE SWARM OPTIMIZATION APPROACH FOR RANDOM GENERATION OUTAGE MAINTENANCE SCHEDULING

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    K. Suresh

    2013-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper presents a methodology for maintenance scheduling (MS of generators using binary particle swarm optimization (BPSO based probabilistic approach. The objective of this paper is to reduce the loss of load probability (LOLP for a power system. The capacity outage probability table (COPT is the initial step in creating maintenance schedule using the probabilistic levelized risk method. This paper proposes BPSO method which is used to construct the COPT. In order to mitigate the effects of probabilistic levelized risk method, BPSO based probabilistic levelized risk method is embarked on a MS problem. In order to validate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm, case study results for simple five unit system can accomplish a significant levelization in the reliability indices that make possible to evaluate system generation system adequacy in the MS horizon of the power system. The proposed method shows better performance compared with other optimization methods and conventional method with improved search performance.

  11. Outage information system

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Svengren, Haakan; Meyer, Brita Diskerud

    2005-09-01

    Today's control room systems are designed to operate during power operation, and there is clearly a need for a system to support control room personnel in automatically supervising the status of the plant during the outage period. In order to improve the supervision of Nuclear Power Plants during outages, three prototypes of the Outage Information system have been designed by the Halden Project, one for PWR and two for BWR. The Outage Information System is presented on a large screen, centrally placed in the control room. There will be a PC connected to manage the system. By using signals from the process as input to logic diagrams reflecting the plant's Safety Technical Specifications, the system automatically is supervising that requirements in Safety Technical Specifications are fulfilled during all plant states of the outage period. The system also automatically gives an overview of the status of safety systems and electrical bus bars. Alarm will occur if a requirement in the Safety Technical Specifications is not fulfilled or if a component planned to be ready for operation, is inoperable. In addition, selected measurements being important during the outage period are presented on the large screen. Which measurements and in which way the values will be presented, depends on the plant's control room design and work practice. (Author)

  12. Estimating the spatial distribution of power outages during hurricanes in the Gulf coast region

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Han, S.-R.; Guikema, Seth D.; Quiring, Steven M.; Lee, Kyung-Ho; Rosowsky, David; Davidson, Rachel A.

    2009-01-01

    Hurricanes have caused severe damage to the electric power system throughout the Gulf coast region of the US, and electric power is critical to post-hurricane disaster response as well as to long-term recovery for impacted areas. Managing power outage risk and preparing for post-storm recovery efforts requires accurate methods for estimating the number and location of power outages. This paper builds on past work on statistical power outage estimation models to develop, test, and demonstrate a statistical power outage risk estimation model for the Gulf Coast region of the US. Previous work used binary hurricane-indicator variables representing particular hurricanes in order to achieve a good fit to the past data. To use these models for predicting power outages during future hurricanes, one must implicitly assume that an approaching hurricane is similar to the average of the past hurricanes. The model developed in this paper replaces these indicator variables with physically measurable variables, enabling future predictions to be based on only well-understood characteristics of hurricanes. The models were developed using data about power outages during nine hurricanes in three states served by a large, investor-owned utility company in the Gulf Coast region

  13. Cycle 7 outage experience

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Gadeken, A.D.

    1986-03-01

    The scheduled 58-day refueling outage in preparation for the seventh operating cycle of the Fast Flux Test Facility (FFTF) was successfully completed three days ahead of schedule. The planning and execution of the outage was greatly aided by Project/2 automated scheduling capabilities. For example, the use of ''maintenance windows'' and resource loading capabilities was particularly effective. The value of the planning process was demonstrated by the smooth transition into the outage phase after an early shutdown and set the stage for our best outage to date

  14. Structural considerations in steam generator replacement

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Bertheau, S.R.; Gazda, P.A.

    1991-01-01

    Corrosion of the tubes and tube-support structures inside pressurized water reactor (PWR) steam generators has led many utilities to consider a replacement of the generators. Such a project is a major undertaking for a utility and must be well planned to ensure an efficient and cost-effective effort. This paper discusses various structural aspects of replacement options, such as total or partial generator replacement, along with their associated pipe cuts; major structural aspects associated with removal paths through the equipment hatch or through an opening in the containment wall, along with the related removal processes; onsite movement and storage of the generators; and the advantages and disadvantages of the removal alternatives. This paper addresses the major structural considerations associated with a steam generator replacement project. Other important considerations (e.g., licensing, radiological concerns, electrical requirements, facilities for management and onsite administrative activities, storage and fabrication activities, and offsite transportation) are not discussed in this paper, but should be carefully considered when undertaking a replacement project

  15. Diablo Canyon refueling outage program

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    McLane, W.B.; Irving, T.L.

    1991-01-01

    Management of outages has become one of the most talked about subjects in the nuclear power industry in the past several years. Many utilities do not perform refueling outages very well or in the past have had some outages that they would not like to repeat and in some cases do not even like to think about. With the growing cost of energy and the demands placed on utilities to improve capacity factors, it is very easy for management to focus on shortening refueling outage durations as a prime objective in improving overall corporate performance. So it is with Pacific Gas and Electric Company and the Diablo Canyon power plant. A review of their refueling outage performance reflects a utility that is responding to the nuclear industry's call for improved outage performance

  16. Line outage contingency analysis including the system islanding scenario

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Hazarika, D.; Bhuyan, S. [Assam Engineering College, Jalukbari, Guwahati 781013 (India); Chowdhury, S.P. [Jadavpur University, Jadavpur, Kolkata 700 032 (India)

    2006-05-15

    The paper describes an algorithm for determining the line outage contingency of a line taking into account of line over load effect in remaining lines and subsequent tripping of over loaded line(s) leading to possible system split or islanding of a power system. The optimally ordered sparse [B'], [B'] matrices for the integrated system are used for load flow analysis to determine modified values of voltage phase angles [{delta}] and bus voltages [V] to determine the over loading effect on the remaining lines due to outage of a selected line outage contingency. In case of over loading in remaining line(s), the over loaded lines are removed from the system and a topology processor is used to find the islands. A fast decoupled load flow (FDLF) analysis is carried out for finding out the system variables for the islanded (or single island) system by incorporating appropriate modification in the [B'] and [B'] matrices of the integrated system. Line outage indices based on line overload, loss of load, loss of generation and static voltage stability are computed to indicate severity of a line outage of a selected line. (author)

  17. Outage reduction of Hamaoka NPS

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hida, Shigeru; Anma, Minoru

    1999-01-01

    In the Hamaoka nuclear power plant, we have worked on the outage reduction since 1993. In those days, the outage length in Hamaoka was 80 days or more, and was largely far apart from excellent results of European and American plants about the 30days. A concrete strategy to achieve the reduction process is the extension of working hours, the changing work schedule control unit for every hour, the equipment improvements, and the improvements of work environments, etc. We executed them one by one reflecting results. As a result, we achieved the outage for 57 days in 1995. Starting from this, we acquired the further outage reduction one by one and achieved the outage for 38 days in 1997 while maintaining safety and reliability of the plant. We advance these strategies further and we will aim at the achievement of the 30·35 days outage in the future. (author)

  18. A Short-Term Outage Model of Wind Turbines with Doubly Fed Induction Generators Based on Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition Data

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Peng Sun

    2016-10-01

    Full Text Available This paper presents a short-term wind turbine (WT outage model based on the data collected from a wind farm supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA system. Neural networks (NNs are used to establish prediction models of the WT condition parameters that are dependent on environmental conditions such as ambient temperature and wind speed. The prediction error distributions are discussed and used to calculate probabilities of the operation of protection relays (POPRs that were caused by the threshold exceedance of the environmentally sensitive parameters. The POPRs for other condition parameters are based on the setting time of the operation of protection relays. The union probability method is used to integrate the probabilities of operation of each protection relay to predict the WT short term outage probability. The proposed method has been used for real 1.5 MW WTs with doubly fed induction generators (DFIGs. The results show that the proposed method is more effective in WT outage probability prediction than traditional methods.

  19. Outage optimization - the US experience and approach

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    LaPlatney, J.

    2007-01-01

    Sustainable development of Nuclear Energy depends heavily on excellent performance of the existing fleet which in turn depends heavily on the performance of planned outages. Some reactor fleets, for example Finland and Germany, have demonstrated sustained good outage performance from their start of commercial operation. Others, such as the US, have improved performance over time. The principles behind a successful outage optimization process are: -) duration is not sole measure of outage success, -) outage work must be performed safely, -) scope selection must focus on improving plant material condition to improve reliability, -) all approved outage work must be completed, -) work must be done cost effectively, -) post-outage plant reliability is a key measure of outage success, and -) outage lessons learned must be effectively implemented to achieve continuous improvement. This approach has proven its superiority over simple outage shortening, and has yielded good results in the US fleet over the past 15 years

  20. Outage management philosophies at Oconee nuclear station

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Bond, R.T.

    1991-01-01

    At Oconee the biggest single factor in improving availability and cutting cost per kilowatt-hour is reducing outage lengths. This must be accomplished without compromising the quality of the work that must be performed during these outages. Oconee has completed 35 refueling outages and has gained considerable experience in outage management. Since 1984, outage costs and durations have consistently been reduced while continuing to improve capacity factors. The last 6 refueling outages were 43, 42, 45, 42, 41, and 44 days, respectively. The capacity factors for these units between refueling outages are 98, 94, 96, 98, and 98%, respectively. The average cost of outages has been less than $12 million. It is believed that success cannot be attributed to any one factor by itself but is a compilation of many factors, all complementing each other. It is also believed, however, that there are four key areas that represent philosophies and can be given most of the credit for successful outages: planning, experience, teamwork, and outage management

  1. Efforts for optimization of BWR core internals replacement

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Iizuka, N.

    2000-01-01

    The core internal components replacement of a BWR was successfully completed at Fukushima-Daiichi Unit 3 (1F3) of the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) in 1998. The core shroud and the majority of the internal components made by type 304 stainless steel (SS) were replaced with the ones made of low carbon type 316L SS to improve Intergranular Stress Corrosion Cracking (IGSCC) resistance. Although this core internals replacement project was completed, several factors combined to result in a longer-than-expected period for the outage. It was partly because the removal work of the internal components was delayed. Learning a lesson from whole experience in this project, some methods were adopted for the next replacement project at Fukushima-Daiichi Unit 2 (1F2) to shorten the outage and reduce the total radiation exposure. Those are new removal processes and new welding machine and so on. The core internals replacement work was ended at 1F2 in 1999, and both the period of outage and the total radiation exposure were the same degree as expected previous to starting of this project. This result shows that the methods adopted in this project are basically applicable for the core internals replacement work and the whole works about the BWR core internals replacement were optimized. The outline of the core internals replacement project and applied technologies at 1F3 and 1F2 are discussed in this paper. (author)

  2. Excellence through outage planning and scheduling

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Ferriole, G.

    1987-01-01

    The Nuclear and Fossil Generation Division of Electricite de France (EdF) has been the largest nuclear plant operating utility in France since 1984. The size of the units, their standardization, and extensive operating experience were favorable parameters leading to the development of a very complete maintenance organization. Electricite de France believes in the importance of well-defined maintenance concepts. These maintenance concepts contribute to outage performance by requiring a careful consideration of work to be done and by defining the techniques and means of accomplishing this work. In addition to maintenance concepts and careful planning and scheduling, good outage management is achieved through the motivation and dedication of the people involved. It is the key to good operational results

  3. Integrated outage management: Leveraging utility system assets including GIS and AMR for optimum outage response

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Finamore, E. P.

    2004-02-01

    The control of electrical system outages is discussed. The principal argument advanced is that traditional stand-alone methods of outage response will no longer get the job done without utility companies integrating their outage management systems with other system assets such as GIS (geographic information system) and AMR (advanced metering systems). Many meter reading systems, while primarily supporting customer billing, can also provide outage alarm and some are also capable of service restoration notification, which is an invaluable benefit to service operators since it obviates the need for verifying system restoration by labour-intensive on-site visits or customer call-backs. If successfully leveraged, optimization of all utility assets and improvements in labour productivity can results in improved outage management performance gains without affecting performance in other areas.

  4. Nuclear power plant outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1998-01-01

    The Finnish Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority (STUK) controls nuclear power plant safety in Finland. In addition to controlling the design, construction and operation of nuclear power plants, STUK also controls refuelling and repair outages at the plants. According to section 9 of the Nuclear Energy Act (990/87), it shall be the licence-holder's obligation to ensure the safety of the use of nuclear energy. Requirements applicable to the licence-holder as regards the assurance of outage safety are presented in this guide. STUK's regulatory control activities pertaining to outages are also described

  5. Advanced Outage and Control Center: Strategies for Nuclear Plant Outage Work Status Capabilities

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Gregory Weatherby

    2012-05-01

    The research effort is a part of the Light Water Reactor Sustainability (LWRS) Program. LWRS is a research and development program sponsored by the Department of Energy, performed in close collaboration with industry to provide the technical foundations for licensing and managing the long-term, safe and economical operation of current nuclear power plants. The LWRS Program serves to help the US nuclear industry adopt new technologies and engineering solutions that facilitate the continued safe operation of the plants and extension of the current operating licenses. The Outage Control Center (OCC) Pilot Project was directed at carrying out the applied research for development and pilot of technology designed to enhance safe outage and maintenance operations, improve human performance and reliability, increase overall operational efficiency, and improve plant status control. Plant outage management is a high priority concern for the nuclear industry from cost and safety perspectives. Unfortunately, many of the underlying technologies supporting outage control are the same as those used in the 1980’s. They depend heavily upon large teams of staff, multiple work and coordination locations, and manual administrative actions that require large amounts of paper. Previous work in human reliability analysis suggests that many repetitive tasks, including paper work tasks, may have a failure rate of 1.0E-3 or higher (Gertman, 1996). With between 10,000 and 45,000 subtasks being performed during an outage (Gomes, 1996), the opportunity for human error of some consequence is a realistic concern. Although a number of factors exist that can make these errors recoverable, reducing and effectively coordinating the sheer number of tasks to be performed, particularly those that are error prone, has the potential to enhance outage efficiency and safety. Additionally, outage management requires precise coordination of work groups that do not always share similar objectives. Outage

  6. Nuclear Power Plant Outage Optimization Strategy. 2016 Edition

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2016-10-01

    This publication is an update of IAEA-TECDOC-1315, Nuclear Power Plant Outage Optimisation Strategy, which was published in 2002, and aims to communicate good outage management practices in a manner that can be used by operators and utilities in Member States. Nuclear power plant outage management is a key factor for safe and economic nuclear power plant performance. This publication discusses plant outage strategy and how this strategy is actually implemented. The main areas that are important for outage optimization that were identified by the utilities and government organizations participating in this report are: 1) organization and management; 2) outage planning and preparation; 3) outage execution; 4) safety outage review; and 5) counter measures to avoid the extension of outages and to facilitate the work in forced outages. Good outage management practices cover many different areas of work and this publication aims to communicate these good practices in a way that they can be used effectively by operators and utilities

  7. Feeder replacement tooling and processes

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Mallozzi, R.; Goslin, R.; Pink, D.; Askari, A.

    2008-01-01

    Primary heat transport system feeder integrity has become a concern at some CANDU nuclear plants as a result of thinning caused by flow accelerated corrosion (FAC). Feeder inspections are indicating that life-limiting wall thinning can occur in the region between the Grayloc hub weld and second elbow of some outlet feeders. In some cases it has become necessary to replace thinned sections of affected feeders to restore feeder integrity to planned end of life. Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL) and Babcock and Wilcox Canada Ltd. (B and W) have developed a new capability for replacement of single feeders at any location on the reactor face without impacting or interrupting operation of neighbouring feeders. This new capability consists of deploying trained crews with specialized tools and procedures for feeder replacements during planned outages. As may be expected, performing single feeder replacement in the congested working environment of an operational CANDU reactor face involves overcoming many challenges with respect to access to feeders, available clearances for tooling, and tooling operation and performance. This paper describes some of the challenges encountered during single feeder replacements and actions being taken by AECL and B and W to promote continuous improvement of feeder replacement tooling and processes and ensure well-executed outages. (author)

  8. Estimating the Propagation of Interdependent Cascading Outages with Multi-Type Branching Processes

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Qi, Junjian; Ju, Wenyun; Sun, Kai

    2016-01-01

    In this paper, the multi-type branching process is applied to describe the statistics and interdependencies of line outages, the load shed, and isolated buses. The offspring mean matrix of the multi-type branching process is estimated by the Expectation Maximization (EM) algorithm and can quantify the extent of outage propagation. The joint distribution of two types of outages is estimated by the multi-type branching process via the Lagrange-Good inversion. The proposed model is tested with data generated by the AC OPA cascading simulations on the IEEE 118-bus system. The largest eigenvalues of the offspring mean matrix indicate that the system is closer to criticality when considering the interdependence of different types of outages. Compared with empirically estimating the joint distribution of the total outages, good estimate is obtained by using the multitype branching process with a much smaller number of cascades, thus greatly improving the efficiency. It is shown that the multitype branching process can effectively predict the distribution of the load shed and isolated buses and their conditional largest possible total outages even when there are no data of them.

  9. Replacement of outboard main steam isolation valves in a boiling water reactor plant

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Schlereth, J.R.; Pennington, D.

    1996-12-01

    Most Boiling Water Reactor plants utilize wye pattern globe valves for main steam isolation valves for both inboard and outboard isolation. These valves have required a high degree of maintenance attention in order to pass the plant local leakage rate testing (LLRT) requirements at each outage. Northern States Power made a decision in 1993 to replace the outboard valves at it`s Monticello plant with double disc gate valves. The replacement of the outboard valves was completed during the fall outage in 1994. During the spring outage in April of 1996 the first LLRT testing was performed with excellent results. This presentation will address the decision process, time requirements and planning necessary to accomplish the task as well as the performance results and cost effectiveness of replacing these components.

  10. Replacement of outboard main steam isolation valves in a boiling water reactor plant

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Schlereth, J.R.; Pennington, D.

    1996-01-01

    Most Boiling Water Reactor plants utilize wye pattern globe valves for main steam isolation valves for both inboard and outboard isolation. These valves have required a high degree of maintenance attention in order to pass the plant local leakage rate testing (LLRT) requirements at each outage. Northern States Power made a decision in 1993 to replace the outboard valves at it's Monticello plant with double disc gate valves. The replacement of the outboard valves was completed during the fall outage in 1994. During the spring outage in April of 1996 the first LLRT testing was performed with excellent results. This presentation will address the decision process, time requirements and planning necessary to accomplish the task as well as the performance results and cost effectiveness of replacing these components

  11. Review of Paks outage results 1990

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Lukacs, P.; Zsoldos, F.; Kiss, Z.

    1991-01-01

    The year 1990 was not the most successful from an outage point of view at the Paks Nuclear Power Plant in Hungary -there were one or two long delays. Work at unit 4 had a delay of 10 days because of an error made during assembling the reactor vessel. While the outage of unit 3 was running, a feedwater pipe hanger problem was discovered - several hangers were found displaced from the right position. A general inspection of the affected system was required and this took about 11 days. Information about each outage is presented on diagrams, making comparison easier. These diagrams give information about deviations from the outage plan, about work hours performed during outages, and about collective exposure. (author)

  12. Planning and management of outages in nuclear power plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Sica, G.F.; Fusari, W.; Reginelli, A.

    1984-01-01

    At present the Ente Nazionale per l'Energia Elettrica (ENEL) operates three nuclear power plants, only one of which belongs to the new generation, i.e. the Caorso Nuclear Power Plant which has been in commercial operation since December 1981. Outage planning, implementation and analysis are very important in order to minimize the shutdown time and thus improve plant availability, which is of particular importance for a large nuclear power plant. Such activities are very complicated because of the large number of jobs that have to be performed in accordance with detailed written procedures and which have to be properly documented and controlled. Large off-site resources are required which have to be accurately interfaced with on-site staff. The ENEL is making a great effort to define both the administrative and technical aspects of refuelling outages. As outage planning requires the availability and handling of a large amount of data and information, a maintenance information system that has been widely used in conventional plants was applied, with some modifications made especially for the Caorso Nuclear Power Plant. After two years the following results have been achieved: a large number of raw and processed data are now available, the first refuelling outage was carried out with few problems and according to schedule, and the second refuelling outage, based on the experience of the first, required somewhat less preparation and is developing well even though many special activities have had to be scheduled. The ENEL believes that the efforts made in the planning and management areas will pay off in terms of the short duration, smoothness and economy of further outages, both for Caorso and for future plants. (author)

  13. Activities of maintenance and outage

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Gracia-Orellan, J. M.; Gonzalez, P. L.; Verdu, M. F.; Fernandez, J. A.

    2004-01-01

    Iberinco Nuclear Generation Department have wanted to promote service activities in nuclear power plants for years besides its dedication to engineering activities. for it, in 1997 Nuclear Services Management was created to complement engineering activities and to be able to make an offer for products and turn key services. People involved in this Management have an extensive experience in Services Area, so that all type of maintenance works are promoted, as well other services like dismantling, fallout management and new equipment's for nuclear power plants services. Iberinco's experience in Support Services in Nuclear Power Plants allows to answer effectively to special workers during operation cycle and outages periods. These activities have been made in spanish nuclear power plants and Angra I and II plants, both of them in Brazil. In this area we provide Technical Consulting Management and Supervision to develop the following activities: - Improvement Maintenance Programs based in PSA: Implantation of Maintenance Rule in the plants. - Supervision and Assembly of design modifications in structures, systems and components. - Fulfilment of efficiency tests, inspection and turbo-group modification. - Noise and vibrations analysis. - Valves and rotative equipment calculations and diagnosis tests. Iberinco develop these outage activities itself or as contractors coordinator under its management. A lot of them have been working with Iberinco for many years and have a great experience in the Service Area they are developing. In this article, the main outage activities developed for Iberinco are detailed. (Author)

  14. Moderator inlet line hanger replacement for Pickering nuclear power station

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kirkpatrick, R.A.; Bowman, J.M.; Symmons, W.R.; El-Nesr, S.

    1988-01-01

    Ontario Hydro's Pickering Nuclear Generating Station (PNGS), Units 1 and 2 were shutdown for large scale fuel channel replacement. Other nonroutine inspection and maintenance activities were performed to determine the overall condition of the units and it was seen that a moderator inlet line hanger (identified as HR-29) had failed in both units. Subsequent inspections during planned maintenance outages of Pickering NGS Units 3 and 4 revealed that hanger HR-29 had failed and required replacement. A research program was conducted to find a suitable technique. These problems included accessing tooling through small inspection ports, manipulating tooling from a significant distance and the high radiation fields within the vault. This paper describes the program undertaken to replace hanger HR-29. (author)

  15. Management strategies for nuclear power plant outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2006-01-01

    More competitive energy markets have significant implications for nuclear power plant operations, including, among others, the need for more efficient use of resources and effective management of plant activities such as on-line maintenance and outages. Outage management is a key factor for safe, reliable and economic plant performance and involves many aspects: plant policy, coordination of available resources, nuclear safety, regulatory and technical requirements, and all activities and work hazards, before and during the outage. The IAEA has produced this report on nuclear power plant outage management strategies to provide both a summary and an update of a follow-up to a series of technical documents related to practices regarding outage management and cost effective maintenance. The aim of this publication is to identify good practices in outage management: outage planning and preparation, outage execution and post-outage review. As in in the related technical documents, this report aims to communicate these practices in such a way that they can be used by operating organizations and regulatory bodies in Member States. The report was prepared as part of an IAEA project on continuous process improvement. The objective of this project is to increase Member State capabilities in improving plant performance and competitiveness through the utilization of proven engineering and management practices developed and transferred by the IAEA

  16. Verification and Enhancement of VIIRS Day-Night Band Power Outage Detection Product

    Science.gov (United States)

    Burke, A.; Schultz, L. A.; Omitaomu, O.; Molthan, A.; Cole, T.; Griffin, R.

    2017-12-01

    The NASA SPoRT (Short-term Prediction Research and Transition) Center has collaborated with scientists at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center to create a power outage detection product from radiance data obtained by the VIIRS (Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite) sensor aboard the Suomi-NPP satellite. This product uses a composite of pre-event radiance values from the VIIRS Day-Night Band to establish a baseline of "normal" nighttime lights for a study area. Then, after a severe weather event or other disaster, post-event images are compared to the composite to generate a percent-of-normal radiance product to identify areas that are experiencing outages and to aid in disaster response and monitor recovery. This project will use ground-truth county-level outage data provided by Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) in order validate the product and to establish a percent-of-normal threshold for identifying power outages. Once a threshold is found, ORNL's LandScan Global population data will be combined with the product to estimate how many electrical customers are being affected by power outages after a disaster. Two case studies will be explored to examine power outage recovery after severe weather events, including Hurricane Matthew from 2016 and the Washington D.C. Derecho event of 2012.

  17. Outage scheduling and implementation

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Allison, J.E.; Segall, P.; Smith, R.R.

    1986-01-01

    Successful preparation and implementation of an outage schedule and completion of scheduled and emergent work within an identified critical path time frame is a result of careful coordination by Operations, Work Control, Maintenance, Engineering, Planning and Administration and others. At the Fast Flux Test Facility (FFTF) careful planning has been responsible for meeting all scheduled outage critical paths

  18. Lessons learned in planning ALARA/health physics support for major nuclear power plant outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Gilman, T.R.; Lesinski, M.L.

    1987-01-01

    Although as low as reasonably achievable (ALARA)/health physics is viewed as necessary support for nuclear power plant outage work, it can be the last area to which attention is given in preparing for a large-scope outage. Inadequate lead times cause last-minute preparations resulting in delays in planned work. The Dresden Unit 3 Recirculation Piping Replacement Project is examined from a planning viewpoint. The attention that was given the various areas of a comprehensive ALARA/health physics program is examined, and approximate recommended lead times are discussed. The discussion will follow a chronological path from project inception to the beginning stages of outage work. Initially, the scope of work needs to be assessed by individuals familiar with similar projects of equivalent magnitude. Those individuals need to be health physics professionals who understand the particular utility and/or the site's way of doing business. They should also possess a good understanding of preferred industry practices

  19. Qinshan CANDU NPP outage performance improvement through benchmarking

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Jiang Fuming

    2005-01-01

    With the increasingly fierce competition in the deregulated Energy Market, the optimization of outage duration has become one of the focal points for the Nuclear Power Plant owners around the world. People are seeking various ways to shorten the outage duration of NPP. Great efforts have been made in the Light Water Reactor (LWR) family with the concept of benchmarking and evaluation, which great reduced the outage duration and improved outage performance. The average capacity factor of LWRs has been greatly improved over the last three decades, which now is close to 90%. CANDU (Pressurized Heavy Water Reactor) stations, with its unique feature of on power refueling, of nuclear fuel remaining in the reactor all through the planned outage, have given raise to more stringent safety requirements during planned outage. In addition, the above feature gives more variations to the critical path of planned outage in different station. In order to benchmarking again the best practices in the CANDU stations, Third Qinshan Nuclear Power Company (TQNPC) have initiated the benchmarking program among the CANDU stations aiming to standardize the outage maintenance windows and optimize the outage duration. The initial benchmarking has resulted the optimization of outage duration in Qinshan CANDU NPP and the formulation of its first long-term outage plan. This paper describes the benchmarking works that have been proven to be useful for optimizing outage duration in Qinshan CANDU NPP, and the vision of further optimize the duration with joint effort from the CANDU community. (authors)

  20. Major outage trends in light water reactors. Interim report

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Burns, E.T.

    1978-04-01

    The report is a summary of the major outages which occurred in light water reactor plants during the period January 1971 through June 1977. Only those outages greater than 100 hours duration (exclusive of refueling outages) are included in the report. The trends in outages related to various reactor systems and components are presented as a function of plant age, and alternatively, calendar year. The principal contributors to major outages are ranked by their effect on the overall outage time for PWRs and BWRs. In addition, the outage history of each operating nuclear plant greater than 150 MWe is presented, along with a brief summary of those outages greater than two months duration

  1. Point Lepreau Refurbishment Project. Programmable digital comparator (PDC) replacement for SDS1 and SDS2 - update 1

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Fraser, K.G.; Ichiyen, N.M.; Condor, A.E.; Thompson, P.D.

    2005-01-01

    NB Power is tentatively planning to conduct an 18-month maintenance outage of the Point Lepreau Generating Station starting in April 2008. The scope of the outage was determined from the outcome of a two year study (Phase 1) involving a detailed condition assessment of the station which examined issues relating to ageing and obsolescence, along with a detailed review of Safety and Licensing issues associated with extended operation. In order to minimize schedule and regulatory risk for the Refurbishment project, pre-project work was initiated in early 2002. This program is called Phase 2 ESA (Early Start Activities). As part of the Phase 1 assessments it was concluded that replacement of the Programmable Digital Comparators for both shutdown systems was required in order to ensure operation of the plant for a further 25-30 years. Critical tasks were identified related to PDC replacement as part of the Phase 2 ESA program. This paper describes the progress of the Phase 2 ESA program as well as the planned future (Phase 2) work for the PDC replacement for both shutdown systems. (author)

  2. Options for shortening nuclear power plant refueling outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kastl, H.

    2001-01-01

    Deregulation of the European electricity market on 01.01.1999 forced a large number of electric utilities- especially nuclear power plant operators - to find ways of drastically cutting down their costs in order to be able to compete successfully within the new market environment. Nuclear power plants currently in operation mainly have three potential ways of reducing their power generating costs: by increasing plant availability, reducing fuel costs and cutting down operating costs. The optimization of plant refueling outages offers considerable potential for enhancing plant availability, but also helps bring down operating costs by reducing expenditure on maintenance. In order to optimize an outage in terms of its duration and costs, a variety of approaches are possible - all of which, however, involve certain key factors such as good organization, planning, logistics and control, improvement of equipment and tools, as well as motivation of personnel. Another aspect is the introduction of innovative technologies. In the last few years, such technologies have frequently enabled maintenance effort to be reduced, thus saving considerable time, and have also resulted in a need for fewer personnel to carry out the work, thus reducing radiation exposure. In many instances they have also improved the quality of work and outage performance as a whole. The paper uses recent examples to show how innovative technologies can contribute to-wards reducing nuclear plant maintenance costs and shorten the duration of refueling out-ages. (author)

  3. Advanced Test Reactor outage risk assessment

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Thatcher, T.A.; Atkinson, S.A.

    1997-01-01

    Beginning in 1997, risk assessment was performed for each Advanced Test Reactor (ATR) outage aiding the coordination of plant configuration and work activities (maintenance, construction projects, etc.) to minimize the risk of reactor fuel damage and to improve defense-in-depth. The risk assessment activities move beyond simply meeting Technical Safety Requirements to increase the awareness of risk sensitive configurations, to focus increased attention on the higher risk activities, and to seek cost-effective design or operational changes that reduce risk. A detailed probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) had been performed to assess the risk of fuel damage during shutdown operations including heavy load handling. This resulted in several design changes to improve safety; however, evaluation of individual outages had not been performed previously and many risk insights were not being utilized in outage planning. The shutdown PRA provided the necessary framework for assessing relative and absolute risk levels and assessing defense-in-depth. Guidelines were written identifying combinations of equipment outages to avoid. Screening criteria were developed for the selection of work activities to receive review. Tabulation of inherent and work-related initiating events and their relative risk level versus plant mode has aided identification of the risk level the scheduled work involves. Preoutage reviews are conducted and post-outage risk assessment is documented to summarize the positive and negative aspects of the outage with regard to risk. The risk for the outage is compared to the risk level that would result from optimal scheduling of the work to be performed and to baseline or average past performance

  4. Outages 1999 and 2000, investments in safety and long-term operation of NE Krsko

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Sirola, P.; Krajnc, J.; Androjna, F.

    1999-01-01

    Plant outage is an important part of nuclear power plant operation. During that time the conditions are established for the performance of specific activities, such as refueling, tests, inspections, preventive and corrective maintenance and modifications, that are intended to confirm proper condition and availability of safety and other important components and improve overall plant safety and reliability. It is well know that in Nuclear Power Plant Krsko (Nuklearna elektrarna Krsko NEK) during Outage 2000 new Steam Generators (SGs) will be placed in service, while Outage '99 was used for preparatory works. But the importance of those two outages is even greater, because they are implementing a broad number of improvements and establishing a basis for long-term plant operation. Outage '99 required very detailed planning to assure a good control over the outage activities and operational plant systems necessary for safe shutdown. Numerous activities took place in a relatively narrow space in the Reactor Building. Some of these activities will have a big significance for the future. The article treats the status update and summarizes the specifics and importance of the mentioned activities to long-term plant safe and reliable operation.(author)

  5. Technical development and its application on steam generator replacement

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Morita, Sadahiko; Hanzawa, Katsumi; Sato, Hajime; Kannoto, Yasuo.

    1995-01-01

    Twenty-two PWR nuclear power plants are now under commercial operation in Japan. Eight of these plants are scheduled to have their steam generators replaced by up-graded units as a social responsibility for improved reliability, economy and easier maintenance. To carry out steam generator replacement, main coolant pipe cutting and restoration techniques, remote controlled welding machines and other remote controlled equipment, templating techniques with which the new steam generator primary nozzles will fit the existing primary pipes correctly were developed. An adequate training program was carried out to establish these techniques and they were then applied in replacement work on site. The steam generators of the three plants were replaced completely in 1994. These newly developed techniques are to be applied in upcoming plants and replaced plants will be much reliable. (author)

  6. Point Lepreau refurbishment project programmable digital comparator (PDC) replacement for SDS1 and SDS2

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Ichiyen, N.M.; Chan, D.; Thompson, P.D.

    2003-01-01

    NB Power is tentatively planning to conduct an 18-month maintenance outage of the Point Lepreau Generating Station (PLGS) starting in April 2007. The scope of the outage was determined from the outcome of a two year study (Phase 1) involving a detailed condition assessment of the station which examined issues relating to ageing and obsolescence, along with a detailed review of Safety and Licensing issues associated with extended operation. In order to minimize schedule and regulatory risk for the Refurbishment project, pre-project work was initiated in early 2002. This program is called Phase 2 ESA (Early Start Activities). As part of the Phase 1 assessments it was concluded that replacement of the PDCs (Programmable Digital Comparators) for both shutdown systems was required in order to ensure operation of the plant for a further 25-30 years. Critical tasks were identified related to PDC replacement as part of the Phase 2 ESA program. This paper describes the activities that have taken place in the Phase 2 ESA program as well as the plan for future work for the PDC replacement for SDS 1 (Shutdown System Number One) and SDS2 (Shutdown System Number Two). (author)

  7. Large scale replacement of fuel channels in the Pickering CANDU reactor using a man-in-the-loop remote control system

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Stratton, D.

    1991-01-01

    Spar Aerospace Limited of Toronto is presently under contract to Ontario Hydro to design a Remote Manipulation and Control System (RMCS) to be used during the large scale replacement of the fuel channels in the Pickering A Nuclear Generating Station. The system is designed to support the replacement of all 390 fuel channels in each of the four reactors at the Pickering A station in a safe manner that minimizes worker radiation exposure and unit outage time

  8. Does Your Domestic Photovoltaic Energy System Survive Grid Outages?

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Marijn R. Jongerden

    2016-09-01

    Full Text Available Domestic renewable energy systems, including photovoltaic energy generation, as well as local storage, are becoming increasingly popular and economically feasible, but do come with a wide range of options. Hence, it can be difficult to match their specification to specific customer’s needs. Next to the usage-specific demand profiles and location-specific production profiles, local energy storage through the use of batteries is becoming increasingly important, since it allows one to balance variations in production and demand, either locally or via the grid. Moreover, local storage can also help to ensure a continuous energy supply in the presence of grid outages, at least for a while. Hybrid Petri net (HPN models allow one to analyze the effect of different battery management strategies on the continuity of such energy systems in the case of grid outages. The current paper focuses on one of these strategies, the so-called smart strategy, that reserves a certain percentage of the battery capacity to be only used in case of grid outages. Additionally, we introduce a new strategy that makes better use of the reserved backup capacity, by reducing the demand in the presence of a grid outage through a prioritization mechanism. This new strategy, called power-save, only allows the essential (high-priority demand to draw from the battery during power outages. We show that this new strategy outperforms previously-proposed strategies through a careful analysis of a number of scenarios and for a selection of survivability measures, such as minimum survivability per day, number of survivable hours per day, minimum survivability per year and various survivability quantiles.

  9. Nuclear outages: an approach to project controls

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Bryson, R.

    1985-01-01

    The annual budget for maintaining and operating a nuclear power plant has risen dramatically over the past 5 years. NRC-mandated plant improvements and outage related expenses are often cited to be the main contributors to these escalating budgets. Nuclear utilities have responded by developing programs to improve plant availability and outage costs through improved outage performance. Utilities recognize that for capital improvements the program to control costs does no begin with outage planning, but rather more appropriately up front during the engineering phase. To support their management objectives, utilities have been developing comprehensive project control systems for concurrently reducing capital expenditures, outage-related costs, and time. This paper provides an approach to project controls that, rather than using one all inclusive comprehensive system, requires five separate monitoring systems - one for each phase of an activity's life cycle. Through the integration of these discrete but interrelated systems, utility management acquires the necessary tools for comprehensive planning and control of their modification program and effective detailed monitoring for all outage-related activities

  10. Outage Risk Assessment and Management (ORAM) technology to improve outage safety and economics

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kalra, S.P.

    2004-01-01

    The Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) has undertaken an aggressive program, called ORAM (Outage Risk Assessment and Management), to provide utilities with tools and technology to assist in managing risk during the planning and conduct of outages. The ORAM program consists of the following 6 steps: i) Perform utility surveys and visits on shutdown risk management needs, ii) Perform probabilistic shutdown safety assessments (PSSAs) to identify generic insights that can be incorporated into risk management guidelines and identify selected areas for the development of contingency actions, iii) Develop risk management guidelines (RMG's) that provide a systematic approach to the planning and conduct of outages from a safety perspective. Incorporate insights from the shutdown safety assessments and other operating experience into the RMG's. iv) Develop selected contingency actions including a thermalhydraulic tool kit to address higher risk time periods and activities identified in the shutdown safety assessments, v) Develop computer software that integrates all of the above capability into an easy to use tool for effective shutdown operation management for utilities, vi) Provide assistance in the transfer of this technology and the application of these tools. This paper briefly describes the technical approach and tools developed under EPRI's ORAM program and its applications for improving outage safety and economics. (author)

  11. Standard plants, standard outages: the EdF approach

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Miron, J.L.

    1991-01-01

    At the end of 1990 Electricite de France had carried out a total of 350 PWR refuelling outages. Although the French units are standardized the routine of the outages are not all the same. The major influences on outages were: setting up new organizations to apply quality assurance regulations; improving systematic experience feedback; incorporating modifications in the outage schedules; assumilation of computerized maintenance management by the sites. (author)

  12. Study of Arkansas Nuclear One-1 13th refueling outage

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hashiba, Takashi

    1997-01-01

    Recently performance of nuclear power plants in the USA has improved remarkably. Their average automatic shutdown rate has been sharply dropping, although it is still higher than that in Japan, and their average capacity factor has become higher than that in Japan in recent years. One of the main contributors is an extension of the operational period, and another is a shortening of refueling-outage time. It is considerably difficult to have accomplished both the improvement of plant reliability and shortening of refueling-outage time because their refueling outage corresponds to our periodical inspection which is central to maintenance activities in Japanese plants. In order to learn how they have been achieved, a visit to Arkansas Nuclear One-1 (ANO-1) which obtained the top-class result of SALP (Systematic Assessment of Licensee Performance) performed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission was planned and study of their 13th refueling outage was carried out. Their achievements result from performance-base maintenance and on-line maintenance, based on a proper preventive maintenance program, and untiring efforts of efficiency improvement, represented by the introduction of several on-line systems. And the reason behind this is severe competition concerning power generation cost reduction. (author)

  13. Study of Arkansas Nuclear One-1 13th refueling outage

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Hashiba, Takashi [Institute of Nuclear Safety System Inc., Seika, Kyoto (Japan)

    1997-09-01

    Recently performance of nuclear power plants in the USA has improved remarkably. Their average automatic shutdown rate has been sharply dropping, although it is still higher than that in Japan, and their average capacity factor has become higher than that in Japan in recent years. One of the main contributors is an extension of the operational period, and another is a shortening of refueling-outage time. It is considerably difficult to have accomplished both the improvement of plant reliability and shortening of refueling-outage time because their refueling outage corresponds to our periodical inspection which is central to maintenance activities in Japanese plants. In order to learn how they have been achieved, a visit to Arkansas Nuclear One-1 (ANO-1) which obtained the top-class result of SALP (Systematic Assessment of Licensee Performance) performed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission was planned and study of their 13th refueling outage was carried out. Their achievements result from performance-base maintenance and on-line maintenance, based on a proper preventive maintenance program, and untiring efforts of efficiency improvement, represented by the introduction of several on-line systems. And the reason behind this is severe competition concerning power generation cost reduction. (author)

  14. Primary Water Chemistry Control during a Planned Outage at Bruce Power

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Ma, Guoping; Nashiem, Rod; Matheson, Shane; Yabar, Berman; Harper, Bill; Roberts, John G.

    2012-09-01

    Bruce Power has developed a comprehensive outage water chemistry program, which includes both primary and secondary chemistry requirements during planned outages. The purpose of the program is to emphasize the chemistry requirements during outages and subsequent start-ups in order to maintain the integrity of the systems, minimise activity transport and radiation fields, reduce the Carbon-14 release, and to ensure that the requirements are integrated with the outage management program. Prior to a planned outage, Station Chemical Technical Sections identify outage chemistry requirements to Operations and Outage Planning and ensure that work necessary to correct system chemistry issues is within outage work scope. The outage water chemistry program provides direction for establishing alternative sampling locations as demanded by the system configuration during the outage and identifies outage prerequisites for nuclear system purification capabilities. These requirements are contained in an outage checklist. The paper mainly highlights the primary water chemistry issues and chemistry control strategies during planned outages and discusses challenges and successes. (authors)

  15. The course of a true outage never ran so smooth

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Harberts, Craig

    1994-01-01

    In order to improve the performance of outages at San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station in California, the working structure of the entire organisation has had to be radically altered, in order to bring San Onofre up to standard with other nuclear plants known to be performing well. Working systems were simplified and efficiency improved. Personnel needed to be remotivated to work cooperatively and the outage budget process was revised to include input from all relevant organizations, historical costs and benchmark information from other plants that performed well. Finally, the decision making and teamwork culture has altered radically at San Onofre over the last decade. (UK)

  16. Maintenance and Outage Management Assessment (MOMA)

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2005-01-01

    The competitive environment has significant implications for nuclear power plant (NPP) operations, which include, inter alia, the need for efficient use of resources and effective management of plant activities of maintenance and outages. The purpose of NPP maintenance and outages is to allow NPPs to use all those functions necessary for safe and reliable power production by keeping them available and adequate maintenance programme is essential. The maintenance programme covers all preventive and remedial measures, both administrative and technical, necessary to identify and mitigate degradation of a functioning system, structure or component, or restore the design functions of a failed system, structure or component to an acceptable level. In response to the needs of MSs, NPES (Nuclear Power Section, Division of Nuclear Power, IAEA) plans to strengthen its services. NPES services will not only continue to provide its 'traditional' products of publications of nuclear industrial best practices and technical implementation of TC projects on plant maintenance and outage management, but also be expanded to deliver, in a timely manner, technical support missions as requested by MSs for NPPs. One of many services is Maintenance and Outage Management Assessment (MOMA). The NPP can obtain support and assistance in assessment and optimisation of its maintenance program and/or outage management. It aims to help the NPP improve its performance of maintenance and outage in a competitive nuclear power business environment. The specific benefits of the assessment are as follows: a) disseminate nuclear industrial best practices on maintenance program and outage management in the world, b) benchmark, evaluate and optimise the approach of maintenance program and outage management and c) identify solutions to known problems at nuclear power plants, if any. MOMA is conducted at the request of NPPs of any IAEA Member States. MOMA consists in a technical mission/visit for 1-3 weeks by

  17. Steam generator replacement at the Obrigheim nuclear power station

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Pickel, E.; Schenk, H.; Huemmler, A.

    1984-01-01

    The Obrigheim Nuclear Power Station (KWO) is equipped with a dual-loop pressurized water reactor of 345 MW electric power; it was built by Siemens in the period 1965 to 1968. By the end of 1983, KWO had produced some 35 billion kWh in 109,000 hours of operation. Repeated leaks in the heater tubes of the two steam generators had occurred since 1971. Both steam generators were replaced in the course of the 1983 annual revision. Kraftwerk Union AG (KWU) was commissioned to plant and carry out the replacement work. Despite the leakages the steam generators had been run safely and reliably over a period of 14 years until their replacement. Replacing the steam generators was completed within twelve weeks. In addition to the KWO staff and the supervising crew of KWU, some 400 external fitters were employed on the job at peak work-load periods. For the revision of the whole plant, work on the emergency systems and replacement of the steam generators a maximum number of approx. 900 external fitters were employed in the plant in addition to some 250 members of the plant crew. The exposure dose of the personnel sustained in the course of the steam generator replacement was 690 man-rem, which was clearly below previous estimates. (orig.) [de

  18. Steam generator replacement from ALARA aspects

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Terry, I.; Breznik, B.

    2003-01-01

    This paper is going to consider radiological related parameters important for steam generator replacement (SGR) implementation. These parameters are identified as ALARA related parameters, owner-contractor relationship, planning, health physics with logistic services, and time required for the replacement. ALARA related parameters such as source or initial dose rate and plant system configuration define the initial conditions for the planning. There is room to optimise work planning. managerial procedures and also the staff during the implementation phase. The overview of these general considerations is based on the following background: using internationally available data and the experience of one of the vendors, i.e. Siemens-Framatome, and management experience of SG replacement which took place at Krsko NPP in the spring of 2000. Generally plant decisions on maintenance or repair procedures under radiation conditions take into account ALARA considerations. But in the main it is difficult to adjudge the results of an ALARA study, usually in the form of a collective dose estimate, because a comparison standard is missing. That is, very often the planned work is of a one-off nature so comparisons are not possible or the scopes are not the same. In such a case the collective doses for other types of work are looked at and a qualitative evaluation is made. In the case of steam generator replacement this is not the case. Over years of steam generator replacements world-wide a standard has been developed gradually. The first part of the following displays an overview of SGR and sets the Krsko SGR in perspective by applying dose analysis. The second part concentrates on the Krsko SGR itself and its ALARA aspects. (authors)

  19. Status Report on the Development of Micro-Scheduling Software for the Advanced Outage Control Center Project

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Germain, Shawn St. [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States); Thomas, Kenneth [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States); Farris, Ronald [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States); Joe, Jeffrey [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States)

    2014-09-01

    The long-term viability of existing nuclear power plants (NPPs) in the United States (U.S.) is dependent upon a number of factors, including maintaining high capacity factors, maintaining nuclear safety, and reducing operating costs, particularly those associated with refueling outages. Refueling outages typically take 20-30 days, and for existing light water NPPs in the U.S., the reactor cannot be in operation during the outage. Furthermore, given that many NPPs generate between $1-1.5 million/day in revenue when in operation, there is considerable interest in shortening the length of refueling outages. Yet, refueling outages are highly complex operations, involving multiple concurrent and dependent activities that are difficult to coordinate. Finding ways to improve refueling outage performance while maintaining nuclear safety has proven to be difficult. The Advanced Outage Control Center project is a research and development (R&D) demonstration activity under the Light Water Reactor Sustainability (LWRS) Program. LWRS is a R&D program which works with industry R&D programs to establish technical foundations for the licensing and managing of long-term, safe, and economical operation of current NPPs. The Advanced Outage Control Center project has the goal of improving the management of commercial NPP refueling outages. To accomplish this goal, this INL R&D project is developing an advanced outage control center (OCC) that is specifically designed to maximize the usefulness of communication and collaboration technologies for outage coordination and problem resolution activities. This report describes specific recent efforts to develop a capability called outage Micro-Scheduling. Micro-Scheduling is the ability to allocate and schedule outage support task resources on a sub-hour basis. Micro-Scheduling is the real-time fine-tuning of the outage schedule to react to the actual progress of the primary outage activities to ensure that support task resources are

  20. Indicators for management of planned outages in nuclear power plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2006-04-01

    The outages considered within the scope of this publication are planned refuelling outages (PWR and BWR nuclear power plants) and planned outages associated with major maintenance, tests and inspections (PHWR and LWGR nuclear power plants). The IAEA has published some valuable reports providing guidance and assistance to operating organizations on outage management. This TECDOC outlines main issues to be considered in outage performance monitoring and provides guidance to operating organizations for the development and implementation of outage programmes which could enhance plant safety, reliability and economics. It also complements the series of reports published by the IAEA on outage management and on previous work related to performance indicators developed for monitoring different areas of plant operation, such as safety, production, reliability and economics. This publication is based upon the information presented at a technical meeting to develop a standardized set of outage indicators for outage optimization, which was organised in Vienna, 6-9 October 2003. At this meeting, case studies and good practices relating to performance indicator utilization in the process of planned outage management were presented and discussed

  1. Outage costs: who should pay?

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Stivison, D.V.

    1986-01-01

    Decisions affecting the Three Mile Island-1 and -2 reactors illustrate new an stricter standards which apply to how regulator will allocate the costs of outages. The rule allows outages for normal refueling and other normal shutdowns if return to the power grid is assured. TMI-1 was removed from the rate base one year after the accident, and was readmitted only after achieving full power in 1986. A reasonableness standard based on an analysis of the outage and utility responses is the basis for deciding for or against removal. The author cites cases in which unreasonable actions caused the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to charge utility management with imprudence. New safety standards will force utilities to reduce employee error, equipment failure, and management weakness. 19 references

  2. The control of reactor outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Bouget, Y.H.; Berteloot, J.M.

    1995-01-01

    The 1985-1992 period was marked by a continuous decay in French reactors operation. This situation has led the Committee for Outages Mastery to take steps for the improvement of nuclear power plants availability. The control of reactor outages requires an integrated vision of the safety, duration, dosimetry, costs and security aspects and a perfect management of contractors. The paper describes the methodology used for the management and the maintenance of the French PWR reactors stock. A detailed schedule of maintenance tasks with dose estimations is now required from each site to anticipate and optimize the duration of outages. Thanks to this action, a significant reduction of the maintenance costs is observed for the 1992-1995 period. (J.S.). 2 figs

  3. Refueling outage data collection and analysis

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Harshaw, K.; Quilliam, J.; Brinsfield, W.; Jeffries, J.

    1993-07-01

    This report summarizes the results of an EPRI project to compile an industry generic refueling outage database applicable to alternate (non-full-power) modes of shutdown conditions at nuclear power plants. The project team evaluated five outages at two BWR plants. They obtained data primarily from control room logs, outage schedules, incident reports, and licensee event reports. The team organized the data by outage segment and time line. Due to its small sample size, this study produced no conclusive results related to initiating event frequencies, equipment failure rates, or human reliability estimates during shutdown conditions. However, it pointed out the problems of brief or inconsistent recordkeeping. A too brief record results in difficulty determining if the root cause of an event was mechanical or the result of human performance. Retrieval of data can be difficult and labor-intensive. There is a clear need for better, more comprehensive documentation

  4. Practice of fuel management and outage strategy at Paks NPP

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Farago, P.; Hamvas, I.; Szecsenyi, Zs.; Nemes, I.; Javor, E.

    2000-01-01

    The Paks Nuclear Power Plant generates almost 40% of Hungarian electricity production at lowest price. In spite of this fact the reduction of operational and maintenance costs is one of the most important goal of the plant management. The proper fuel management and outage strategy can give a considerable influence for this cost reduction. The aim of loading pattern planning is to get the required cycle length with available fuel cassettes and to keep all key parameters of safety analysis under safety limits. Another important point is production at profit, where both the fuel and spent fuel cost are determining. Earlier the conditions given by our only fuel supplier restricted our possibilities, so at the beginning the fuel arrangement changing was the only way to improve efficiency of fuel using. As first step we introduced the low leakage core design. The next step was the 4 years cycle using of some cassettes. By this way nearly half of 3 years cycle old cassettes remained in the core for fourth cycle. In the immediate future we want to use profiled cassettes developed by Russian supplier. Simultaneously we will load new type of WWER cassettes with burnable poison developed by BNFL Company. Hereby we can apply more BNFL cassettes for four years cycle even more. Both cost of fuel and number of spent fuel can be reduced besides keeping parameters under safety limits. The Hungarian in service inspection rules determine that every four year we have to make a complete inspection of reactor vessel. Therefore earlier we had two types of outages. Every 4 years we planned a long outage with 55-65 days duration and normal ones with about 30-35 days duration between the long ones. During the normal outages this way did not give us enough room to utilise the shortest possible critical path determined by works on reactor. Some years ago we changed our outage strategy. Now we plan every 4 years a long outage, and between them one normal and two short ones. As a result the

  5. WNP-2 outage safety review methodology

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Chiang, Albert; Fu, James

    2004-01-01

    A practical and versatile method was developed in the flow chart and checklist forms to show the defense-in-depth for various key safety functions of a nuclear power plant during shutdown. Using four different colors (green, yellow, orange, and red) for indication of levels of defense-in-depth is visually impressive, easy to understand, and was adopted by the outage management personnel as a convenient reference tool for maintenance activity planning before the outage, and schedule changes during the outage. This paper describes the method and its application at Washington Public Power Supply System's Nuclear Project 2 (WNP-2). (author)

  6. Long-term damage management strategies for optimizing steam generator performance

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Egan, G.R.; Besuner, P.M.; Fox, J.H.; Merrick, E.A.

    1991-01-01

    Minimizing long-term impact of steam generator operating, maintenance, outage, and replacement costs is the goal of all pressurized water reactor utilities. Recent research results have led to deterministic controls that may be implemented to optimize steam generator performance and to minimize damage accumulation. The real dilemma that utilities encounter is the decision process that needs to be made in the face of uncertain data. Some of these decisions involve the frequency and extent of steam generator eddy current tube inspections; the definition of operating conditions to minimize the rate of corrosion reactions (T (hot) , T (cold) ; and the imposition of strict water quality management guidelines. With finite resources, how can a utility decide which damage management strategy provides the most return for its investment? Aptech Engineering Services, Inc. (APTECH) developed a damage management strategy that starts from a deterministic analysis of a current problem- primary water stress corrosion cracking (PWSCC). The strategy involves a probabilistic treatment that results in long-term performance optimization. By optimization, we refer to minimizing the total cost of operating the steam generator. This total includes the present value costs of operations, maintenance, outages, and replacements. An example of the application of this methodology is presented. (author)

  7. Air traffic control : good progress on interim replacement for outage-plagued system, but risks can be further reduced

    Science.gov (United States)

    1996-10-01

    Certain air traffic control(ATC) centers experienced a series of major outages, : some of which were caused by the Display Channel Complex or DCC-a mainframe : computer system that processes radar and other data into displayable images on : controlle...

  8. Unit availability not affected by extending outage cycles

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Smith, D.J.

    2003-03-01

    To improve their economic dispatch position, more and more plant owners are extending the intervals between major outages for boilers from one year to 18-24 months and for steam turbine up to 12 years. In many instances, extended outage cycles have resulted in no loss in availability or increases in forced outages. The article discusses outage scheduling at Tucson Electric Power's Springville coal-fired plant, the Panther Creek Energy Facility in Pennsylvania, and at Tennessee Valley Authority's coal-fired power plants. 1 fig.

  9. Three Steam Generator Replacement Projects in 1995

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Holz, R.; Clavier, G.

    1996-01-01

    Since the companies Siemens AG and Framatome S. A. joined their experience and efforts in the field of steam generator replacements and formed a consortium in 1991, the following projects were performed in 1995: Ringhals 3, Tihange 3 and Asco 1. Further projects will follow in 1996, i. e., Doel 4 and Asco 2. Currently, this European consortium is bidding for the contract to replace the steam generators at the Krsko NPP and hopes to be awarded in 1996. An overview of the way the Consortium Siemens and Framatome approaches SG replacement projects is given based on the projects performed in 1995. Various aspects of project planning, management, licensing, personnel qualification and techniques used on site will be discussed. (author)

  10. Technology Integration Initiative In Support of Outage Management

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Gregory Weatherby; David Gertman

    2012-07-01

    Plant outage management is a high priority concern for the nuclear industry from cost and safety perspectives. Often, command and control during outages is maintained in the outage control center where many of the underlying technologies supporting outage control are the same as those used in the 1980’s. This research reports on the use of advanced integrating software technologies and hand held mobile devices as a means by which to reduce cycle time, improve accuracy, and enhance transparency among outage team members. This paper reports on the first phase of research supported by the DOE Light Water Reactor Sustainability (LWRS) Program that is performed in close collaboration with industry to examine the introduction of newly available technology allowing for safe and efficient outage performance. It is thought that this research will result in: improved resource management among various plant stakeholder groups, reduced paper work, and enhanced overall situation awareness for the outage control center management team. A description of field data collection methods, including personnel interview data, success factors, end-user evaluation and integration of hand held devices in achieving an integrated design are also evaluated. Finally, the necessity of obtaining operations cooperation support in field studies and technology evaluation is acknowledged.

  11. Contingency Analysis of Cascading Line Outage Events

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Thomas L Baldwin; Magdy S Tawfik; Miles McQueen

    2011-03-01

    As the US power systems continue to increase in size and complexity, including the growth of smart grids, larger blackouts due to cascading outages become more likely. Grid congestion is often associated with a cascading collapse leading to a major blackout. Such a collapse is characterized by a self-sustaining sequence of line outages followed by a topology breakup of the network. This paper addresses the implementation and testing of a process for N-k contingency analysis and sequential cascading outage simulation in order to identify potential cascading modes. A modeling approach described in this paper offers a unique capability to identify initiating events that may lead to cascading outages. It predicts the development of cascading events by identifying and visualizing potential cascading tiers. The proposed approach was implemented using a 328-bus simplified SERC power system network. The results of the study indicate that initiating events and possible cascading chains may be identified, ranked and visualized. This approach may be used to improve the reliability of a transmission grid and reduce its vulnerability to cascading outages.

  12. Steam generator replacement at Bruce A: approach, results, and lessons learned

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Tomkiewicz, W.; Savage, B.; Smith, J.

    2008-01-01

    Steam Generator Replacement is now complete in Bruce A Units 1 and 2. In each reactor, eight steam generators were replaced; these were the first CANDU steam generator replacements performed anywhere in the world. The plans for replacement were developed in 2004 and 2005, and were summarized in an earlier paper for the CNS Conference held in November, 2006. The present paper briefly summarizes the methodologies and special processes used such as metrology, cutting and welding and heavy lifting. The paper provides an update since the earlier report and focuses on the project achievements to date, such as: - A combination of engineered methodology, laser metrology and precise remote machining led to accurate first time fit-ups of each new replacement steam generator and steam drums - Lessons learned in the first unit led to schedule improvements in the second unit - Dose received was lowest recorded for any steam generator replacement project. The experience gained and lessons learned from Units 1 and 2 will be valuable in planning and executing future replacement steam generator projects. A video was presented

  13. Predicting Power Outages Using Multi-Model Ensemble Forecasts

    Science.gov (United States)

    Cerrai, D.; Anagnostou, E. N.; Yang, J.; Astitha, M.

    2017-12-01

    Power outages affect every year millions of people in the United States, affecting the economy and conditioning the everyday life. An Outage Prediction Model (OPM) has been developed at the University of Connecticut for helping utilities to quickly restore outages and to limit their adverse consequences on the population. The OPM, operational since 2015, combines several non-parametric machine learning (ML) models that use historical weather storm simulations and high-resolution weather forecasts, satellite remote sensing data, and infrastructure and land cover data to predict the number and spatial distribution of power outages. A new methodology, developed for improving the outage model performances by combining weather- and soil-related variables using three different weather models (WRF 3.7, WRF 3.8 and RAMS/ICLAMS), will be presented in this study. First, we will present a performance evaluation of each model variable, by comparing historical weather analyses with station data or reanalysis over the entire storm data set. Hence, each variable of the new outage model version is extracted from the best performing weather model for that variable, and sensitivity tests are performed for investigating the most efficient variable combination for outage prediction purposes. Despite that the final variables combination is extracted from different weather models, this ensemble based on multi-weather forcing and multi-statistical model power outage prediction outperforms the currently operational OPM version that is based on a single weather forcing variable (WRF 3.7), because each model component is the closest to the actual atmospheric state.

  14. Integrated head area design of KNGR to reduce refueling outage duration

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Jeong, Woo Tae; Park, Chi Yong; Kim, In Hwan; Kim, Dae Woong [Korea Electric Power Research Institute, Taejon (Korea, Republic of)

    1998-12-31

    In the design of KNGR (Korea Next Generation Reactor), we believe that economy is one of the most important factors to be considered. Thus, we reviewed and evaluated the consequences of designing the head area into an integrated package from an economical point of view. The refueling outage durations of the nuclear power plants currently in operation in Korea, some having and others not having integrated head package, are compared. This paper discusses the characteristics of head area design and the critical design issues of KNGR head area to evaluate the effect of the head area characteristics on the outage duration. 8 refs., 4 figs. (Author)

  15. Integrated head area design of KNGR to reduce refueling outage duration

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Jeong, Woo Tae; Park, Chi Yong; Kim, In Hwan; Kim, Dae Woong [Korea Electric Power Research Institute, Taejon (Korea, Republic of)

    1997-12-31

    In the design of KNGR (Korea Next Generation Reactor), we believe that economy is one of the most important factors to be considered. Thus, we reviewed and evaluated the consequences of designing the head area into an integrated package from an economical point of view. The refueling outage durations of the nuclear power plants currently in operation in Korea, some having and others not having integrated head package, are compared. This paper discusses the characteristics of head area design and the critical design issues of KNGR head area to evaluate the effect of the head area characteristics on the outage duration. 8 refs., 4 figs. (Author)

  16. Analysis of T101 outage radiation dose

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Li, Zhonghua

    2008-01-01

    Full text: Collective radiation dose during outage is about 80% of annual collective radiation dose at nuclear power plants (NPPs). T 101 Outage is the first four-year outage of Unit 1 at Tianwan Nuclear Power Station (TNPS) and thorough overhaul was undergone for the 105-day's duration. Therefore, T 101 Outage has significant reference meaning to reducing collective radiation dose at TNPS. This paper collects the radiation dose statistics during T 101 Outage and analyses the radiation dose distribution according to tasks, work kinds and varying trend of the collective radiation dose etc., comparing with other similar PWRs in the world. Based on the analysis this paper attempts to find out the major factors in collective radiation dose during T 101 Outage. The major positive factor is low radiation level at workplace, which profits from low content of Co in reactor construction materials, optimised high-temperature p H value of the primary circuit coolant within the tight range and reactor operation without trips within the first fuel cycle. One of the most negative factors is long outage duration and many person-hours spent in the radiological controlled zone, caused by too many tasks and inefficient work. So besides keeping good performance of reducing radioactive sources, it should be focused on how to improve implementation of work management including work selection, planning and scheduling, work preparation, work implementation, work assessment and feedback, which can lead to reduced numbers of workers needed to perform a task, of person-hours spent in the radiological controlled zone. Moreover, this leads to reduce occupational exposures in an ALARA fashion. (author)

  17. Generator replacement is associated with an increased rate of ICD lead alerts.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lovelock, Joshua D; Cruz, Cesar; Hoskins, Michael H; Jones, Paul; El-Chami, Mikhael F; Lloyd, Michael S; Leon, Angel; DeLurgio, David B; Langberg, Jonathan J

    2014-10-01

    Lead malfunction is an important cause of morbidity and mortality in patients with an implantable cardioverter-defibrillator (ICD). We have shown that the failure of recalled high-voltage leads significantly increases after ICD generator replacement. However, generator replacement has not been recognized as a predictor of lead failure in general. The purpose of this study is to assess the effect of ICD generator exchange on the rate of ICD lead alerts. A time-dependent Cox proportional hazards model was used to analyze a database of remotely monitored ICDs. The model assessed the impact of generator exchange on the rate of lead alerts after ICD generator replacement. The analysis included 60,219 patients followed for 37 ± 19 months. The 5-year lead survival was 99.3% (95% confidence interval 99.2%-99.4%). Of 60,219 patients, 7458 patients (12.9%) underwent ICD generator exchange without lead replacement. After generator replacement, the rate of lead alerts was more than 5-fold higher than in controls with leads of the same age without generator replacement (hazard ratio 5.19; 95% confidence interval 3.45-7.84). A large number of lead alerted within 3 months of generator replacement. Lead alerts were more common in patients with single- vs dual-chamber ICDs and in younger patients. Sex was not associated with lead alerts. Routine generator replacement is associated with a 5-fold higher risk of lead alert compared to age-matched leads without generator replacement. This suggests the need for intense surveillance after generator replacement and the development of techniques to minimize the risk of lead damage during generator replacement. Copyright © 2014 Heart Rhythm Society. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  18. Improved servicing equipment for steam generators

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hedtke, James C.

    1998-01-01

    To help keep personnel exposure as low as reasonably achievable and reduce critical path outage time, most nuclear plants of PWR design in the USA are now using improved equipment to service their steam generators (SGs) during outages. Because of the success of this equipment in the USA, two Belgian plants and one English plant have purchased this equipment, and other nuclear plants in Europe are also considering procurement. The improved SG servicing equipment discussed in this paper discusses consists of nozzle dams, segmented multi-stud tensioner, primary manway cover handling tool set, shield door and fastener cleaner. This equipment is specifically designed for the individual plant application and can also be specified for replacement SG projects. All of the equipment can be used without modification of the existing SGs. (author)

  19. Pricing power outages in the Netherlands

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Baarsma, Barbara E.; Hop, J. Peter [SEO Economic Research/University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam (Netherlands)

    2009-09-15

    In most Western countries, the power grid provides electricity more than 99% of the time. To maintain reliability at such high levels, energy companies have to continually invest in electric transmission- and distribution systems. Since customers of electricity cannot switch from one distribution network to another, no economic incentive exists that matches the supplied reliability to customer preferences. Either under- or over-investment in reliability may thus result. In order to introduce market-like incentives, the Dutch Energy Regulator introduced a regulatory system based on the (perceived) costs of power outages. An essential ingredient of the regulation is the cost of a power outage of a particular duration (i.e., 1 minute). This paper measures these outage cost by using conjoint analysis. We find that the social cost of the present Dutch level of reliability - that is, one outage of two hours every four years - is EUR2.80 on average for every household, and EUR33.10 on average for every SME firm. The total costs to Dutch society are almost EUR50 million. (author)

  20. Residential outage cost estimation: Hong Kong

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Woo, C.K.; Ho, T.; Shiu, A.; Cheng, Y.S.; Horowitz, I.; Wang, J.

    2014-01-01

    Hong Kong has almost perfect electricity reliability, the result of substantial investments ultimately financed by electricity consumers who may be willing to accept lower reliability in exchange for lower bills. But consumers with high outage costs are likely to reject the reliability reduction. Our ordered-logit regression analysis of the responses by 1876 households to a telephone survey conducted in June 2013 indicates that Hong Kong residents exhibit a statistically-significant preference for their existing service reliability and rate. Moreover, the average residential cost estimate for a 1-h outage is US$45 (HK$350), topping the estimates reported in 10 of the 11 studies published in the last 10 years. The policy implication is that absent additional compelling evidence, Hong Kong should not reduce its service reliability. - Highlights: • Use a contingent valuation survey to obtain residential preferences for reliability. • Use an ordered logit analysis to estimate Hong Kong's residential outage costs. • Find high outage cost estimates that imply high reliability requirements. • Conclude that sans new evidence, Hong Kong should not reduce its reliability

  1. Outage management: A case study

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Haber, S.B.; Barriere, M.T.; Roberts, K.H.

    1992-01-01

    Outage management issues identified from a field study conducted at a two-unit commercial pressurized water reactor (PWR), when one unit was in a refueling outage and the other unit was at full power operation, are the focus of this paper. The study was conduced as part of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission's (NRC) organizational factors research program, and therefore the issues to be addressed are from an organizational perspective. Topics discussed refer to areas identified by the NRC as critical for safety during shutdown operations, including outage planning and control, personnel stress, and improvements in training and procedures. Specifically, issues in communication, management attention, involvement and oversight, administrative processes, organizational culture, and human resources relevant to each of the areas are highlighted by example from field data collection. Insights regarding future guidance in these areas are presented based upon additional data collection subsequent to the original study

  2. Ratepayers should not fund IP-2 outage, NY Attorney General says

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Anon.

    1981-01-01

    The New York Attorney General is trying to block Consolidated Edison's effort to pay for an Indian Point nuclear plant outage through the fuel-adjustment clause on the grounds that the utility had repeated system warnings and should have taken action to prevent the leakage of water into the containment building. The utility rejects the assessment of personnel negligence and, blaming equipment failure, plans to replace its heat exchangers. The New York Public Service Commission approved Con Ed's use of the fuel-adjustment clause to pay for replacement power, but agrees that ratepayers should not pay the costs of negligence if the charges are proved. The Attorney General feels that Con Ed could legally challenge a later request for refunds. Other funding possibilities include nuclear-insurance policies or legal action against the equipment manufacturer

  3. Development and demonstration of techniques for reducing occupational radiation doses during refueling outages. Tasks 7A/7B. Advanced outage management and radiation exposure control

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1985-03-01

    Objectives of Tasks 7A and 7B were to develop and demonstrate computer based systems to assist plant management and staff in utilizing information more effectively to reduce occupational exposures received as a result of refueling outages, and to shorten the duration of the outage. The Advanced Outage Management (AOM) Tool (Task 7A) is an automated outage planning system specifically designed to meet the needs of nuclear plant outage management. The primary objective of the AOM tool is to provide a computerized system that can manipulate the information typically associated with outage planning and scheduling to furnish reports and schedules that more accurately project the future course of the outage. The Radiation Exposure Control (REC) Tool (Task 7B) is a computerized personnel radiation exposure accounting and management system designed to enable nuclear plant management to project and monitor total personnel radiation exposure on a real-time basis. The two systems were designed to operate on the same computer system and interface through a common database that enables information sharing between plant organizations not typically interfaced. This interfacing provides outage planners with a means of incorporating occupational radiation exposure as a factor for making decisions on the course of an outage

  4. A framework and review of customer outage costs: Integration and analysis of electric utility outage cost surveys

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Lawton, Leora; Sullivan, Michael; Van Liere, Kent; Katz, Aaron; Eto, Joseph

    2003-11-01

    A clear understanding of the monetary value that customers place on reliability and the factors that give rise to higher and lower values is an essential tool in determining investment in the grid. The recent National Transmission Grid Study recognizes the need for this information as one of growing importance for both public and private decision makers. In response, the U.S. Department of Energy has undertaken this study, as a first step toward addressing the current absence of consistent data needed to support better estimates of the economic value of electricity reliability. Twenty-four studies, conducted by eight electric utilities between 1989 and 2002 representing residential and commercial/industrial (small, medium and large) customer groups, were chosen for analysis. The studies cover virtually all of the Southeast, most of the western United States, including California, rural Washington and Oregon, and the Midwest south and east of Chicago. All variables were standardized to a consistent metric and dollar amounts were adjusted to the 2002 CPI. The data were then incorporated into a meta-database in which each outage scenario (e.g., the lost of electric service for one hour on a weekday summer afternoon) is treated as an independent case or record both to permit comparisons between outage characteristics and to increase the statistical power of analysis results. Unadjusted average outage costs and Tobit models that estimate customer damage functions are presented. The customer damage functions express customer outage costs for a given outage scenario and customer class as a function of location, time of day, consumption, and business type. One can use the damage functions to calculate outage costs for specific customer types. For example, using the customer damage functions, the cost experienced by an ''average'' customer resulting from a 1 hour summer afternoon outage is estimated to be approximately $3 for a residential customer, $1

  5. The process of NPP refuelling outage analysis and follow-up

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Nemec, T.; Savli, S.; Cernilogar Radez, M.; Persic, A.; Pecek, V.; Stritar, A.

    2007-01-01

    Following the outages in 2004 and 2006, the Slovenian Nuclear Safety Administration (SNSA) has started with the practice of independent outage analysis in a form of an internal report. It includes a comparison of performed activities against the planned time schedule of activities, evaluation of design modifications implementation and analysis of significant events. The main result of the outage analysis is a list of recommendations and some open issues that have been identified. These findings are the basis for development of an action plan for SNSA activities until the next outage, aimed at eliminating deficiencies found out during the outage and further improving outage activities. The established system of outage supervision together with the final analysis and long term action plan represents an effective continuous safety supervision process, by which the regulatory body independently contributes to the higher level of safety culture both at the licensee and among its own staff. (author)

  6. Ontario-U.S. power outages : impacts on critical infrastructure

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2006-01-01

    This paper described the power outage and resulting blackout that occurred on August 14, 2003 and identified how critical infrastructure was directly and interdependently impacted in Canada. The aim of the paper was to assist critical infrastructure protection and emergency management professionals in assessing the potential impacts of large-scale critical infrastructure disruptions. Information for the study was acquired from Canadian and American media reports and cross-sectoral information sharing with provincial and federal governments and the private sector. The blackout impacted most of the sources and means of generating, transmitting and distributing power within the area, which in turn impacted all critical infrastructure sectors. Landline and cellular companies experienced operational difficulties, which meant that emergency responders were impacted. Newspapers and the electronic media struggled to release information to the public. The banking and finance industry experienced an immediate degradation of services. The power outage caused shipping and storage difficulties for commercial retailers and dairy producers. A number of incidents were reported where only partially treated waste water was released into neighbouring waterways. The timing of the blackout coincided with the closures of workplaces and created additional difficulties on transportation networks. Many gas station pumps were inoperable. Police, fire departments and ambulance services experienced a dramatic increase in the volume of calls received, and all branches of the emergency services sector encountered transportation delays and difficulties with communications equipment. Nuclear reactors were also impacted. An estimated 150,000 Government of Canada employees were unable to report to work. Estimates have indicated that the power outage cost Ontario's economy between $1 and $2 billion. The outage negatively impacted 82 per cent of small businesses in Ontario. 170 refs., 3 figs

  7. ALARA database value in future outage work planning and dose management

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Miller, D.W.; Green, W.H.

    1995-01-01

    ALARA database encompassing job-specific duration and man-rem plant specific information over three refueling outages represents an invaluable tool for the outage work planner and ALARA engineer. This paper describes dose-management trends emerging based on analysis of three refueling outages at Clinton Power Station. Conclusions reached based on hard data available from a relational database dose-tracking system is a valuable tool for planning of future outage work. The system's ability to identify key problem areas during a refueling outage is improving as more outage comparative data becomes available. Trends over a three outage period are identified in this paper in the categories of number and type of radiation work permits implemented, duration of jobs, projected vs. actual dose rates in work areas, and accuracy of outage person-rem projection. The value of the database in projecting 1 and 5 year station person-rem estimates is discussed

  8. ALARA database value in future outage work planning and dose management

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Miller, D.W.; Green, W.H. [Clinton Power Station Illinois Power Co., IL (United States)

    1995-03-01

    ALARA database encompassing job-specific duration and man-rem plant specific information over three refueling outages represents an invaluable tool for the outage work planner and ALARA engineer. This paper describes dose-management trends emerging based on analysis of three refueling outages at Clinton Power Station. Conclusions reached based on hard data available from a relational database dose-tracking system is a valuable tool for planning of future outage work. The system`s ability to identify key problem areas during a refueling outage is improving as more outage comparative data becomes available. Trends over a three outage period are identified in this paper in the categories of number and type of radiation work permits implemented, duration of jobs, projected vs. actual dose rates in work areas, and accuracy of outage person-rem projection. The value of the database in projecting 1 and 5 year station person-rem estimates is discussed.

  9. Operating performance of LWR nuclear generating units

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Pia, S.

    1984-01-01

    This work aims at reviewing, on the basis of historical data, the operational problem areas which explain the degree of availability and productivity achieved up to now by nuclear power plants in commercial operation in the world. The operating performance data of nuclear power plants area analysed with respect to plant type, size and other significant reference parameters and they are evaluated also by comparison with fossil generating unit data. Major performance indices data are presented for both nuclear and fossil units type and distribution of outage causes. Unplanned full outages caused by nuclear power plant equipment and components failure are particulary emphasized. The trend for unplanned full outages due to the failure of components shows decreasing numerical values in 1981 with respect to the previous years. But this result should be weighed with the increasing plant unavailability hours needed for maintenance and repair action (chiefly preventive maintenance on critical components). This means that the number and downtime of forced outage must be drastically reduced for economic reasons (production losses and problems associated with the unavailable unit unplanned replacement) as well as for plant safe and reliable operation (sudden unavailability of key components and frequency of transients associated with plant shutdown and routine startup operation)

  10. Some economic aspects of steam generator replacements in nuclear power plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Lebegner, J.

    1995-01-01

    The steam generator replacements performed over last decade (about 25 replacements until now), indicate trends towards improved techniques, shorter schedules and reduced total exposure and total costs. The goal of this paper is to give a worldwide review of SG replacement experience with accent on the economic aspect of the SG replacement. The main information about carried out replacements will be presented: cost, schedules, exposures, SG supplier and type, date of replacement, etc. Furthermore, the paper will contain the list of planned steam generator replacements in Europe, Japan and US future replacement plans. Finally, some of NPPs will be described whose initial nominal power has been increased along with SG replacement. (author)

  11. Partnership - its contribution to outage success

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Gill, K.S.; Kirton-Darling, F.; Robinson, F.T.

    1996-01-01

    An innovative approach to developing the teamwork between the power station and the outage contractor has been pioneered over the past three years at the Bradwell nuclear power station in the UK, which houses two Magnox reactors. Magnox Electric and Rolls-Royce Nuclear Engineering Services are now undertaking their third outage under a partnership contract which has provided significant benefits to both parties. (Author)

  12. San Onofre - the evolution of outage management

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Slagle, K.A.

    1993-01-01

    With the addition of units 2 and 3 to San Onofre nuclear station in 1983 and 1984, it became evident that a separate group was needed to manage outages. Despite early establishment of a division to handle outages, it was a difficult journey to make the changes to achieve short outages. Early organizational emphasis was on developing an error-free operating environment and work culture. This is difficult for a relatively large organization at a three-unit site. The work processes and decision styles were designed to be very deliberate with many checks and balances. The organization leadership and accountability were focused in the traditional operations, maintenance, and engineering divisions. Later, our organization emphasis shifted to achieving engineering excellence. With a sound foundation of operating and engineering excellence, our organizational focus has turned to achieving quality outages. This means accomplishing the right work in a shorter duration and having the units run until the next refueling

  13. The status of the Hanaro class 4 power outage

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hyungkyoo, K.; Hoansung, J.; Jongsup, W.

    2004-01-01

    Electric power is essential for all industrial plant. All who use electric power desire a perfect frequency, voltage stability, and reliability all the time. But this cannot be realized in practice because of the many causes of a power supply disturbance that are beyond the control of the utility. Since the first criticality of the Hanaro research reactor, the major reasons for reactor trips were system malfunctions and inexperienced operators in the initial stage of its operation. As Hanaro is stabilizing, the power supply outage becomes the major reason for a reactor trip. This paper describes the status of power supply outages. This paper deals with not only the outages which have an effect on Hanaro operation but also the reasons for the Hanaro class-4 power outages. The class-4 power is a commercial power which supplies the load centers and the large motors such as primary cooling pumps and secondary cooling pumps. Even if a class-4 power outage occurs, Hanaro is safe because of the reactor cooling by natural convection and the flywheel effect of the primary cooling pumps. The analysis of the characteristics and the trends of the outages can provide clues to how the outages can be minimized and what the impact of the outages are on the operation. For the site-wide class-4 power, the latest failure rate has been 2.36 per year and the mean time to repair is 23,78 minutes for the exponentially weighted mowing average. The unavailability of the Class-4 power is 1.5 10 -4

  14. Nuclear safety risk control in the outage of CANDU unit

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Wu Mingliang; Zheng Jianhua

    2014-01-01

    Nuclear fuel remains in the core during the outage of CANDU unit, but there are still nuclear safety risks such as reactor accidental criticality, fuel element failure due to inability to properly remove residual heat. Furthermore, these risks are aggravated by the weakening plant system configuration and multiple cross operations during the outage. This paper analyzes the phases where there are potential nuclear safety risks on the basis of the typical critical path arrangement of the outage of Qinshan NPP 3 and introduces a series of CANDU-specific risk control measures taken during the past plant outages to ensure nuclear safety during the unit outage. (authors)

  15. Outage time reduction in GKN II without loss of safety

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Sturm, J.

    1999-01-01

    GKN II is a 1340 MWE 4-loop pressurised water reactor from Siemens KONVOI type, located in the south of Germany. It was originally connected to the grid at the end of 1988. Commercial operation under utility responsibility started at the second half of 1989. The first outage was performed in 1990. Beginning from this date, the outage duration was contiguously reduced from 33 days to 15 days in 1996. In 1998, two refueling and maintenance outages were performed, each with a duration of 7 days. Key planning factors to achieve these results are: A well adapted planning organisation with an outage manager and an outage planning team. An effective long term planning. This means the combination of work with a long duration every 4 or 8 years. No longlasting work in the years in between. Main work only on one safety train per year. Optimisation and standardisation of the shutdown and the startup sequence. The real change of reactor states have been modified, compared to the vendor recommendations. An tests are assigned to plant conditions, where they are most effective and are less time critical. Small modifications in the plant, mainly on the auxiliary systems, to speedup some sequences. Extreme detailed planning of maintenance and periodic tests. Each work/test can be found in a detailed schedule with a dedicated time widow. Optimized tools to perform the detailed planning and to implement the feedback of experience from former outages. Optimized tools for maintenance and handlings of heavy equipment on the critical path. Optimized tools to perform periodic tests. Key factors during outage are: Permanent control of the schedules with an updated 3-day program. Best and permanent information with this 3-day program of all people that are involved. Fast reaction on delays. Outage managers permanent on site. Gain in safety during shutdown states, with reduced outage duration: It has to be proven, that short outages don't lead to faster and less accurate work. It can be

  16. Evolution of an outage management organization in a small utility

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Oubre, R.P.; Shetler, J.

    1985-01-01

    Six refueling outages with a number of major equipment failure outages have taught Rancho Seco management three main items. One is that a dedicated management organization must be formed for the purpose of controlling work functions at Rancho Seco. This dedicated organization must have the experience of the plant and not have the responsibility for the actual maintenance. Second, upper management within a power plant must get directly involved in the outage. Upper management must show their presence, give input, and be available when needed. The third item learned is that the scheduling organization must be adequately staffed. Although Rancho Seco completed a refueling outage in 1978 within only 36 days, additional inspection requirements due to regulatory changes and/or previous equipment failures requiring follow-up actions would place the shortest possible outage today at approx.70 days. The only way an organization can keep this outage time down is with the proper scheduling of the resources and the timely coordination of activities to reduce conflicts

  17. Cell outage compensation in LTE networks: Algorithms and performance assessment

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Amirijoo, M.; Jorguseski, L.; Litjens, R.; Schmelz, L.C.

    2011-01-01

    Cell outage compensation is a self-healing function and as such part of the Self-Organising Networks concept for mobile wireless networks. It aims at mitigating the degradation of coverage, capacity and service quality caused by a cell or site level outage. Upon detection of such an outage, cell

  18. Analysis of scrams and forced outages at boiling water reactors

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Earle, R.T.; Sullivan, W.P.; Miller, K.R.; Schwegman, W.J.

    1980-07-01

    This report documents the results of a study of scrams and forced outages at General Electric Boiling Water Reactors (BWRs) operating in the United States. This study was conducted for Sandia Laboratories under a Light Water Reactor Safety Program which it manages for the United States Department of Energy. Operating plant data were used to identify the causes of scrams and forced outages. Causes of scrams and forced outages have been summarized as a function of operating plant and plant age and also ranked according to the number of events per year, outage time per year, and outage time per event. From this ranking, identified potential improvement opportunities were evaluated to determine the associated benefits and impact on plant availability

  19. Maintenance, outages and chemistry really can be compatible

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Roberts, J.G.; Deaconescu, R.

    2006-01-01

    'Full text:' In their address to the Canadian Nuclear Society, Bruce Power's Chemistry Design staff will describe how maintenance and outages can impact negatively on chemistry control and asset protection. Considerations of material impacts and material condition have significant influences on the approach to, and control of, chemistry. This applies equally to operation as it does during unit and/or system outages. Ideas will be presented as to how to facilitate making maintenance, outages and chemistry compatible. It will be shown how the lack of such an approach can lead to disastrous results. (author)

  20. Improving refueling outages through partnership

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Mercado, Angelo L.

    2004-01-01

    This paper describes an approach to reduce nuclear plant outage duration and cost through partnership. Partnership is defined as a long-term commitment between the utility and the vendor with the objective of achieving shared business goals by maximizing the effectiveness of each party's resources. The elements of an effective partnership are described. Specific examples are given as to how partnership has worked in the effective performance of refueling outages. To gain the full benefits of a partnership, both parties must agree to share information, define the scope early, communicate goals and expectations, and identify boundaries for technical ownership. (author)

  1. Steam generator replacement in Bruce A Unit 1 and Unit 2

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hart, R.S.

    2006-01-01

    The Bruce A Generating Station consists of four 900 MW class CANDU units. The reactor and Primary Heat Transport System for each Unit are housed within a reinforced concrete reactor vault. A large duct running below the reactor vaults accommodates the shared fuel handling system, and connects the four reactor vaults to the vacuum building. The reactor vaults, fuelling system duct and the vacuum building constitute the station vacuum containment system. Bruce A Unit 2 was shut down in 1995 and Bruce A Units 1, 3 and 4 were shutdown in 1997. Bruce A Units 3 and 4 were returned to service in late 2003 and are currently operating. Units 1 and 2 remain out of service. Bruce Power is currently undertaking a major rehabilitation of Bruce A Unit 1 and Units 2 that will extend the in-service life of these units by at least 25 years. Replacement of the Steam Generators (eight in each unit) is required; this work was awarded to SNC-Lavalin Nuclear (SLN). The existing steam drums (which house the steam separation and drying equipment) will be retained. Unit 2 is scheduled to be synchronized with the grid in 2009, followed by Unit 1 in 2009. Each Bruce A unit has two steam generating assemblies, one located above and to each end of the reactor. Each steam generating assembly consists of a horizontal cylindrical steam drum and four vertical Steam Generators. The vertical Steam Generators connect to individual nozzles that are located on the underside of the Steam Drum (SD). The steam drums are located in concrete shielding structures (steam drum enclosures). The lower sections of the Steam Generators penetrate the top of the reactor vaults: the containment pressure boundary is established by bellows assemblies that connect between the reactor vault roof slab and the Steam Generators. Each Steam Generators is supported from the bottom by a trapeze that is suspended from the reactor vault top structure. The Steam Generator Replacement (SGR) methodology developed by SLN for Unit 1

  2. Steam generator replacement at Doel 3 NPP (Belgium)

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Danhier, B.

    1993-01-01

    The reasons are presented that led to the conclusion that the most cost-effective strategy for the Doel 3 unit was the immediate replacement of the SG. Discussed are the advantages and drawbacks of the replacement techniques, the so-called 2, 3 and 4 cuts methods. The advantages are emphasized of intensive use of computer aided engineering in this kind of backfitting. The methodology applied to combine a power uprating of 10% over the nominal power with the steam generator replacement is presented. (author) 1 fig

  3. Maintenance, outages and chemistry really can be compatible

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Roberts, J.G.; Deaconescu, R. [Bruce Power, Tiverton, Ontario (Canada)

    2006-07-01

    'Full text:' In their address to the Canadian Nuclear Society, Bruce Power's Chemistry Design staff will describe how maintenance and outages can impact negatively on chemistry control and asset protection. Considerations of material impacts and material condition have significant influences on the approach to, and control of, chemistry. This applies equally to operation as it does during unit and/or system outages. Ideas will be presented as to how to facilitate making maintenance, outages and chemistry compatible. It will be shown how the lack of such an approach can lead to disastrous results. (author)

  4. Lightning-generated whistler waves observed by probes on the Communication/Navigation Outage Forecast System satellite at low latitudes

    Science.gov (United States)

    Holzworth, R. H.; McCarthy, M. P.; Pfaff, R. F.; Jacobson, A. R.; Willcockson, W. L.; Rowland, D. E.

    2011-06-01

    Direct evidence is presented for a causal relationship between lightning and strong electric field transients inside equatorial ionospheric density depletions. In fact, these whistler mode plasma waves may be the dominant electric field signal within such depletions. Optical lightning data from the Communication/Navigation Outage Forecast System (C/NOFS) satellite and global lightning location information from the World Wide Lightning Location Network are presented as independent verification that these electric field transients are caused by lightning. The electric field instrument on C/NOFS routinely measures lightning-related electric field wave packets or sferics, associated with simultaneous measurements of optical flashes at all altitudes encountered by the satellite (401-867 km). Lightning-generated whistler waves have abundant access to the topside ionosphere, even close to the magnetic equator.

  5. Modernization of the Nuclear Power Plant Krsko with new steam generators

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Holz, R.; Stach, U.; Gloaguen, C.

    2000-01-01

    The contract for the replacement of two steam generators at NPP Krsko was awarded in February 1998 to the Consortium SIEMENS AG FRAMATOME S.A.. The time frame for the replacement outage was scheduled from April to June 2000. The replacement itself started with the plant shut down on 15 th of April 2000 and the plant was back on line on 15 th of June, so that after an intensive engineering period of more than two years the plant was off line only 62 days, as scheduled. This document deals with the various aspects of the replacement phase itself and the techniques used. During the last years conference the engineering and licensing phase of the project have been presented. (author)

  6. Modernization of the Nuclear Power Plant Krsko with new steam generators

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Holz, R; Stach, U [Siemens AG, Erlangen, Offenbach (Germany); Gloaguen, C [Framatome, Paris (France)

    2000-07-01

    The contract for the replacement of two steam generators at NPP Krsko was awarded in February 1998 to the Consortium SIEMENS AG FRAMATOME S.A.. The time frame for the replacement outage was scheduled from April to June 2000. The replacement itself started with the plant shut down on 15{sup th} of April 2000 and the plant was back on line on 15{sup th} of June, so that after an intensive engineering period of more than two years the plant was off line only 62 days, as scheduled. This document deals with the various aspects of the replacement phase itself and the techniques used. During the last years conference the engineering and licensing phase of the project have been presented. (author)

  7. Approach to shortening duration of nuclear plant refueling outage

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Takahashi, Yoshiharu; Nakanishi, Tooru [Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd., Kobe (Japan). Kobe Shipyard and Machinery Works; Yoshihara, Seiichi; Kanbara, Masayuki; Yamanaka, Misao; Shimizu, Takeshi

    1998-07-01

    This paper summarizes the mission role of the MHI in-house project team for a shorter outage duration for PWR plants operating in Japan and its results. The major tasks of project team are benchmarking to develop outage performance goals, and develop recommendation packages for outage enhancement covering field procedures and tooling betterment. An optimization study for maintenance tasks was also carried out. This paper highlights the results of efforts the activities of the project team. (author)

  8. Elimination of maintenance outage and cost reduction by development of outage-free maintenance techniques

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Jakabe, Hideo; Maruyama, Yoshinaga

    1996-01-01

    The development program of KEPCO on outage-free maintenance techniques for distribution line work since 1984 is overviewed. It has succeeded in eliminating maintenance outages since 1989. The original aim was to improve customer satisfaction. However, in all, four benefits were realised through the development. These are cost reduction, securing of worker safety, improvement of customer service, and advancement of distribution techniques and morale in KEPCO. The introduction of robotic techniques for maintenance work and manipulator techniques for repair work is planned for further modernization. These new techniques are helping in both work safety and work efficiency improvement. Cost reduction and advancement of distribution line work techniques is also considered. (R.P.)

  9. On Outage Performance of Spectrum-Sharing Communication over M-Block Fading

    KAUST Repository

    Alabbasi, AbdulRahman

    2015-12-06

    In this paper, we consider a cognitive radio system in which a block-fading channel is assumed. Each transmission frame consists of M blocks and each block undergoes a different channel gain. Instantaneous channel state information about the interference links remains unknown to the primary and secondary users. We minimize the secondary user\\'s targeted outage probability over the block-fading channels. To protect the primary user, a statistical constraint on its targeted outage probability is enforced. The secondary user\\'s targeted outage region and the corresponding optimal power are derived. We also propose two sub-optimal power strategies and derive compact expressions for the corresponding outage probabilities. These probabilities are shown to be asymptotic lower and upper bounds on the outage probability. Utilizing these bounds, we derive the exact diversity order of the secondary user outage probability. Selected numerical results are presented to characterize the system\\'s behavior.

  10. Central alarm system replacement in NPP Krsko

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Cicvaric, D.; Susnic, M.; Djetelic, N.

    2004-01-01

    Current NPP Krsko central alarm system consists of three main segments. Main Control Board alarm system (BETA 1000), Ventilation Control Board alarm system (BETA 1000) and Electrical Control Board alarm system (BETA 1100). All sections are equipped with specific BetaTone audible alarms and silence, acknowledge as well as test push buttons. The main reason for central alarm system replacement is system obsolescence and problems with maintenance, due to lack of spare parts. Other issue is lack of system redundancy, which could lead to loss of several Alarm Light Boxes in the event of particular power supply failure. Current central alarm system does not provide means of alarm optimization, grouping or prioritization. There are three main options for central alarm system replacement: Conventional annunciator system, hybrid annunciator system and advanced alarm system. Advanced alarm system implementation requires Main Control Board upgrade, integration of process instrumentation and plant process computer as well as long time for replacement. NPP Krsko has decided to implement hybrid alarm system with patchwork approach. The new central alarm system will be stand alone, digital, with advanced filtering and alarm grouping options. Sequence of event recorder will be linked with plant process computer and time synchronized with redundant GPS signal. Advanced functions such as link to plant procedures will be implemented with plant process computer upgrade in outage 2006. Central alarm system replacement is due in outage 2004.(author)

  11. Methodology if inspections to carry out the nuclear outages model

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Aycart, J.; Mortenson, S.; Fourquet, J. M.

    2005-01-01

    Before the nuclear generation industry was deregulated in the United States, refueling and maintenance outages in nuclear power plants usually lasted orotund 100 days. After deregulation took effect, improved capability factors and performances became more important. As a result, it became essential to reduce the critical path time during the outage, which meant that activities that had typically been done in series had to be executed in parallel. The new outage model required the development of new tools and new processes, The 360-degree platform developed by GE Energy has made it possible to execute multiple activities in parallel. Various in-vessel visual inspection (IVVI) equipments can now simultaneously perform inspections on the pressurized reactor vessel (RPV) components. The larger number of inspection equipments in turn results in a larger volume of data, with the risk of increasing the time needed for examining them and postponing the end of the analysis phase, which is critical for the outage. To decrease data analysis times, the IVVI Digitalisation process has been development. With this process, the IVVI data are sent via a high-speed transmission line to a site outside the Plant called Center of Excellence (COE), where a team of Level III experts is in charge of analyzing them. The tools for the different product lines are being developed to interfere with each other as little as possible, thus minimizing the impact of the critical path on plant refueling activities. Methods are also being developed to increase the intervals between inspection. In accordance with the guidelines of the Boiling Water Reactor Vessel and Internals project (BWRVIP), the intervals between inspections are typically longer if ultrasound volumetric inspections are performed than if the scope is limited to IVVI. (Author)

  12. Reactor outage schedule (tentative)

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Walton, R.P.

    1969-11-01

    This single page document is the November 1, 1969 reactor refueling outage schedule for the Hanford Production Reactor. It also contains data on the amounts and types of fuels to be loaded and relocated in the production reactor.

  13. Reactor outage schedule (tentative)

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Walton, R.P.

    1969-10-01

    This single page document is the October 1, 1969 reactor refueling outage schedule for the Hanford Production Reactor. It also contains data on the amounts and types of fuels to be loaded and relocated in the Production Reactor.

  14. Reactor outage schedule (tentative)

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Walton, R.P.

    1969-10-15

    This single page document is the October 15, 1969 reactor refueling outage schedule for the Hanford Production Reactor. It also contains data on the amounts and types of fuels to be loaded and relocated in the Production Reactor.

  15. Reactor outage schedule (tentative)

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Walton, R.P.

    1969-09-15

    This single page document is the September 15, 1969 reactor refueling outage schedule for the Hanford Production Reactor. It also contains data on the amounts and types of fuels to be loaded and relocated in the Production Reactor.

  16. Reactor outage schedule (tentative)

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Walton, R.P.

    1969-12-15

    This single page document is the December 16, 1969 reactor refueling outage schedule for the Hanford Production Reactor. It also contains data on the amounts and types of fuels to be loaded and relocated in the Production reactor.

  17. Reactor outage schedule (tentative)

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Walton, R.P.

    1969-12-01

    This single page document is the December 1, 1969 reactor refueling outage schedule for the Hanford Production Reactor. It also contains data on the amounts and types of fuels to be loaded and relocated in the Production reactor.

  18. Failed fuel rod detection system and computerized manipulator during outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Boehm, H.H.; Foerch, H.

    1984-01-01

    During regular outages spent fuel assemblies need to be replaced and relocated within the core. Defective fuel rods in particular fuel assemblies have to be removed from further service and before delivery of such faulty fuel assemblies to a reprocessing plant. The system which Brown Boveri Reaktor GmbH and Krautkraemer have developed in the Federal Republic of Germany is capable of directly locating the defective rods in a proper fuel assembly. Inspection times are comparable to those of standard sipping methods, with the advantages of immediately available results and direct identification of the defective fuel rods. During the repair of fuel assemblies this system allows withdrawal of individual defective rods. With the sipping method all the fuel rods of a defective fuel assembly need to be removed and inspected by eddy current testing. During steam generator inspection and repair personnel are exposed to ample radiation. A remotely controlled, computerized manipulator was used to significantly reduce the radiation dose by automating steps in the procedures; at the same time inspection and repair times were reduced. The main features of the manipulator are a rigid component construction of the leg and two arms, and a resolver control for horizontal and vertical motion that enables rapid and accurate access to a desired tube (author)

  19. RECAP, Replacement Energy Cost for Short-Term Reactor Plant Shut-Down

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    VanKuiken, J.C.; Daun, C.J.; Jusko, M.J.

    1995-01-01

    1 - Description of program or function: RECAP (Replacement Energy Cost Analysis Package) determines the replacement energy costs associated with short-term shutdowns or de-ratings of one or more nuclear reactors. Replacement energy cost refers to the change in generating-system production cost that results from shutting down a reactor. The cost calculations are based on the seasonal, unit-specific cost estimates for 1988-1991 for all 117 nuclear electricity-generating units in the U.S. RECAP is menu-driven, allowing the user to define specific case studies in terms of parameters such as the units to be included, the length and timing of the shutdown or de-rating period, the unit capacity factors, and the reference year for reporting cost results. In addition to simultaneous shutdown cases, more complicated situations, such as overlapping shutdown periods or shutdowns that occur in different years, can be examined through use of a present-worth calculation option. 2 - Method of solution: The user selects a set of units for analysis, defines a shutdown (or de-rating) period, and specifies any planned maintenance outages, delays in unit start-ups, or changes in default capacity factors. The program then determines which seasonal cost numbers to apply, estimates total and daily costs, and makes the appropriate adjustments for multiple outages if they are encountered. The change in production cost is determined from the difference between the total variable costs (variable fuel cost, variable operation and maintenance cost, and purchased energy cost) when the reactor is available for generation and when it is not. Changes in reference-year dollars are based on gross national product (GNP) price deflators or on optional use inputs. Once RECAP has completed the initial cost estimates for a case study (or series of case studies), present-worth analysis can be conducted using different reference-year dollars and discount rates, as specified by the user. The program uses

  20. Integrated use of Primavera and ORAM codes in outage 1999 at NPP Krsko

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Krajnc, J.; Skaler, F.; Basic, I.; Kocnar, R.

    1999-01-01

    The paper deals with the following postulated main goals of outage scheduling with Primavera tool at Krsko NPP: planning and controlling of resources (people, equipment, locations, sources), controlling the safety aspects of an outage and assuring defense-in-depth philosophy (through integrated safety assessment by ORAM code), diversity use of the plan during preparations period and outage progress (MCB, work leaders, management, planning Dept., subcontractors, support, etc.), allowing for optimization of outage duration. A snapshot in Primavera of what actually happened in outage 1999, lessons learned and a new work template is the scope of the next year outage.(author)

  1. Design Concepts for an Outage Control Center Information Dashboard

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hugo, Jacques Victor; St Germain, Shawn Walter; Thompson, Cheradan Jo; Whitesides, McKenzie Jo; Farris, Ronald Keith

    2015-01-01

    The nuclear industry, and the business world in general, is facing a rapidly increasing amount of data to be dealt with on a daily basis. In the last two decades, the steady improvement of data storage devices and means to create and collect data along the way influenced the manner in which we deal with information. Most data is still stored without filtering and refinement for later use. Many functions at a nuclear power plant generate vast amounts of data, with scheduled and unscheduled outages being a prime example of a source of some of the most complex data sets at the plant. To make matters worse, modern information and communications technology is making it possible to collect and store data faster than our ability to use it for making decisions. However, in most applications, especially outages, raw data has no value in itself; instead, managers, engineers and other specialists want to extract the information contained in it. The complexity and sheer volume of data could lead to information overload, resulting in getting lost in data that may be irrelevant to the task at hand, processed in an inappropriate way, or presented in an ineffective way. To prevent information overload, many data sources are ignored so production opportunities are lost because utilities lack the ability to deal with the enormous data volumes properly. Decision-makers are often confronted with large amounts of disparate, conflicting and dynamic information, which are available from multiple heterogeneous sources. Information and communication technologies alone will not solve this problem. Utilities need effective methods to exploit and use the hidden opportunities and knowledge residing in unexplored data resources. Superior performance before, during and after outages depends upon the right information being available at the right time to the right people. Acquisition of raw data is the easy part; instead, it is the ability to use advanced analytical, data processing and data

  2. Design Concepts for an Outage Control Center Information Dashboard

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Hugo, Jacques Victor [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States); St Germain, Shawn Walter [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States); Thompson, Cheradan Jo [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States); Whitesides, McKenzie Jo [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States); Farris, Ronald Keith [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States)

    2015-12-01

    The nuclear industry, and the business world in general, is facing a rapidly increasing amount of data to be dealt with on a daily basis. In the last two decades, the steady improvement of data storage devices and means to create and collect data along the way influenced the manner in which we deal with information. Most data is still stored without filtering and refinement for later use. Many functions at a nuclear power plant generate vast amounts of data, with scheduled and unscheduled outages being a prime example of a source of some of the most complex data sets at the plant. To make matters worse, modern information and communications technology is making it possible to collect and store data faster than our ability to use it for making decisions. However, in most applications, especially outages, raw data has no value in itself; instead, managers, engineers and other specialists want to extract the information contained in it. The complexity and sheer volume of data could lead to information overload, resulting in getting lost in data that may be irrelevant to the task at hand, processed in an inappropriate way, or presented in an ineffective way. To prevent information overload, many data sources are ignored so production opportunities are lost because utilities lack the ability to deal with the enormous data volumes properly. Decision-makers are often confronted with large amounts of disparate, conflicting and dynamic information, which are available from multiple heterogeneous sources. Information and communication technologies alone will not solve this problem. Utilities need effective methods to exploit and use the hidden opportunities and knowledge residing in unexplored data resources. Superior performance before, during and after outages depends upon the right information being available at the right time to the right people. Acquisition of raw data is the easy part; instead, it is the ability to use advanced analytical, data processing and data

  3. Good practices for outage management in nuclear power plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1991-09-01

    As a follow-up to an earlier Technical Document on Good Practices for Improved Nuclear Power Plant Performance (IAEA-TECDOC-498), the Agency has produced a more focused technical report on good practices associated with nuclear power plant outage planning and execution. As with the earlier document, the overall aim is that by identifying good practices in the key aspects of outage management, overall world nuclear performance will improve and the gap between excellent performers and operators with developing programmes will be narrowed. This document has been produced through the contribution of numerous operators and government agencies. It aims at minimizing text and focusing on actual good practices in use which can be found in the annexes. While the specific methods used to achieve excellence in maintenance/refuelling outages may differ, the fundamental requirements of outage management are discussed

  4. Saving doses by outage planning strategy and architectural arrangements

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Wahlstroem, B.

    1993-01-01

    All radiation doses come out as a result of dose rate and exposure time, and the main part of the occupational exposure is caused during outages. While every reasonable attempt should be made to lower the dose rates, the other factor, the exposure time, may not be forgotten. The paper presents possible ways of saving man-hours in the controlled zone by outage planning strategy. And every saved man-hour means a saved radiation dose. At Loviisa NPS also some special architectural arrangements contribute to shortening the outage time, thus saving doses

  5. Gentilly 2 steam generators Spring 2000 outage: tubesheet waterlance cleaning and inspection; upper bundle inspection

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Akeroyd, J.K.; Plante, S.

    2000-01-01

    A review of the secondary side maintenance activities recently completed during the Gentilly 2 Annual Spring 2000 Maintenance Outage. Activities included: 1) Tubesheet intertube waterlance cleaning and visual inspection, 2) First tube support plate, in-bundle visual inspection of the hot leg, and 3) Upper bundle tube support plate visual inspection. A description of the waterlancing and inspection equipment and setup in the RB at Gentilly 2 is provided. Several innovative techniques were successfully employed and yielded savings in critical path duration, labour and personnel radiation dose. These included accessing the SG tubesheet region through one handhole only and sludge removal utilizing the SG blowdown system. Plant personnel judged tubesheet sludge removal successful. Before and after results of the cleaning process along with samples of the visual inspection results are provided. Inspection of the first support plate, which was a repeat of an inspection done in 1997, was conducted along with an in-bundle inspection of the upper tube supports. Results are presented along with a discussion of the implications for future steam generator maintenance. (author)

  6. Outage performance of cognitive radio systems with Improper Gaussian signaling

    KAUST Repository

    Amin, Osama

    2015-06-14

    Improper Gaussian signaling has proved its ability to improve the achievable rate of the systems that suffer from interference compared with proper Gaussian signaling. In this paper, we first study impact of improper Gaussian signaling on the performance of the cognitive radio system by analyzing the outage probability of both the primary user (PU) and the secondary user (SU). We derive exact expression of the SU outage probability and upper and lower bounds for the PU outage probability. Then, we design the SU signal by adjusting its transmitted power and the circularity coefficient to minimize the SU outage probability while maintaining a certain PU quality-of-service. Finally, we evaluate the proposed bounds and adaptive algorithms by numerical results.

  7. Line outage contingency analysis including the system islanding ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    The optimally ordered sparse [Bʹ], [Bʺ] matrices for the integrated system are used for load flow analysis to determine modified values of voltage phase angles [d] and bus voltages [V] to determine the over loading effect on the remaining lines due to outage of a selected line outage contingency. In case of over loading in ...

  8. Replacement of fine particle purification filter of the PHT purification system - 15083

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Lee, D.S.

    2015-01-01

    The increase of chalk river unidentified deposit (CRUD), a particulate corrosion product in PHT (primary heat transport) system with increased operating years of a nuclear power plant causes: -) the problems of increased heavy water decomposition and deuterium formation reaction due to catalytic reaction with CRUD, -) damage to PHT pump seal due to a corrosion product, -) damage to fuel channel closure seal, and increased radiation exposure of workers due to elevated dose rate in steam generator water chamber. Wolsung unit 3 and 4 have replaced fine filter media in PHT purification system in phases reducing the pore size of the filter media (5 μm → 2 μm → 1 μm → 0.45 μm) to solve this problem. The phased replacement of fine filter media by the one with a smaller pore size reduced CRUD in PHT system significantly and also radiation dose rate in steam generator water chamber. Accordingly, many problems related to the aging of a plant (including increased radiation exposure of workers during outage, damage to mechanical seal of PHT pump) have been solved. (author)

  9. Feed water distribution pipe replacement at Loviisa NPP

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Savolainen, S.; Elsing, B. [Imatran Voima Loviisa NPP (Finland)

    1995-12-31

    Imatran Voima Oy operates two WWER-440 reactors. Unit 1 has been operating since 1977 and unit 2 since 1981. First damages of feed water distribution (FWD) pipe were observed in 1989. The FWD-pipe T-connection had suffered from severe erosion corrosion damages. Similar damages have been been found also in other WWER-440 type NPPs. In 1989 the nozzles of the steam generator YB11 were inspected. No signs of the damages or signs of erosion were detected. The first damaged nozzles were found in 1992 in steam generators of both units. In 1992 it was started studying different possibilities to either repair or replace the damaged FWD-pipes. Due to the difficult conditions for repairing the damaged nozzles it was decided to study different FWD-pipe constructions. In 1991 two new feedwater distributors had been implemented at Dukovany NPP designed by Vitckovice company. Additionally OKB Gidropress had presented their design for new collector. In spring 1994 all the six steam generators of Rovno NPP unit 1 were replaced with FWD-pipes designed by OKB Gidropress. After the implementation an experimental program with the new systems was carried out. Due to the successful experiments at Rovno NPP Unit 1 it was decided to implement `Gidropress solution` during 1994 refueling outage into the steam generator YB52 at Loviisa 2. The object of this paper is to discuss the new FWD-pipe and its effects on the plant safety during normal and accident conditions. (orig.).

  10. Feed water distribution pipe replacement at Loviisa NPP

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Savolainen, S; Elsing, B [Imatran Voima Loviisa NPP (Finland)

    1996-12-31

    Imatran Voima Oy operates two WWER-440 reactors. Unit 1 has been operating since 1977 and unit 2 since 1981. First damages of feed water distribution (FWD) pipe were observed in 1989. The FWD-pipe T-connection had suffered from severe erosion corrosion damages. Similar damages have been been found also in other WWER-440 type NPPs. In 1989 the nozzles of the steam generator YB11 were inspected. No signs of the damages or signs of erosion were detected. The first damaged nozzles were found in 1992 in steam generators of both units. In 1992 it was started studying different possibilities to either repair or replace the damaged FWD-pipes. Due to the difficult conditions for repairing the damaged nozzles it was decided to study different FWD-pipe constructions. In 1991 two new feedwater distributors had been implemented at Dukovany NPP designed by Vitckovice company. Additionally OKB Gidropress had presented their design for new collector. In spring 1994 all the six steam generators of Rovno NPP unit 1 were replaced with FWD-pipes designed by OKB Gidropress. After the implementation an experimental program with the new systems was carried out. Due to the successful experiments at Rovno NPP Unit 1 it was decided to implement `Gidropress solution` during 1994 refueling outage into the steam generator YB52 at Loviisa 2. The object of this paper is to discuss the new FWD-pipe and its effects on the plant safety during normal and accident conditions. (orig.).

  11. Use of collaboration software to improve nuclear power plant outage management

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Germain, Shawn

    2015-02-01

    Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) refueling outages create some of the most challenging activities the utilities face in both tracking and coordinating thousands of activities in a short period of time. Other challenges, including nuclear safety concerns arising from atypical system configurations and resource allocation issues, can create delays and schedule overruns, driving up outage costs. Today the majority of the outage communication is done using processes that do not take advantage of advances in modern technologies that enable enhanced communication, collaboration and information sharing. Some of the common practices include: runners that deliver paper-based requests for approval, radios, telephones, desktop computers, daily schedule printouts, and static whiteboards that are used to display information. Many gains have been made to reduce the challenges facing outage coordinators; however; new opportunities can be realized by utilizing modern technological advancements in communication and information tools that can enhance the collective situational awareness of plant personnel leading to improved decision-making. Ongoing research as part of the Light Water Reactor Sustainability Program (LWRS) has been targeting NPP outage improvement. As part of this research, various applications of collaborative software have been demonstrated through pilot project utility partnerships. Collaboration software can be utilized as part of the larger concept of Computer-Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW). Collaborative software can be used for emergent issue resolution, Outage Control Center (OCC) displays, and schedule monitoring. Use of collaboration software enables outage staff and subject matter experts (SMEs) to view and update critical outage information from any location on site or off.

  12. Assessing energy supply security: Outage costs in private households

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Praktiknjo, Aaron J.; Hähnel, Alexander; Erdmann, Georg

    2011-01-01

    The objective of this paper is to contribute to the topic of energy supply security by proposing a Monte Carlo-based and a survey based model to analyze the costs of power interruptions. Outage cost estimations are particularly important when deciding on investments to improve supply security (e.g. additional transmission lines) in order to compare costs to benefits. But also other policy decisions on measures that have direct or indirect consequences for the supply security (e.g. a phasing out of nuclear energy) need to be based on results from outage cost estimations. The main focus of this paper lies with residential consumers, but the model is applied to commercial, industrial and governmental consumers as well. There are limited studies that have approached the problem of evaluating outage cost. When comparing the results of these studies, they often display a high degree of diversification. As consumers have different needs and dependencies towards the supply of electricity because of varying circumstances and preferences, a great diversity in outage cost is a logical consequence. To take the high degree of uncertainties into account, a Monte Carlo simulation was conducted in this study for the case of private households in Germany. - Highlights: ► A macroeconomic model to assess outage cost is proposed. ► Possibilities for substitution are considered by analyzing individual preferences for the time-use. ► Uncertainties are taken into account by using a Monte Carlo simulation. ► This study reveals the distribution of outage costs to different electricity consumers. ► Implications for energy policy decisions are discussed.

  13. Refurbishment of Point Lepreau Generating Station

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Thompson, P.D.; Jaitly, R.; Ichiyen, N.; Petrilli, M.A.

    2004-01-01

    NB Power is planning to conduct an 18-month maintenance outage of the Point Lepreau Generating Station (PLGS) beginning in April 2008. The major activity would be the replacement of all 380 Fuel Channel and Calandria Tube Assemblies and the connecting feeder pipes. This activity is referred to as Retube. NB Power would also take advantage of this outage to conduct a number of repairs, replacements, inspections and upgrades (such as rewinding or replacing the generator, replacement of shutdown system trip computers, replacement of certain valves and expansion joints, inspection of systems not normally accessible, etc). These collective activities are referred to as Refurbishment. This would allow the station to operate for an additional 25 to 30 years. The scope of the project was determined from the outcome of a two-year study involving a detailed condition assessment of the station that examined issues relating to ageing and obsolescence. The majority of the plant components were found to be capable of supporting extended operation without needing replacement or changes. In addition to the condition assessment, a detailed review of Safety and Licensing issues associated with extended operation was performed. This included a review of known regulatory and safety issues, comparison of the station against current codes and standards, and comparison of the station against safety related modifications made to more recent CANDU 6 units. Benefit cost analyses (BCA) were performed to assist the utility in determining which changes were appropriate to include in the project scope. As a Probabilistic Safety Assessment (PSA) for PLGS did not exist at the time, a risk baseline for the station had to be determined for use in the BCA. Extensive dialogue with the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission staff was also undertaken during this phase. A comprehensive Licensing Framework was produced upon which the CNSC provided feedback to NB Power. This feedback was important in terms of

  14. Balance-of-plant outage availability study. Phase I. Extension report

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Thomasson, F.R.

    1978-09-01

    After completion of the Phase 1 Refueling Outage Availability Study, Babcock and Wilcox and the U.S. Department of Energy entered into a supplemental agreement to perform a balance-of-plant maintenance, inspection, and test study with the cooperation of Duke Power Company and Arkansas Power and Light Company. The objectives were (1) to expand the Phase 1 data base, including balance-of-plant activities, to reduce outage time and increase plant availability and (2) to conduct an onsite review of plant maintenance, practices to complement the utility efforts in reducing outage time and increasing on-line operational time. Data were obtained from (1) observations during the 1977 refueling outage at Oconee 3, (2) review of maintenance practices during the Arkansas Nuclear One, Unit 1, operational cycle in 1977, and (3) selected observations of the 1978 refueling outage at ANO-1. Accumulated data were then reviewed and analyzed to produce a list of improvement recommendations for Oconee 3 and ANO-1 that can be generically applied to plants of similar design and construction

  15. Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station, Units 2 and 3. Annual operating report: January--December 1976

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1977-01-01

    Unit 2 experienced 11 forced outages, 5 power reductions, and one major refueling outage which lasted about 3 months during which time the feedwater spargers were replaced. Net electrical power generated was 5,569,633 MWH with the generator on line 5,998 hrs. Unit 3 experienced 17 forced outages, 11 power reductions and 2 major outages. The first refueling outage began 12/24/77. Net electrical power generated was 6,049,644 MWH with the unit on line 6,829 hrs. Information is presented concerning operations, personnel exposures, radioactive releases, maintenance, and irradiated fuel examination

  16. Underlay Cognitive Radio Systems with Improper Gaussian Signaling: Outage Performance Analysis

    KAUST Repository

    Amin, Osama

    2016-03-29

    Improper Gaussian signaling has the ability over proper (conventional) Gaussian signaling to improve the achievable rate of systems that suffer from interference. In this paper, we study the impact of using improper Gaussian signaling on the performance limits of the underlay cognitive radio system by analyzing the achievable outage probability of both the primary user (PU) and secondary user (SU). We derive the exact outage probability expression of the SU and construct upper and lower bounds of the PU outage probability which results in formulating an approximate expression of the PU outage probability. This allows us to design the SU signal by adjusting its transmitted power and the circularity coefficient to minimize the SU outage probability while maintaining a certain PU quality-of-service. Finally, we evaluate the derived expressions for both the SU and the PU and the corresponding adaptive algorithms by numerical results.

  17. Underlay Cognitive Radio Systems with Improper Gaussian Signaling: Outage Performance Analysis

    KAUST Repository

    Amin, Osama; Abediseid, Walid; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

    2016-01-01

    Improper Gaussian signaling has the ability over proper (conventional) Gaussian signaling to improve the achievable rate of systems that suffer from interference. In this paper, we study the impact of using improper Gaussian signaling on the performance limits of the underlay cognitive radio system by analyzing the achievable outage probability of both the primary user (PU) and secondary user (SU). We derive the exact outage probability expression of the SU and construct upper and lower bounds of the PU outage probability which results in formulating an approximate expression of the PU outage probability. This allows us to design the SU signal by adjusting its transmitted power and the circularity coefficient to minimize the SU outage probability while maintaining a certain PU quality-of-service. Finally, we evaluate the derived expressions for both the SU and the PU and the corresponding adaptive algorithms by numerical results.

  18. Steam generator replacement at Surry Power Station

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    McKay, H.S.

    1982-01-01

    The purposes of the steam generator repair program at Surry Power Station were to repair the tube degradation caused by corrosion-related phenomena and to restore the integrity of the steam generators to a level equivalent to new equipment. The repair program consisted of (1) replacing the existing lower-shell assemblies with new ones and (2) adding new moisture separation equipment to the upper-shell assemblies. These tasks required that several pieces of reactor coolant piping, feedwater piping, main steam piping, and the steam generator be cut and refurbished for reinstallation after the new lower shell was in place. The safety implications and other potential effects of the repair program both during the repair work and after the unit was returned to power were part of the design basis of the repair program. The repair program has been completed on Unit 2 without any adverse effects on the health and safety of the general public or to the personnel engaged in the repair work. Before the Unit 1 repair program began, a review of work procedures and field changes for the Unit 2 repair was conducted. Several major changes were made to avoid recurrence of problems and to streamline procedures. Steam generator replacements was completed on June 1, 1981, and the unit is presently in the startup phase of the outrage

  19. Estimating Power Outage Cost based on a Survey for Industrial Customers

    Science.gov (United States)

    Yoshida, Yoshikuni; Matsuhashi, Ryuji

    A survey was conducted on power outage cost for industrial customers. 5139 factories, which are designated energy management factories in Japan, answered their power consumption and the loss of production value due to the power outage in an hour in summer weekday. The median of unit cost of power outage of whole sectors is estimated as 672 yen/kWh. The sector of services for amusement and hobbies and the sector of manufacture of information and communication electronics equipment relatively have higher unit cost of power outage. Direct damage cost from power outage in whole sectors reaches 77 billion yen. Then utilizing input-output analysis, we estimated indirect damage cost that is caused by the repercussion of production halt. Indirect damage cost in whole sectors reaches 91 billion yen. The sector of wholesale and retail trade has the largest direct damage cost. The sector of manufacture of transportation equipment has the largest indirect damage cost.

  20. Reliabilty worth: Development of a relationship with outage magnitude, duration and frequency

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Turner, F.P.P.; Katrichak, A.M.; Dwyer, A.; Edwards, D.; Ibrahim, A.

    1994-01-01

    British Columbia Hydro's Worth Project Team was founded to determine values for reliability for reference in evaluation of investment and operating decisions. Work to date has produced key preliminary values for specific outages and concepts for the shape of the relationship between value and these determinates of reliability worth, frequency, magnitude and duration. These values and concepts are described. The values are developed through an iterative, trial and refinement approach. The approach incorporates direct input from customers, common sense and judgement, and micro- and macro-economic concepts. Reliability worth values for reduced or prevented outages are presented for residential, commercial, small industrial and mixed sectors and various outage durations. Reliability worth values were obtained through customer surveys. Limitations of the reliability worth value are numerous and are listed. Study of cost vs magnitude of interruption using microeconomic models has shown that costly system improvements to reduce the possibility of widespread outages may not be justified. The case of exceptionally large area outages (blackouts) is examined. The cost vs frequency relationship was examined in terms of the economic concept of utility or satisfaction. Different loss/frequency characteristics are demonstrated for different customer classes. Customer value for reduced outage duration is expressed in a curve with flatter slope than that for eliminated outages. 2 refs., 6 figs

  1. The Role of Occupational Health and Safety in Complex Outage Services to NPPs

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Rozman, A.; Androjna, A.

    2010-01-01

    Meeting outage schedules in NPPs which are increasingly demanding, apart from all other aspects, introduces a new perspective on occupational health and safety (OHS). Not only is the OHS a constituent part of a plant's overall outage management, it above all dictates paramount objectives to outage service providers. The paper reviews the impacts of reductions of outage durations on OHS and presents related experience of the leading Slovenian outage services provider, NUMIP d.o.o. over the last ten years. The company is now getting prepared for its 12th outage at Krsko NPP in 2010, and has not have recorded a major injury so far, even though these projects engaged over 450 people at a time on-site. To achieve such results, a lot of emphasis is being put onto OHS management prior to and during outages. A certified OHSAS 18001 system has been established and implemented to further support preparation and execution of NUMIP's outage activities at Krsko NPP, and also for other projects. An effective continuous improvement system is built into the project, providing for implementation of lessons learned from domestic and foreign plants. To illustrate the topic in more detail, a case on a Seismic protection of polar crane project is presented. It took place in the 2009 Outage and has certainly been one of the most demanding projects from the OHS point of view for NUMIP so far. The paper aims at contributing to a better understanding of the role of effective management of OHS on the side of a service provider, and, consequently, in the overall outage success of a plant.(author).

  2. Outage Risk Assessment and Management (ORAM) thermal-hydraulics toolkit

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Denny, V.E.; Wassel, A.T.; Issacci, F.; Pal Kalra, S.

    2004-01-01

    A PC-based thermal-hydraulic toolkit for use in support of outage optimization, management and risk assessment has been developed. This mechanistic toolkit incorporates simple models of key thermal-hydraulic processes which occur during an outage, such as recovery from or mitigation of outage upsets; this includes heat-up of water pools following loss of shutdown cooling, inadvertent drain down of the RCS, boiloff of coolant inventory, heatup of the uncovered core, and reflux cooling. This paper provides a list of key toolkit elements, briefly describes the technical basis and presents illustrative results for RCS transient behavior during reflux cooling, peak clad temperatures for an uncovered core and RCS response to loss of shutdown cooling. (author)

  3. Monitoring Disaster-Related Power Outages Using NASA Black Marble Nighttime Light Product

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wang, Z.; Román, M. O.; Sun, Q.; Molthan, A. L.; Schultz, L. A.; Kalb, V. L.

    2018-04-01

    Timely and accurate monitoring of disruptions to the electricity grid, including the magnitude, spatial extent, timing, and duration of net power losses, is needed to improve situational awareness of disaster response and long-term recovery efforts. Satellite-derived Nighttime Lights (NTL) provide an indication of human activity patterns and have been successfully used to monitor disaster-related power outages. The global 500 m spatial resolution National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Black Marble NTL daily standard product suite (VNP46) is generated from Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) Day/Night Band (DNB) onboard the NASA/National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (Suomi- NPP) satellite, which began operations on 19 January 2012. With its improvements in product accuracy (including critical atmospheric and BRDF correction routines), the VIIRS daily Black Mable product enables systematic monitoring of outage conditions across all stages of the disaster management cycle.

  4. Balance-of-plant outage availability study. Phase I. Extension report. [PWR

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Thomasson, F.R.

    1978-09-01

    After completion of the Phase 1 Refueling Outage Availability Study, Babcock and Wilcox and the U.S. Department of Energy entered into a supplemental agreement to perform a balance-of-plant maintenance, inspection, and test study with the cooperation of Duke Power Company and Arkansas Power and Light Company. The objectives were (1) to expand the Phase 1 data base, including balance-of-plant activities, to reduce outage time and increase plant availability and (2) to conduct an onsite review of plant maintenance, practices to complement the utility efforts in reducing outage time and increasing on-line operational time. Data were obtained from (1) observations during the 1977 refueling outage at Oconee 3, (2) review of maintenance practices during the Arkansas Nuclear One, Unit 1, operational cycle in 1977, and (3) selected observations of the 1978 refueling outage at ANO-1. Accumulated data were then reviewed and analyzed to produce a list of improvement recommendations for Oconee 3 and ANO-1 that can be generically applied to plants of similar design and construction.

  5. Steam generator replacement in Bruce A Unit 1 and Unit 2

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hart, R.S.

    2007-01-01

    The Bruce A Generating Station consists of four 900 MW class CANDU units. The reactor and Primary Heat Transport System for each Unit are housed within a reinforced concrete reactor vault. A large duct running below the reactor vaults accommodates the shared fuel handling system, and connects the four reactor vaults to the vacuum building. The reactor vaults, fuelling system duct and the vacuum building constitute the station vacuum containment system. Bruce A Unit 2 was shut down in 1995 and Bruce A Units 1, 3 and 4 were shutdown in 1997. Bruce A Units 3 and 4 were returned to service in late 2003 and are currently operating. Units 1 and 2 remain out of service. Bruce Power is currently undertaking a major rehabilitation of Bruce A Unit 1 and Unit 2 that will extend the in-service tile of these units by at least 25 years. Replacement of the Steam Generators (eight in each unit) is required; this work was awarded to SNC-Lavalin Nuclear (SLN). The existing steam drums (which house the steam separation and drying equipment) will be retained. Unit 2 is scheduled to be synchronized with the grid in 2009, followed by Unit 1 in 2009. Each Bruce A unit has two steam generating assemblies, one located above and to each end of the reactor. Each steam generating assembly consists of a horizontal cylindrical steam drum and four vertical Steam Generators. The vertical Steam Generators connect to individual nozzles that are located on the underside of the Steam Drum (SD). The steam drums are located in concrete shielding structures (steam drum enclosures). The lower sections of the Steam Generators penetrate the top of the reactor vaults: the containment pressure boundary is established by bellows assemblies that connect between the reactor vault roof slab and the Steam Generators. Each Steam Generators is supported from he bottom by a trapeze that is suspended from the reactor vault top structure. The Steam Generator Replacement (SGR) methodology developed by SLN for Unit 1

  6. Seasonal and Local Characteristics of Lightning Outages of Power Distribution Lines in Hokuriku Area

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sugimoto, Hitoshi; Shimasaki, Katsuhiko

    The proportion of the lightning outages in all outages on Japanese 6.6kV distribution lines is high with approximately 20 percent, and then lightning protections are very important for supply reliability of 6.6kV lines. It is effective for the lightning performance to apply countermeasures in order of the area where a large number of the lightning outages occur. Winter lightning occurs in Hokuriku area, therefore it is also important to understand the seasonal characteristics of the lightning outages. In summer 70 percent of the lightning outages on distribution lines in Hokuriku area were due to sparkover, such as power wire breakings and failures of pole-mounted transformers. However, in winter almost half of lightning-damaged equipments were surge arrester failures. The number of the lightning outages per lightning strokes detected by the lightning location system (LLS) in winter was 4.4 times larger than that in summer. The authors have presumed the occurrence of lightning outages from lightning stroke density, 50% value of lightning current and installation rate of lightning protection equipments and overhead ground wire by multiple regression analysis. The presumed results suggest the local difference in the lightning outages.

  7. Questions and perceptions about nuclear power plant outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Mc Donald, R.P.

    1985-01-01

    The most commonly used measure of nuclear power plant productivity is ''availability'' which is usually construed to be the percentage of time in a given period that a nuclear unit is actually tied to a grid supplying electrical power. When a unit is not tied to a grid, it is in an ''outage'' condition, possibly being shutdown, refueled, repaired, or in some stage of startup. There are some very positive by-products of well performed outages in addition to cost and availability enhancements: almost all supervisory and engineering personnel participate in planning and preparations. This approach promotes the professional and leadership development of each person, the supervisors and engineers participate in a competitive venture as a team and enjoy and benefit from comparative interactions with other utilities, perhaps the greatest benefit reaped from the development of outage management expertise is the improved ability to handle unexpected plant problems

  8. World class performance: the outage/operating cycle continuum

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Remphal, M. [Ontario Power Generation, Darlington, Ontario (Canada)

    2011-07-01

    It's all about Performance! Predictable and sustainable high performance is the key to public and stakeholder confidence in the nuclear industry. Why? Because nuclear is unique and safe, reliable operation each and every day is required to keep public trust. What better way to demonstrate this predictability than in breaker to breaker operating runs? Delivering on what was promised is the essence of our OPG accountability model: 'Say it, Do it'. This presentation is drawn from practical experience gained during the most recent planned maintenance outages at Darlington Nuclear. Key elements for outage success that will be discussed include; Human Performance: Ensuring each action is deliberate and executed right the first time; Continuous Learning: Recent examples demonstrating how drawing from lessons learned and operating experience worldwide can dramatically improve outage performance; Teamwork and Partnership: Recognizing our industry is too complex for a single; individual or organization to run on its own; Scope Selection: Darlington currently has an industry leading 0.5% Forced Loss Rate (FLR). If right work is selected and executed at the right time then ultimately the plant speaks and it shows up in low FLR and high Nuclear Performance Index; Planning: Ask and anticipate what can go wrong, what options exist and then pre-decide what path you would take. Some practical tools will be provided which have been recently used to plan out surprises; Oversight: An outage left to run its own course will have a surprise outcome. Strong management oversight is required to meet the goals of outage execution. Tips on how to improve communication and accountability will be discussed. Trust is built on confidence and confidence is built on sustainable performance. World class sustainable performance requires using all the tools available. This discussion will provide insight on these very tools. (author)

  9. World class performance: the outage/operating cycle continuum

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Remphal, M.

    2011-01-01

    It's all about Performance! Predictable and sustainable high performance is the key to public and stakeholder confidence in the nuclear industry. Why? Because nuclear is unique and safe, reliable operation each and every day is required to keep public trust. What better way to demonstrate this predictability than in breaker to breaker operating runs? Delivering on what was promised is the essence of our OPG accountability model: 'Say it, Do it'. This presentation is drawn from practical experience gained during the most recent planned maintenance outages at Darlington Nuclear. Key elements for outage success that will be discussed include; Human Performance: Ensuring each action is deliberate and executed right the first time; Continuous Learning: Recent examples demonstrating how drawing from lessons learned and operating experience worldwide can dramatically improve outage performance; Teamwork and Partnership: Recognizing our industry is too complex for a single; individual or organization to run on its own; Scope Selection: Darlington currently has an industry leading 0.5% Forced Loss Rate (FLR). If right work is selected and executed at the right time then ultimately the plant speaks and it shows up in low FLR and high Nuclear Performance Index; Planning: Ask and anticipate what can go wrong, what options exist and then pre-decide what path you would take. Some practical tools will be provided which have been recently used to plan out surprises; Oversight: An outage left to run its own course will have a surprise outcome. Strong management oversight is required to meet the goals of outage execution. Tips on how to improve communication and accountability will be discussed. Trust is built on confidence and confidence is built on sustainable performance. World class sustainable performance requires using all the tools available. This discussion will provide insight on these very tools. (author)

  10. Design and manufacture of steam generators for replacement

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hirano, Hiroshi; Kuri, Syuhei

    1995-01-01

    The basic specification of the steam generators for replacement as heat exchangers (the pressure, temperature, flow rate and thermal output on primary and secondary sides) is set same as that of steam generators before replacement, but the latest design reflecting the operation experience obtained so far and taking the countermeasures for preventing heating tube damage in it is adopted, such as the heating tubes made of TT 690 alloy, the tube support plates with four-lobe shape tube holes made of stainless steel, the stainless steel rest fittings of three in one set and so on. After the heating tube break accident in Mihama No. 2 plant, the quality control was further strengthened. The comparison of the specifications of the steam generators of respective plants before and after the replacement is shown. The main objective of improving steam generators is the heightening of the reliability of heating tubes against intergranular attack and primary water stress corrosion cracking. The improvements of heating tube material, tube support plate material, secondary side heat flow, the shape of tube holes of tube support plates, the method of expanding heating tubes, and vibration-controlling fittings are explained. As to the manufacturing procedure and quality control, the manufacture of raw materials, the build-up welding of tube plates, the manufacture of lower half shell plates, the tube hole making of support plates, the insection of outer cylinder, flow rate distribution plate. Support plates and heating tubes, the sealing welding and expanding of heating tubes, the fixing of rest fittings, the manufacture and fixing of water chamber cover, the manufacture of upper half shell, the fixing of parts inside it, the final joint and inspection are described. (K.I.)

  11. MONITORING DISASTER-RELATED POWER OUTAGES USING NASA BLACK MARBLE NIGHTTIME LIGHT PRODUCT

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Z. Wang

    2018-04-01

    Full Text Available Timely and accurate monitoring of disruptions to the electricity grid, including the magnitude, spatial extent, timing, and duration of net power losses, is needed to improve situational awareness of disaster response and long-term recovery efforts. Satellite-derived Nighttime Lights (NTL provide an indication of human activity patterns and have been successfully used to monitor disaster-related power outages. The global 500 m spatial resolution National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA Black Marble NTL daily standard product suite (VNP46 is generated from Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS Day/Night Band (DNB onboard the NASA/National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (Suomi- NPP satellite, which began operations on 19 January 2012. With its improvements in product accuracy (including critical atmospheric and BRDF correction routines, the VIIRS daily Black Mable product enables systematic monitoring of outage conditions across all stages of the disaster management cycle.

  12. Impacts of organization and management on outage performance

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Huang Yuhao; Cheng, S.-K.

    2004-01-01

    From probabilistic safety assessments and root cause analyses for incidents/accidents, the risk at refueling outage has recently been recognized to be comparable to (or even more significant than) the commonly evaluated risk at power in a Nuclear Power Plant (NPP). This paper summarizes the major findings in the aspect of 'organization and management', which is identified to have significant impacts on outage performance in the qualitative assessment of a PWR plant. In order to reduce the potential risk arisen from those identified imperfections, the corresponding suggestions are also proposed. (author)

  13. Development of an Overview Display to Allow Advanced Outage Control Center Management to Quickly Evaluate Outage Status

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    St Germain, Shawn Walter [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States); Hugo, Jacques Victor [Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States)

    2016-09-01

    This report describes recent advances made in developing a framework for the design of visual outage information presentation, as well as an overview of the scientific principles that informed the development of the visualizations.

  14. Commercial operation and outage experience of ABWR at Kashiwazaki-Kariwa units Nos. 6 and 7

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Anahara, N.; Yamada, M.; Kataoka, H.

    2000-01-01

    Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Nuclear Power Station Units Nos. 6 and 7, the world's first ABWRs (Advanced Boiling Water Reactor), started commercial operation on November 7, 1996 and July 2, 1997, respectively, and continued their commercial operation with a high capacity factor, low occupational radiation exposure and radioactive waste. Units 6 and 7 were in their 3rd cycle operation until 25th April 1999 and 1st November 1999, respectively. Thermal efficiency was 35.4-35.8% (design thermal efficiency: 34.5%) during these period, demonstrating better performance than that of BWR-5 (design thermal efficiency: 33.4%). Nos. 6 and 7 have experienced 2 annual outages. The first outage of unit No. 6 started on November 20, 1997 and was completed within 61 days (including 6 New Year holidays), and the second outage started on March 13, 1999 and was completed within 44 days. The first annual outage of unit No. 7 started on May 27, 1998, earlier than it would normally have been, to avoid an annual outage during the summer, and was completed within 55 days, and the second outage started on September 18th, 1999 and was completed within 45 days, All annual outages were carried out within a very short time period without any severe malfunctions, including newly designed ABWR systems and equipment. As the first outage in Japan, 55 days is a very short period, despite the fact that the Nos. 6 and 7 are the first ABWRs in the world and the largest capacity units in Japan. The total occupational radiation exposure of No. 6 was 300 man-mSv (1st outage) and 331 man-mSv (2nd outage). That of Unit 7 was 153 man-mSv (1st outage) Those of unit No. 6 were at the same level as those of unit No. 3, which is the latest design 1100MW(e) BWR-5. That of unit No. 7 was the lowest ever at Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power station. The drums of radioactive waste discharged during the annual outage numbered 54 (1st outage) for No. 6 and 62 (1st outage) for No. 7, which was less than the design target of 100

  15. Distributed power-line outage detection based on wide area measurement system.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zhao, Liang; Song, Wen-Zhan

    2014-07-21

    In modern power grids, the fast and reliable detection of power-line outages is an important functionality, which prevents cascading failures and facilitates an accurate state estimation to monitor the real-time conditions of the grids. However, most of the existing approaches for outage detection suffer from two drawbacks, namely: (i) high computational complexity; and (ii) relying on a centralized means of implementation. The high computational complexity limits the practical usage of outage detection only for the case of single-line or double-line outages. Meanwhile, the centralized means of implementation raises security and privacy issues. Considering these drawbacks, the present paper proposes a distributed framework, which carries out in-network information processing and only shares estimates on boundaries with the neighboring control areas. This novel framework relies on a convex-relaxed formulation of the line outage detection problem and leverages the alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM) for its distributed solution. The proposed framework invokes a low computational complexity, requiring only linear and simple matrix-vector operations. We also extend this framework to incorporate the sparse property of the measurement matrix and employ the LSQRalgorithm to enable a warm start, which further accelerates the algorithm. Analysis and simulation tests validate the correctness and effectiveness of the proposed approaches.

  16. The role of the safety analysis organization in steam generators replacement and reactor vessel head replacement evaluations

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Choe, Whee G.; Boatwright, W.J.

    2004-01-01

    When a major component in a nuclear power plant is replaced, especially the steam generators, the plant operator is presented a rare opportunity to learn from operating experience and significantly improve the performance, reliability and robustness of the plant. In addition to the use of improved materials, improved design margins can be built into the component specification that can later be used to provide meaningful operating margins. A Safety Analysis organization that is well-integrated with other plant organizations and possesses a detailed knowledge of the plant design and licensing bases can effectively balance the wants and needs of each organization to optimize the benefits realized by the plant as a whole. Knowledge of the assumptions, limitations, and available margins, both analytical and operating, can be used to specify a replacement steam generator design that optimizes costs and operating improvements. The work scope required to support the new design can be controlled through carefully selected and evaluated restrictions in operations, development of alternate operating strategies, and imposition of appropriate limitations. The important point is that the effective Safety Analysis organization must possess both the breadth and depth of knowledge of the plant design and operations and proactively use this information to support the replacement steam generator project. (author)

  17. Latest-Generation Transcatheter Aortic Valve Replacement Devices and Procedures.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chamandi, Chekrallah; Puri, Rishi; Rodriguez-Gabella, Tania; Rodés-Cabau, Josep

    2017-09-01

    Transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) is a well-established treatment for patients with severe symptomatic aortic stenosis who are at high or prohibitive surgical risk. More recently, TAVR has emerged as a valid alternative to surgical aortic valve replacement for treating intermediate-risk patients, and several studies are currently evaluating the role of TAVR in low-risk patients. Transcatheter heart valve (THV) technologies have evolved considerably over time, and important iterations have been implemented in many of the latest-generation devices to (1) reduce the size and improve delivery system properties; (2) improve valve deployment, repositioning, and retrievability; and (3) reduce paravalvular leaks. This article reviews the main characteristics of, and clinical results associated with, the newer-generation THVs while providing an overview of novel TAVR indications. Copyright © 2017 Canadian Cardiovascular Society. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  18. Outage performance of reactive cooperation in Nakagami-m fading channels

    KAUST Repository

    Benjillali, Mustapha

    2010-06-01

    In this paper, we investigate the outage performance of Decode-and-Forward with reactive relaying in dual-hop cooperetive Nakagaml-m fading links. The destination, based on the umque knowledge of local second hop channel state information, selects the best relay to increase the chances of cooperation when the direct link is also available. After deriving the exact distribution of the variables of interest, the outage probability of the system - with and without the direct link - is obtained in closed-form, and the ε-outage capacity is derived in the particular c.se wh.ere the channel model is reduced to a Rayleigh fading. Simulation results confirm the accuracy of our analysis for a large selection of system and fading parameters.

  19. Replacement of steam generators at arkansas nuclear one, unit-2 (ano-2)

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Wilson, R.M.; Buford, A.

    2001-01-01

    The Arkansas Nuclear One, Unit-2 steam generators, originally supplied by Combustion Engineering, began commercial operation in 1980 producing a gross electrical output of 958 MW. After several years of successful operation, the owner decided that the tube degradation rates of the original steam generators were too high for the plant to meet the performance requirements for the full 40-year license period. The contract to supply replacement steam generators (RSGs) was awarded to Westinghouse Electric Company in 1996. Installation of these RSGs took place in the last months of 2000. This paper compares the design features of the original and re-placement steam generators with emphasis on design and reliability enhancements achieved. (author)

  20. Gentilly 2 divider plate replacement

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Forest, J.; Klisel, E.; McClellan, G.; Schnelder, W.

    1995-01-01

    The steam generators at the Gentilly 2 Nuclear Plant in operation since 1983 were built with primary divider plates of a bolted panel configuration. During a routine outage inspection, it was noted that two bolts had dislodged from the divider and were located lying in the primary head. Subsequent inspections revealed erosion damage to a substantial number of divider plate bolts and to a lesser extent, to the divider plate itself. After further inspection and repair the units were returned to operation, however, it was determined that a permanent replacement of the primary divider plates was going to be necessary. After evaluation of various options, it was decided that the panel type dividers would be replaced with a single piece floating design. The divider itself was to be of a one piece all-welded arrangement to be constructed from individual panels to be brought in through the manways. In view of the strength limitations of the bolted attachment of the upper seat bar to the tubesheet, a new welded seat bar was provided. To counteract erosion concerns, the new divider is fitted with erosion resistant inserts or weld buildup and with improved sealing features in order to minimize leakage and erosion. At an advanced stage in the design and manufacture of the components, the issue of divider strength during LOCA conditions came into focus. Analysis was performed to determine the strength and/or failure characteristics of the divider to a variety of small and large LOCA conditions. The paper describes the diagnosis of the original divider plates and the design, manufacture, field mobilization, installation and subsequent operation of the replacement divider plates. (author)

  1. Outage Analysis of Spectrum-Sharing over M-Block Fading with Sensing Information

    KAUST Repository

    Alabbasi, Abdulrahman

    2016-07-13

    Future wireless technologies, such as, 5G, are expected to support real-time applications with high data throughput, e.g., holographic meetings. From a bandwidth perspective, cognitive radio is a promising technology to enhance the system’s throughput via sharing the licensed spectrum. From a delay perspective, it is well known that increasing the number of decoding blocks will improve the system robustness against errors, while increasing the delay. Therefore, optimally allocating the resources to determine the tradeoff of tuning the length of decoding blocks while sharing the spectrum is a critical challenge for future wireless systems. In this work, we minimize the targeted outage probability over the block-fading channels while utilizing the spectrum-sharing concept. The secondary user’s outage region and the corresponding optimal power are derived, over twoblocks and M-blocks fading channels. We propose two suboptimal power strategies and derive the associated asymptotic lower and upper bounds on the outage probability with tractable expressions. These bounds allow us to derive the exact diversity order of the secondary user’s outage probability. To further enhance the system’s performance, we also investigate the impact of including the sensing information on the outage problem. The outage problem is then solved via proposing an alternating optimization algorithm, which utilizes the verified strict quasiconvex structure of the problem. Selected numerical results are presented to characterize the system’s behavior and show the improvements of several sharing concepts.

  2. Outage Analysis of Spectrum-Sharing over M-Block Fading with Sensing Information

    KAUST Repository

    Alabbasi, Abdulrahman; Rezki, Zouheir; Shihada, Basem

    2016-01-01

    on the outage probability with tractable expressions. These bounds allow us to derive the exact diversity order of the secondary user’s outage probability. To further enhance the system’s performance, we also investigate the impact of including the sensing

  3. Failure analysis of retired steam generator tubings

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Kim, Hong Pyo; Kim, J. S.; Hwang, S. S. and others

    2005-04-15

    Degradation of steam generator leads to forced outage and extension of outage, which causes increase in repair cost, cost of purchasing replacement power and radiation exposure of workers. Steam generator tube rupture incident occurred in Uljin 4 in 2002, which made public sensitive to nuclear power plant. To keep nuclear energy as a main energy source, integrity of steam generator should be demonstrated. Quantitative relationship between ECT(eddy current test) signal and crack size is needed in assesment of integrity of steam generator in pressurized water reactor. However, it is not fully established for application in industry. Retired steam generator of Kori 1 has many kinds of crack such as circumferential and axial primary water stress corrosion crack and outer diameter stress corrosion crack(ODSCC). So, it can be used in qualifying and improving ECT technology and in condition monitoring assesment for crack detected in ISI(in service inspection). In addition, examination of pulled tube of Kori 1 retired steam generator will give information about effectiveness of non welded sleeving technology which was employed to repair defect tubes and remedial action which was applied to mitigate ODSCC. In this project, hardware such as semi hot lab. for pulled tube examination and modification transportation cask for pulled tube and software such as procedure of transportation of radioactive steam generator tube and non-destructive and destructive examination of pulled tube were established. Non-destructive and destructive examination of pulled tubes from Kori 1 retired steam generator were performed in semi hot lab. Remedial actions applied to Kori 1 retired steam generator, PWSCC trend and bulk water chemistry and crevice chemistry in Kori 1 were evaluated. Electrochemical decontamination technology for pulled tube was developed to reduce radiation exposure and enhance effectiveness of pulled tube examination. Multiparameter algorithm developed at ANL, USA was

  4. World-class outage performance of the Olkiluoto nuclear power plant

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Paavola, M.

    1998-01-01

    The production of the Olkiluoto power plant units covered 17% of the electricity consumption in Finland in 1997; the total share of nuclear energy was 27% of the electricity consumed in the country. Based on Finnish experience, nuclear energy is a safe, environmentally friendly and economic way to produce electricity provided that the plants and their personnel are well taken care of. TVO's policy is to keep the plant units in good condition and technically modern. This requires continuous investments in the plant. In maintenance, attention is paid to monitoring the condition of the plant and to preventive maintenance aiming at avoiding disturbances in production. TVO has chosen continuous development as the operational line develops the plant by annual investments and performs the necessary modifications during planned annual outages trying to avoid long production interruptions. The load factors of the Olkiluoto nuclear power plant have been high. The average load factor during the last decade was over 93%. The most significant single factor in the production deficits is the amount or electricity, which has not been produced because of the annual outages. Due to this, special attention has been paid to the performance of the annual outages. TVO aims at continuous development of the annual outage procedure. A centralized task management system makes it possible to perform simultaneously more tasks than before. The company has also invested in equipment and systems, which ease and speed up servicing. Normal outage length varies between 10 and 16 days. By keeping the plant units as modern as possible and in good condition we facilitate reaching TVO's target, which is also stated in TVO's slogan 'always 40 years lifetime'. (author)

  5. Optimization of safety equipment outages improves safety

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Cepin, Marko

    2002-01-01

    Testing and maintenance activities of safety equipment in nuclear power plants are an important potential for risk and cost reduction. An optimization method is presented based on the simulated annealing algorithm. The method determines the optimal schedule of safety equipment outages due to testing and maintenance based on minimization of selected risk measure. The mean value of the selected time dependent risk measure represents the objective function of the optimization. The time dependent function of the selected risk measure is obtained from probabilistic safety assessment, i.e. the fault tree analysis at the system level and the fault tree/event tree analysis at the plant level, both extended with inclusion of time requirements. Results of several examples showed that it is possible to reduce risk by application of the proposed method. Because of large uncertainties in the probabilistic safety assessment, the most important result of the method may not be a selection of the most suitable schedule of safety equipment outages among those, which results in similarly low risk. But, it may be a prevention of such schedules of safety equipment outages, which result in high risk. Such finding increases the importance of evaluation speed versus the requirement of getting always the global optimum no matter if it is only slightly better that certain local one

  6. The four ''Ps'' of outage management

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kuehn, S.E.

    1996-01-01

    This article describes how planning, partnering, preparation and people prevent poor outage performance. Boasting the best production costs in a decade, the US fleet of nuclear reactors is performing better than ever. Industry wide, production costs fell 7% to $20.02 per net megawatt hour (MWh) and output climbed 3% to 634million MWh. It doesn't take a nuclear physicists to realize that when base-loaded nuclear units are operated for long periods of time, near their technical potential, costs will fall and relative performance improves. Statistics for 1994 compiled by the Institute of Nuclear Operations (INPO) and the World Association of Nuclear Operators (WANO) showed the industry has steadily improved in most of the 10 industry-recognized categories. In 1994, Unit Capability Factor (the percentage of maximum energy generation a plant can supply to the grid) reached just under 82%, beating the 1995 goal and proving just how far the industry has come (62.7% in 1980) when improving plant operations

  7. Outage Performance of Flexible OFDM Schemes in Packet-Switched Transmissions

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Romain Couillet

    2009-01-01

    Full Text Available α-OFDM, a generalization of the OFDM modulation, is proposed. This new modulation enhances the outage capacity performance of bursty communications. The α-OFDM scheme is easily implementable as it only requires an additional time symbol rotation after the IDFT stage and a subsequent phase rotation of the cyclic prefix. The physical effect of the induced rotation is to slide the DFT window over the frequency spectrum. When successively used with different angles α at the symbol rate, α-OFDM provides frequency diversity in block fading channels. Interestingly, simulation results show a substantial gain in terms of outage capacity and outage BER in comparison with classical OFDM modulation schemes. The framework is extended to multiantenna and multicellular OFDM-based standards. Practical simulations, in the context of 3GPP-LTE, called hereafter α-LTE, sustain our theoretical claims.

  8. Outage performance improvement by state of the art reactor stud tensioning

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Oehler, Horst Werner; Vervliet, Herman

    2006-01-01

    Actual methods of reactor closing, i.e. cover to vessel sealing, is based on the creation of an equal load to the sealing circumference by tensioning all reactor studs with an equal force. This method ensures leak tightness through equal compression of the reactor seal in normal circumstances and is largely applied for all types of reactors throughout many generations and designs of nuclear power stations. The tension generated in each reactor stud is controlled indirectly by measuring the reactor stud elongation while under stress. Most studs are designed to measure this elongation easily by conventional or more advanced systems (from individual clock gauge to integrated digital transmission to a computer screen). It is this elongation value, prescribed by the reactor vessel/cover manufacturer which must be respected and demonstrated during all reactor closing operations, weather they take place for initial hydro testing, refuelling operations or periodical hydraulic tests of the primary circuit. Closing (and re-opening) of reactor vessels has become a routine operation as it is required for fuel reloading of the reactor core. This operation is performed on all PWR and BWR type of reactors with a large variety of tooling. As most of the utilities have implemented maintenance optimisation programs, the refuelling outage is reduced to a sequence of activities that allow quick and efficient refuelling of the core. The performance and efficiency of instrumentation and tooling deployed during these essential activities are of the utmost importance to minimise the critical path of the refuelling outage. Today, in support of outage performance, many utilities have invested in new and refurbished tooling to allow quick and efficient opening and closing of the reactor vessel. The features and properties of the most performing multi stud tensioning machines currently in service in nuclear power stations world wide (Africa, Europe, Asia and USA) are presented in the paper

  9. On test and maintenance: Optimization of allowed outage time

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Mavko, B.; Cepin, M.T.

    2000-01-01

    Probabilistic Safety Assessment is widely becoming standard method for assessing, maintaining, assuring and improving the nuclear power plant safety. To achieve one of its many potential benefits, the optimization of allowed outage time specified in technical specifications is investigated. Proposed is the risk comparison approach for evaluation of allowed outage time. The risk of shutting the plant down due to failure of certain equipment is compared to the risk of continued plant operation with the specified equipment down. The core damage frequency serves as a risk measure. (author)

  10. Outage capacity of multicarrier systems

    KAUST Repository

    Yilmaz, Ferkan; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

    2010-01-01

    The probability density function and the cumulative distribution function of the product of shifted Gamma variates are obtained in terms of the generalized Fox's H function. Using these new results, the exact outage capacity of multi carrier transmission through a slow Nakagami-m fading channel is presented. Moreover, it is shown that analytical and simulation results are in perfect agreement. © 2009 IEEE.

  11. Allowable outage analysis for the LOFT CIS and reflood assist bypass valves

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Trainer, J.E.; Matthews, S.D.

    1977-06-01

    To determine the outage time allowable for a typical 1 of 2 redundant valve configuration, a Markov model was created to analyze the various operating states for the valves. Since no performance criteria have been specified, an availability model was constructed with regard to the valve outage

  12. Replacement of input/output cables of the digital control computers at Gentilly 2

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Melancon, P.; Lafreniere, P.

    1991-01-01

    During the 1990 annual outage at Gentilly 2 the Preventive Maintenance Program inspections on the digital control computers (DCCs) revealed an alarming degradation of cable insulation at several locations. It was found that approximately 20% of the cable connector assemblies inspected showed signs of degradation. These findings raised the concern of an increased risk of random short-circuit faults at the very heart of the station control system. Given the excellent reliability of the Gentilly 2 DCCs and their inherent design robustness, it was decided to proceed with the replacement of all of the complete cable connector assemblies within a reasonable time frame. It is planned to replace all assemblies of DCCX and DCCY during the 1991 annual outage. The degradation of the insulation was traced to a material incompatibility problem originating during cable manufacture. A migration of the plastifier contained in the PVC of the transparent sheaths, surrounding many of the cable conductors to terminal block connections, resulted in the chemical attack of the conductor insulation. This paper summarizes the problem identification and disposition process followed by Gentilly 2 Technical Unit personnel

  13. Steam generator replacement project in 2000

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Cerjak, J.; Holz, R.; Haus, J.; Gloaguen, C.

    1999-01-01

    NE Krsko has awarded the contract for the Steam Generator Replacement Project, which is one of the modernization projects in Krsko, to the Consortium of Siemens / Framatome in February 1998. This paper deals with the various aspects of the project: scope planning, engineering, preparation of modification packages for licensing, management, major techniques used, etc., showing also the status of the activities for the project which are scheduled to be performed in April through June 2000. The project is being performed on a turnkey basis, that means the Consortium is performing all engineering, preparation of the modification packages and site activities; NE Krsko is dealing with the licensing of the project.(author)

  14. Upgrade, rebuild or replace?

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Forbes, C.A.

    1990-01-01

    Ageing reactor simulators present some tough decisions for utility managers. Although most utilities have chosen the cheaper, upgrading solution as the best compromise between costs and outage length, some US utilities have found that for them, replacement represents the best option. Simulators may be less than ten years old, but they have limited instructor systems, older low fidelity models that cannot reproduce important training scenarios, and out of date, difficult to maintain computers that do not permit much expansion of the models anyway. Perhaps worse than this is the possibility that the simulator may no longer be a faithful reproduction of the referenced plant, or have poor (or non-existent) documentation. (author)

  15. Upgrading BWR training simulators for annual outage operation training

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Yamakabe, K.; Nakajima, A.; Shiyama, H.; Noji, K.; Okabe, N.; Murata, F.

    2006-01-01

    Based upon the recently developed quality assurance program by the Japanese electric companies, BWR Operator Training Center (BTC) identified the needs to enhance operators' knowledge and skills for operations tasks during annual outage, and started to develop a dedicated operator training course specialized for them. In this paper, we present the total framework of the training course for annual outage operations and the associated typical three functions of our full-scope simulators specially developed and upgraded to conduct the training; namely, (1) Simulation model upgrade for the flow and temperature behavior concerning residual heat removal (RHR) system with shutdown cooling mode, (2) Addition of malfunctions for DC power supply equipment, (3) Simulation model upgrade for water filling operation for reactor pressurization (future development). We have implemented a trial of the training course by using the upgraded 800MW full-scope training simulator with functions (1) and (2) above. As the result of this trial, we are confident that the developed training course is effective for enhancing operators' knowledge and skills for operations tasks during annual outage. (author)

  16. Neck Pain One Week after Pacemaker Generator Replacement.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Graham, Ross F; Wightman, John M

    2015-07-01

    The incidence of cardiac pacemaker implantation has risen markedly in the past three decades, making awareness of possible postprocedural complications critical to the emergency physician. This case is the first documented instance of internal jugular (IJ) deep vein thrombosis (DVT) from an uncomplicated pacemaker generator replacement. A patient presented to an Emergency Department with a 2-day history of mild left temporal headache migrating to his left neck. The patient did not volunteer this information, but review of systems revealed a temporary transvenous pacemaker inserted through the right IJ vein 1 week previously during a routine exchange of a left-sided cardiac pacemaker generator. Manipulation of the existing pacemaker wires entering the left subclavian vein was minimal. Computed tomographic angiography of the neck demonstrated near-complete thrombotic occlusion of the entire length of his left IJ vein. This required hospital admission for observation and treatment with anticoagulation. WHY SHOULD AN EMERGENCY PHYSICIAN BE AWARE OF THIS?: DVT, with thrombotic extension into adjacent vessels anywhere along the course of pacemaker wires, should be considered by the emergency provider in the evaluation of head, neck, or upper extremity symptoms after recent or remote implantation or manipulation of a transvenous cardiac pacemaker, including generator replacement. Failure to identify and treat appropriately could result in significant morbidity and mortality from airway edema, septic thrombophlebitis, superior vena cava syndrome, superior sagittal sinus thrombosis, or pulmonary embolism. Published by Elsevier Inc.

  17. Health and maintenance outages in nuclear power plants: an epidemiological survey

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Telle, M.A.; Huez, D.; Niedbala, J.M.; Auclair, J.; Canales, J.P.; Duverge, C.; Forest, H.; Gerondal, M.; Paris, P.M.; Renault, J.C.; Bossevain, L.; Blaise, P.; Blanc, M.C.; Goldberg, M.; Charpak, Y.

    1995-01-01

    An epidemiological survey, started in 1989, was carried out at the nuclear power plants in the Loire river valley and at Le Blayais (France). Working conditions, work organisation and their impact on health during annual maintenance outages were studied. The main areas covered in this cross-sectional study were: anxiety and symptoms of depression using the Spielberger and CES-D scales. Comparisons were made during both a scheduled outage and in normal operation on four distinct groups of workers, each individual being his own control. A chi-square test was used for the quantitative variables and a test on differences for the quantitative variables. During a unit outage, more frequent overtime and atypical working hours were reported (p<0.01); working rhythms and safety rules were felt as more restrictive and exposure to radiation higher (p<0.01). Detrimental modifications of anxiety and symptoms of depression were observed on controllers whereas expected on maintenance agents. Similar results were observed when considering the rates of outages. Possible readings are given with reference to qualitative studies carried out on this topic, which implies extending our research with both the quantitative and qualitative approaches. (authors). 10 refs., 6 tabs

  18. Outage capacity of multicarrier systems

    KAUST Repository

    Yilmaz, Ferkan

    2010-01-01

    The probability density function and the cumulative distribution function of the product of shifted Gamma variates are obtained in terms of the generalized Fox\\'s H function. Using these new results, the exact outage capacity of multi carrier transmission through a slow Nakagami-m fading channel is presented. Moreover, it is shown that analytical and simulation results are in perfect agreement. © 2009 IEEE.

  19. Acceptance test for 900 MWe PWR unit replacement steam generators

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Gourguechon, B.

    1993-01-01

    During the first half of 1994, the Gravelines 1 steam generators will be replaced (SG replacement procedure). The new SG's differ from the former components notably by the alloy used for the tube bundle, in this case, the high chromium content Inconel 690. So, from this standpoint, they are to be considered as PWR 900 replacement SG first models and their thermal efficiency has consequently to be assessed. This will provide an opportunity of ensuring that the performance of the components delivered is in compliance with requirements and of making the necessary provisions if significant deviations are observed. The EFMT branch, which has been in charge of the instrumentation and acceptance of the different SG first models since the first PWR plants were commissioned, will be responsible for the acceptance tests and the ultimate validation of a performance assessment procedure applicable to the future replacement steam generators. The methods and tests proposed for SG expert appraisal are based on consideration of the importance of primary measurement quality for satisfactory SG assessment and of the new test facilities with which the 900 and 1 300 PWR plants are gradually being equipped. These facilities provide an on-site computer environment for tests compatible with the tools (PATTERN, etc.) used at EFMT and in other departments. This test is the first of this kind performed by EFMT and the test facility of a nuclear power plant. (author). 6 figs

  20. Outage Analysis of Asymmetric RF-FSO Systems

    KAUST Repository

    Ansari, Imran Shafique; Abdallah, Mohamed M.; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim; Qaraqe, Khalid A.

    2017-01-01

    In this work, the outage performance analysis of a dual-hop transmission system composed of asymmetric radio frequency (RF) channels cascaded with free-space optical (FSO) links is presented. The RF links are modeled by the Rayleigh fading

  1. The costs of power outages: A case study from Cyprus

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Zachariadis, Theodoros; Poullikkas, Andreas

    2012-01-01

    We study the costs of electricity disruptions in Cyprus, which suffered severe power shortages in summer 2011 after an explosion that destroyed 60% of its power generating capacity. We employ both economic and engineering approaches to assess these costs. Among other calculations, we provide estimates of the value of lost load by economic sector and the hourly value of electricity by season and type of day. The results of two economic methods employed to assess welfare losses differ largely, indicating that the assessment of outage costs is associated with many uncertainties. Our calculations show that the emergency actions taken by national energy authorities in response to that accident, though not necessarily optimal, have generally been appropriate and in line with international best practices: the additional costs incurred due to these measures are lower than the economic losses avoided thanks to these actions. Preferential treatment of specific consumer types in the case of repeated power outages remains an open policy question. - Highlights: ► We evaluate the response of energy authorities to a sudden electricity crisis. ► We combine two top-down economic methods and a bottom-up engineering approach. ► We estimate the value of lost electricity by hour, day type and season. ► The response of energy authorities turned out to be effective. ► Costs of emergency actions were lower than the economic losses avoided.

  2. Enhanced outage prediction modeling for strong extratropical storms and hurricanes in the Northeastern United States

    Science.gov (United States)

    Cerrai, D.; Anagnostou, E. N.; Wanik, D. W.; Bhuiyan, M. A. E.; Zhang, X.; Yang, J.; Astitha, M.; Frediani, M. E.; Schwartz, C. S.; Pardakhti, M.

    2016-12-01

    The overwhelming majority of human activities need reliable electric power. Severe weather events can cause power outages, resulting in substantial economic losses and a temporary worsening of living conditions. Accurate prediction of these events and the communication of forecasted impacts to the affected utilities is necessary for efficient emergency preparedness and mitigation. The University of Connecticut Outage Prediction Model (OPM) uses regression tree models, high-resolution weather reanalysis and real-time weather forecasts (WRF and NCAR ensemble), airport station data, vegetation and electric grid characteristics and historical outage data to forecast the number and spatial distribution of outages in the power distribution grid located within dense vegetation. Recent OPM improvements consist of improved storm classification and addition of new predictive weather-related variables and are demonstrated using a leave-one-storm-out cross-validation based on 130 severe extratropical storms and two hurricanes (Sandy and Irene) in the Northeast US. We show that it is possible to predict the number of trouble spots causing outages in the electric grid with a median absolute percentage error as low as 27% for some storm types, and at most around 40%, in a scale that varies between four orders of magnitude, from few outages to tens of thousands. This outage information can be communicated to the electric utility to manage allocation of crews and equipment and minimize the recovery time for an upcoming storm hazard.

  3. A Thermoelectric Generator Replacing Radiator for Internal Combustion Engine Vehicles

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Shiho Kim

    2011-12-01

    Full Text Available We have proposed and developed a low temperature thermoelectric generator (TEG using engine water coolant of light-duty vehicles. Experimental results from test vehicle, of which engine size is about 2.0 liters, show that fabricated prototype Thermoelectric Generator generates more than 75W for driving condition of 80 km/hour, and output power is about 28W during idle condition. The proposed TEG can replace conventional radiator without additional water pumps or mechanical devices except for basic components of legacy water cooling system of radiator.

  4. Use of a Computerized Tool (ORAM) to Help Manage Outage Safety and Risk at NPP Krsko

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Spiler, J.; Basic, I.; Vrbanic, I.; Fifnja, I.; Kastelan, M.; Dagan, W. J.; Shanley, L. B.; Naum, T. J.

    1998-01-01

    Outage Risk Assessment and Management (ORAM) is a computerized methodology developed by the U.S. Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) to help Nuclear Power Plant personnel manage the risk and safety associated with refueling and forced plant outages. Today, over 60 plants including NPP Krsko are using ORAM during the preparation and performance of plant outages. In fact, many plants are attributing much of the reductions in the duration of refueling outages to the use of ORAM. The success of the ORAM methodology is the capability to provide plant and management personnel with understandable results from both deterministic evaluations of plant safety and quantitative risk assessments. The Nuklearna Elektrarna Krsko (NEK) use of ORAM involves both of these approaches. The deterministic portion of ORAM is used to model the NPP Krsko Shutdown Technical Specifications and administrative considerations. The probabilistic portion of ORAM uses industry and NEK specific initiating events and other risk elements pertaining to shutdown to derive a quantitative risk assessment for various end states, including core damage and RCS boiling. This paper expands on the value of each approach and demonstrates the benefits of combining these elements in the decision-making process. Another key advantage of ORAM is the ability to apply the methodology to specific outages. Since no outage is identical, this provides tremendous benefits to plant personnel for managing the safety and risk of a particular outage. ORAM does this ba organizing all of the various plant configurations and equipment unavailability windows into numerous plant states. Furthermore, ORAM evaluations can be a utomated b y interfacing with outage scheduling software programs such as Primavera. For each plant state, the deterministic and the probabilistic logic evaluations are applied. This paper will demonstrate the ORAM evaluation for an actual NPP Krsko outage. (author)

  5. Outage analysis of opportunistic decode-and-forward relaying

    KAUST Repository

    Tourki, Kamel

    2010-09-01

    In this paper, we investigate a dual-hop opportunistic decode-and-forward relaying scheme where the source may or not be able to communicate directly with the destination. We first derive statistics based on exact probability density function (PDF) of each hop. Then, the PDFs are used to determine closed-form outage probability expression for a transmission rate R. Furthermore, we evaluate the asymptotic outage performance and the diversity order is deduced. Unlike existing works where the analysis focused on high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) regime, such results are important to enable the designers to take decisions regarding practical systems that operate at low SNR regime. We show that performance simulation results coincide with our analytical results under practical assumption of unbalanced hops. © 2010 IEEE.

  6. Outage analysis of blind cooperative diversity

    KAUST Repository

    Tourki, Kamel; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

    2011-01-01

    Mobile users with single antennas can still take advantage of spatial diversity through cooperative space-time-encoded transmission. In this paper, we considered a scheme in which a relay chooses to cooperate only if its source-relay channel is of an acceptable quality, and we evaluate the usefulness of relaying when the source acts blindly and ignores the decision of the relays whether they may cooperate or not. In our study, we consider the regenerative relays in which the decisions to cooperate are based on a targeted end-to-end data rate R. We derived the end-to-end outage probability for a transmission rate R and a code rate ρ and look at a power allocation strategy between the source and the relays in order to minimize the end-to-end outage probability at the destination for high signal-to-noise ratio, by using the golden section search method. Performance results show that the computer simulations-based results coincide with our analytical results. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

  7. Outage analysis of blind cooperative diversity

    KAUST Repository

    Tourki, Kamel

    2011-06-06

    Mobile users with single antennas can still take advantage of spatial diversity through cooperative space-time-encoded transmission. In this paper, we considered a scheme in which a relay chooses to cooperate only if its source-relay channel is of an acceptable quality, and we evaluate the usefulness of relaying when the source acts blindly and ignores the decision of the relays whether they may cooperate or not. In our study, we consider the regenerative relays in which the decisions to cooperate are based on a targeted end-to-end data rate R. We derived the end-to-end outage probability for a transmission rate R and a code rate ρ and look at a power allocation strategy between the source and the relays in order to minimize the end-to-end outage probability at the destination for high signal-to-noise ratio, by using the golden section search method. Performance results show that the computer simulations-based results coincide with our analytical results. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

  8. BWR control blade replacement strategies

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Kennard, M W [Stoller Nuclear Fuel, NAC International, Pleasantville, NY (United States); Harbottle, J E [Stoller Nuclear Fuel, NAC International, Thornbury, Bristol (United Kingdom)

    2000-02-01

    The reactivity control elements in a BWR, the control blades, perform three significant functions: provide shutdown margin during normal and accident operating conditions; provide overall core reactivity control; and provide axial power shaping control. As such, the blades are exposed to the core's neutron flux, resulting in irradiation of blade structural and absorber materials. Since the absorber depletes with time (if B{sub 4}C is used, it also swells) and the structural components undergo various degradation mechanisms (e.g., embrittlement, corrosion), the blades have limits on their operational lifetimes. Consequently, BWR utilities have implemented strategies that aim to maximize blade lifetimes while balancing operational costs, such as extending a refuelling outage to shuffle high exposure blades. This paper examines the blade replacement strategies used by BWR utilities operating in US, Europe and Asia by assembling information related to: the utility's specific blade replacement strategy; the impact the newer blade designs and changes in core operating mode were having on those strategies; the mechanical and nuclear limits that determined those strategies; the methods employed to ensure that lifetime limits were not exceeded during operation; and blade designs used (current and replacement blades). (author)

  9. BWR control blade replacement strategies

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kennard, M.W.; Harbottle, J.E.

    2000-01-01

    The reactivity control elements in a BWR, the control blades, perform three significant functions: provide shutdown margin during normal and accident operating conditions; provide overall core reactivity control; and provide axial power shaping control. As such, the blades are exposed to the core's neutron flux, resulting in irradiation of blade structural and absorber materials. Since the absorber depletes with time (if B 4 C is used, it also swells) and the structural components undergo various degradation mechanisms (e.g., embrittlement, corrosion), the blades have limits on their operational lifetimes. Consequently, BWR utilities have implemented strategies that aim to maximize blade lifetimes while balancing operational costs, such as extending a refuelling outage to shuffle high exposure blades. This paper examines the blade replacement strategies used by BWR utilities operating in US, Europe and Asia by assembling information related to: the utility's specific blade replacement strategy; the impact the newer blade designs and changes in core operating mode were having on those strategies; the mechanical and nuclear limits that determined those strategies; the methods employed to ensure that lifetime limits were not exceeded during operation; and blade designs used (current and replacement blades). (author)

  10. Bingham Pump Outage Pits: Environmental information document

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Pekkala, R.O.; Jewell, C.E.; Holmes, W.G.; Marine, I.W.

    1987-03-01

    Seven waste sites known as the Bingham Pump Outage Pits located in areas of the Savannah River Plant (SRP) received solid waste containing an estimated 4 Ci of low-level radioactivity in 1957-1958. These sites were subsequently backfilled and have been inactive since that time. Most of the radioactivity at the Bingham Pump Outage Pits has been eliminated by radioactive decay. A total of approximately 1 Ci of activity (primarily 137 Cs and 90 Sr) is estimated to remain at the seven sites. The closure options considered for the Bingham Pump Outage Pits are waste removal and closure, no waste removal and closure, and no action. The predominant pathways for human exposure to chemical and/or radioactive constituents are through surface, subsurface, and atmospheric transport. Modeling calculations were made to determine the risks to human population via these general pathways for the three postulated closure options. An ecological assessment was conducted to predict the environmental impacts on aquatic and terrestrial biota. The relative costs for each of the closure options were estimated. Evaluation indicates that the relative human health risks for all closure options are small. The greatest public risk would occur after the waste site was released to unrestricted public use (assumed to occur in Year 2085) via the groundwater pathway to a well. The cost estimates show that the waste removal and closure option is the most expensive (89.6 million dollars). The cost of the no waste removal and the no action options is $800,000. 35 refs., 26 figs., 47 tabs

  11. Understanding portable generators

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Hills, A.; Hawkins, B. [Guelph Univ., ON (Canada); Clarke, S. [Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs, Toronto, ON (Canada)

    2000-06-01

    This factsheet is intended to help consumers select a small portable generator for emergency electrical needs. Interest in standby generators has been heightened ever since the prolonged power outage in Eastern Ontario and Southwestern Quebec during the 1998 ice storm and the concern over Y2K related outages. Farmers, in particular, have been reassessing their need for emergency electrical power supply. This document presents some of the factors that should be considered when purchasing and operating a portable generator in the 3 to 12 kW size. It provides a detailed review of power quality and describes the use of tractor-driven power-take-off generators of 15 kW and larger. Several manufacturers make portable generators in many sizes with a whole range of features. This document includes a table depicting generator Feature/Benefit analysis to help consumers understand the differences between features and benefits. A second table provides a check list for generator feature/benefits. Specific details for the operations of various generators are available from manufacturers, distributors and electrical contractors. 2 tabs., 1 fig.

  12. Optimization of steam generator replacement with virtual reality modeling

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kim, Jeong H.; Suh, Kune Y.

    2008-01-01

    Nuclear power plants (NPPs) have to be carefully examined and maintained up to the point of replacing major components during the overhaul period for continued operation. Most understandably the cost of maintenance and upgrading will tend to increase with the NPP power. There is thus an escalating need for developing an optimized process management method to reduce the cost involved. Albeit the steam generators (SGs) may not directly affect the expected lifespan of NPP, thousands of tubes with diameter on the order of 3 cm in the SG operating at 320degC and 16 MPa may well tend to be called Achilles' heel of the pressurized water reactors (PWRs). For instance, the SGs of Kori Nuclear Unit 1 (KNU 1) were replaced in October 1998 after 20 years of service on account of aging and potential threat to operational safety. In the same year the SG tubes of Ulchin Nuclear Units 1 and 2 were ruptured to result in leakage of the primary coolant to the secondary side. As a result their SGs are planned to be replaced in a few years. There is, however, a limit to improving the replacement process by trial and error in practice on account of the size of NPP with the ensuing complexity in process management. This paper proposes an optimization method for the SG replacement process based on the KNU 1 experience in 1998. The whole process was simulated accounting for interactions of each part in virtual reality utilizing the computer aided design solution CATIA, and the digital process management solution DELMIA. (author)

  13. Gentilly-2 and Point Lepreau divider plate replacement

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Schneider, W.; McClellan, G.; Weston, S.

    1996-01-01

    The steam generators at Hydro Quebec's Gentilly-2 and New Brunswick Power's Point Lepreau Nuclear Plants have been in operation since 1983, and were built with primary divider plates of a bolted panel configuration. During a routine outage inspection at Gentilly-2, it was noted that two bolts had dislodged from the divider plate and were located lying in the primary head. Subsequent inspections revealed erosion damage to a a substantial number of divider plate bolts and to a lesser extent, to the divider plate itself. After further inspection and repair the units were returned to operation, however, it was determined that a permanent replacement of the primary divider plates was going to be necessary. Upon evaluation of various options, it was decided that the panel type divider plates would be replaced with a single piece floating design. The divider plate itself was to be of one piece all-welded arrangement to be constructed from individual panels to be brought in through the manways. In view of the strength limitations of the bolted attachment of the upper seat bar to the tubesheet, a new welded seat was was provided. To counteract erosion concerns, the new divider plate is fitted with erosion resistant inserts of weld buildup and with improved sealing features in order to minimize leakage and erosion. At an advanced stage in the design and manufacture of the components, the issue of divider plate strength during loss of coolant accident (LOCA) conditions came into focus. Analysis was performed to determine the strength and/or failure characteristics of the divider plate to a variety of small and large LOCA conditions. Subsequently, Point Lepreau decided to replace their divider plates to address LOCA concerns. The paper describes the diagnosis of the original divider plates and the design. manufacture, field mobilization, installation and subsequent operation of the replacement divider plates. (author)

  14. Environmental determinants of unscheduled residential outages in the electrical power distribution of Phoenix, Arizona

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Maliszewski, Paul J.; Larson, Elisabeth K.; Perrings, Charles

    2012-01-01

    The sustainability of power infrastructures depends on their reliability. One test of the reliability of an infrastructure is its ability to function reliably in extreme environmental conditions. Effective planning for reliable electrical systems requires knowledge of unscheduled outage sources, including environmental and social factors. Despite many studies on the vulnerability of infrastructure systems, the effect of interacting environmental and infrastructural conditions on the reliability of urban residential power distribution remains an understudied problem. We model electric interruptions using outage data between the years of 2002 and 2005 across Phoenix, Arizona. Consistent with perceptions of increased exposure, overhead power lines positively correlate with unscheduled outages indicating underground cables are more resistant to failure. In the presence of overhead lines, the interaction between birds and vegetation as well as proximity to nearest desert areas and lakes are positive driving factors explaining much of the variation in unscheduled outages. Closeness to the nearest arterial road and the interaction between housing square footage and temperature are also significantly positive. A spatial error model was found to provide the best fit to the data. Resultant findings are useful for understanding and improving electrical infrastructure reliability. - Highlights: ► Unscheduled outages were related to interacting environmental and infrastructural conditions. ► Underground feeders are more resistant to failure. ► In the presence of overhead lines, birds, vegetation, and proximity to desert areas are positive driving factors. ► Proximity to arterial roads and a proxy for energy demand were significantly positive. ► Outages were most spatially dependent up to around 350 m.

  15. Consequences of long-term power outages and high electricity prices lasting for months

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2005-01-01

    Several areas in the world have experienced electricity outages for longer periods of time, but the consequences of these are sparsely documented. There is a need for further analysis of the socioeconomic consequences of the outages. In addition to KILE (Quality adjusted revenue framework for un supplied energy) costs one has to take into account that the costs often increase proportionally with the durance of the outage, and that KILE tariffs do not reflect lost consumer's surplus for products that are not produced during an outage. A good example is the public underground transport, where the company's economical loss can be significantly smaller than the loss of utility value for the travellers. If the authorities act with reasonability it is difficult to see that periods with very high prices represent a big problem. The most important problems are related to diffused effects, especially for households with a weak economy. These problems can be solved with improved contractual forms (price guarantees) or by transfers to the households, without weakening the incentives for electricity economising (ml)

  16. Outage Probability Analysis of FSO Links over Foggy Channel

    KAUST Repository

    Esmail, Maged Abdullah

    2017-02-22

    Outdoor Free space optic (FSO) communication systems are sensitive to atmospheric impairments such as turbulence and fog, in addition to being subject to pointing errors. Fog is particularly severe because it induces an attenuation that may vary from few dBs up to few hundreds of dBs per kilometer. Pointing errors also distort the link alignment and cause signal fading. In this paper, we investigate and analyze the FSO systems performance under fog conditions and pointing errors in terms of outage probability. We then study the impact of several effective communication mitigation techniques that can improve the system performance including multi-hop, transmit laser selection (TLS) and hybrid RF/FSO transmission. Closed-form expressions for the outage probability are derived and practical and comprehensive numerical examples are suggested to assess the obtained results. We found that the FSO system has limited performance that prevents applying FSO in wireless microcells that have a 500 m minimum cell radius. The performance degrades more when pointing errors appear. Increasing the transmitted power can improve the performance under light to moderate fog. However, under thick and dense fog the improvement is negligible. Using mitigation techniques can play a major role in improving the range and outage probability.

  17. Outage Probability Analysis of FSO Links over Foggy Channel

    KAUST Repository

    Esmail, Maged Abdullah; Fathallah, Habib; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

    2017-01-01

    Outdoor Free space optic (FSO) communication systems are sensitive to atmospheric impairments such as turbulence and fog, in addition to being subject to pointing errors. Fog is particularly severe because it induces an attenuation that may vary from few dBs up to few hundreds of dBs per kilometer. Pointing errors also distort the link alignment and cause signal fading. In this paper, we investigate and analyze the FSO systems performance under fog conditions and pointing errors in terms of outage probability. We then study the impact of several effective communication mitigation techniques that can improve the system performance including multi-hop, transmit laser selection (TLS) and hybrid RF/FSO transmission. Closed-form expressions for the outage probability are derived and practical and comprehensive numerical examples are suggested to assess the obtained results. We found that the FSO system has limited performance that prevents applying FSO in wireless microcells that have a 500 m minimum cell radius. The performance degrades more when pointing errors appear. Increasing the transmitted power can improve the performance under light to moderate fog. However, under thick and dense fog the improvement is negligible. Using mitigation techniques can play a major role in improving the range and outage probability.

  18. Monitoring the risk of loss of heat sink during plant shutdowns at Bruce Generating Station 'A'

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Krishnan, K.S.; Mancuso, F.; Vecchiarelli, D.

    1996-01-01

    A relatively simple loss of shutdown heat sink fault tree model has been developed and used during unit outages at Bruce Nuclear Generation Station 'A' to assess, from a risk and reliability perspective, alternative heat sink strategies and to aid in decisions on allowable outage configurations. The model is adjusted to reflect the various unit configurations planned during a specific outage, and identifies events and event combinations leading to loss of fuel cooling. The calculated failure frequencies are compared to the limits consistent with corporate and international public safety goals. The importance measures generated by the interrogation of the fault tree model for each outage configuration are also used to reschedule configurations with high fuel damage frequency later into the outage and to control the configurations with relatively high probability of fuel damage to short intervals at the most appropriate time into the outage. (author)

  19. Performance Shaping Factors Assessments and Application to PHWR Outages

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Lee, Seung Woo

    2007-02-15

    Human reliability analysis is definitely related to the quality of PSA because human errors have been identified as major contributors to PSA. According to NRC's 'Office of analysis and evaluation of operational data (AEOD)',82% of the reactor trips and accident during outage is caused by the events related to human errors. There is, however, no one HRA method universally accepted. Furthermore, HRA during PHWR outages has not been performed around the world yet. HRA during PHWR outages is especially important since manual management of operator is more required during PHWR. In this study, accident scenarios which HYU developed are used to perform a quantification of human error probability. In this study, overall procedures of standard HRA methodology are introduced and follows the quantification of 10 possible selected human actions during PHWR outages based on standard HRA methodology. To see the verification, quantified values were compared with the values from 'Generic CANDU Probabilistic Safety Assessment' and the values estimated by ASEP.Core Damage Frequency was estimated 3.35 x 10{sup -4} more higher than CDF estimated by AECL data. It was considered that the differences between the HEPs for OPAFW and OPECC3 make CDF higher. Therefore, complementary study of reestimating HEP for OPAFW and OPECC3 in detail is required for increasing the qualities of HRA and PSA. Moreover, one of the difficulties in performing human reliability analysis is to evaluate performance shaping factors which represent the characteristics and circumstances. For assessing a specific human action more exactly, it is necessary to consider all of the PSFs at the same time which makes an effect on the human action. Also, it requires the effect comparison among PSFs to minimize the uncertainties which are usually caused by the subjective judgements of HRA analysts. To see the sensitivity, performance shaping factors of each decision rule are changed which resulted

  20. Performance Shaping Factors Assessments and Application to PHWR Outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Lee, Seung Woo

    2007-02-01

    Human reliability analysis is definitely related to the quality of PSA because human errors have been identified as major contributors to PSA. According to NRC's 'Office of analysis and evaluation of operational data (AEOD)',82% of the reactor trips and accident during outage is caused by the events related to human errors. There is, however, no one HRA method universally accepted. Furthermore, HRA during PHWR outages has not been performed around the world yet. HRA during PHWR outages is especially important since manual management of operator is more required during PHWR. In this study, accident scenarios which HYU developed are used to perform a quantification of human error probability. In this study, overall procedures of standard HRA methodology are introduced and follows the quantification of 10 possible selected human actions during PHWR outages based on standard HRA methodology. To see the verification, quantified values were compared with the values from 'Generic CANDU Probabilistic Safety Assessment' and the values estimated by ASEP.Core Damage Frequency was estimated 3.35 x 10 -4 more higher than CDF estimated by AECL data. It was considered that the differences between the HEPs for OPAFW and OPECC3 make CDF higher. Therefore, complementary study of reestimating HEP for OPAFW and OPECC3 in detail is required for increasing the qualities of HRA and PSA. Moreover, one of the difficulties in performing human reliability analysis is to evaluate performance shaping factors which represent the characteristics and circumstances. For assessing a specific human action more exactly, it is necessary to consider all of the PSFs at the same time which makes an effect on the human action. Also, it requires the effect comparison among PSFs to minimize the uncertainties which are usually caused by the subjective judgements of HRA analysts. To see the sensitivity, performance shaping factors of each decision rule are changed which resulted in changes of core damage

  1. Comparison and validation of statistical methods for predicting power outage durations in the event of hurricanes.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Nateghi, Roshanak; Guikema, Seth D; Quiring, Steven M

    2011-12-01

    This article compares statistical methods for modeling power outage durations during hurricanes and examines the predictive accuracy of these methods. Being able to make accurate predictions of power outage durations is valuable because the information can be used by utility companies to plan their restoration efforts more efficiently. This information can also help inform customers and public agencies of the expected outage times, enabling better collective response planning, and coordination of restoration efforts for other critical infrastructures that depend on electricity. In the long run, outage duration estimates for future storm scenarios may help utilities and public agencies better allocate risk management resources to balance the disruption from hurricanes with the cost of hardening power systems. We compare the out-of-sample predictive accuracy of five distinct statistical models for estimating power outage duration times caused by Hurricane Ivan in 2004. The methods compared include both regression models (accelerated failure time (AFT) and Cox proportional hazard models (Cox PH)) and data mining techniques (regression trees, Bayesian additive regression trees (BART), and multivariate additive regression splines). We then validate our models against two other hurricanes. Our results indicate that BART yields the best prediction accuracy and that it is possible to predict outage durations with reasonable accuracy. © 2011 Society for Risk Analysis.

  2. Programming and organisation of unit outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hadjidakis, Y.; Cezard, C.; Audierne, J.

    1997-01-01

    The unit outages are scheduled every 12 to 18 months for fuel reloading. The success of these shutdowns, with the whole of objectives (duration, dosimetry, costs), with maintaining the safety level, is an important stake for the competitiveness of the enterprise. In this article are described the planning, the experience return and the organisation of scheduled shutdowns which have contribute to the improvement of availability. (N.C.)

  3. Exact Outage Probability of Dual-Hop CSI-Assisted AF Relaying Over Nakagami-m Fading Channels

    KAUST Repository

    Xia, Minghua; Aissa, Sonia; Wu, Yik-Chung

    2012-01-01

    to evaluate the outage performance of the system under study. The analytical results of outage probability coincide exactly with Monte-Carlo simulation results and outperform the previously reported upper bounds in the low and medium SNR regions.

  4. Synergistic Use of Nighttime Satellite Data, Electric Utility Infrastructure, and Ambient Population to Improve Power Outage Detections in Urban Areas

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Tony A. Cole

    2017-03-01

    Full Text Available Natural and anthropogenic hazards are frequently responsible for disaster events, leading to damaged physical infrastructure, which can result in loss of electrical power for affected locations. Remotely-sensed, nighttime satellite imagery from the Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (Suomi-NPP Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS Day/Night Band (DNB can monitor power outages in disaster-affected areas through the identification of missing city lights. When combined with locally-relevant geospatial information, these observations can be used to estimate power outages, defined as geographic locations requiring manual intervention to restore power. In this study, we produced a power outage product based on Suomi-NPP VIIRS DNB observations to estimate power outages following Hurricane Sandy in 2012. This product, combined with known power outage data and ambient population estimates, was then used to predict power outages in a layered, feedforward neural network model. We believe this is the first attempt to synergistically combine such data sources to quantitatively estimate power outages. The VIIRS DNB power outage product was able to identify initial loss of light following Hurricane Sandy, as well as the gradual restoration of electrical power. The neural network model predicted power outages with reasonable spatial accuracy, achieving Pearson coefficients (r between 0.48 and 0.58 across all folds. Our results show promise for producing a continental United States (CONUS- or global-scale power outage monitoring network using satellite imagery and locally-relevant geospatial data.

  5. High-Rate Communications Outage Recorder Operations for Optimal Payload and Science Telemetry Management Onboard the International Space Station

    Science.gov (United States)

    Shell, Michael T.; McElyea, Richard M. (Technical Monitor)

    2002-01-01

    All International Space Station (ISS) Ku-band telemetry transmits through the High-Rate Communications Outage Recorder (HCOR). The HCOR provides the recording and playback capability for all payload, science, and International Partner data streams transmitting through NASA's Ku-band antenna system. The HCOR is a solid-state memory recorder that provides recording capability to record all eight ISS high-rate data during ISS Loss-of-Signal periods. NASA payloads in the Destiny module are prime users of the HCOR; however, NASDA and ESA will also utilize the HCOR for data capture and playback of their high data rate links from the Kibo and Columbus modules. Marshall Space Flight Center's Payload Operations Integration Center manages the HCOR for nominal functions, including system configurations and playback operations. The purpose of this paper is to present the nominal operations plan for the HCOR and the plans for handling contingency operations affecting payload operations. In addition, the paper will address HCOR operation limitations and the expected effects on payload operations. The HCOR is manifested for ISS delivery on flight 9A with the HCOR backup manifested on flight 11A. The HCOR replaces the Medium-Rate Communications Outage Recorder (MCOR), which has supported payloads since flight 5A.1.

  6. Study on optimization of normal plant outage work plan for nuclear power plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Aoki, Takayuki; Kodama, Noriko; Takase, Kentaro; Miya, Kenzo

    2011-01-01

    This paper discusses maintenance optimization in maintenance implementation stage following maintenance planning stage in nuclear power plants and proposes a methodology to get an optimum maintenance work plan. As a result of consideration, the followings were obtained. (1) The quantitative evaluation methodology for optimizing maintenance work plan in nuclear power plants was developed. (2) Utilizing the above methodology, a simulation analysis of maintenance work planning for BWR's PLR and RHR systems in a normal plant outage was performed. Maintenance cost calculation in several cases was carried out on the condition of smoothening man loading over the plant outage schedule as much as possible. (3) As a result of the simulation, the economical work plans having a flat man loading over the plant outage schedule were obtained. (author)

  7. Risk-informed business modeling for nuclear power generation

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Liming, J.K.; Grantom, C.R.

    2000-01-01

    This paper documented the results of operations and maintenance cost-benefit-risk analysis (OMCBRA) of the currently planned refueling outage schedule profile and two potential alternate outage schedule strategy options for the South Texas Project Electric Generating Station (STPEGS). The objects, basic methodology, including bases and assumptions, results, conclusions, and recommendations developed for STPNOC during the project were presented. The application of the cost-benefit-risk analysis tools and techniques developed for the STPEGS staffs during the project were presented. The key question under consideration by the STPNOC leadership was whether or not there is an economic lower limit to planned refueling outage duration at STPEGS. The results showed that 14-day outage duration strategy was preferable in all assumption sets evaluated in this project. Therefore, this analysis shows that the 'point of diminishing returns' for outage duration reduction has not been reached between 14- and 30-day outage duration options. The sensitivity study on profitability versus refueling outage duration showed that the hypothetical optimum refueling outage duration was probably somewhere between 5 and 10 days. That is, given the bases and assumptions applied in this analysis, any reasonable options for reducing refueling outage duration below the current 21-day strategy would appear to be justified on cost-benefit-risk considerations. OMCBRA can be used to both monitor station overall economic performance as well as support change management and it can be applied to continually optimize station decision-making for maximum profitability. (M.N.)

  8. Kozloduy NPP units 5 and 6 modernization program. Measures implementation in outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Naydenov, N.; Mignone, O.

    2004-01-01

    The units 5 and 6 modernization program is a highly demanding program composed by many plant modifications and studies about plant conditions. The program measures implementation during the units outages represents a challenge by the need to compromise shut down duration with the workload related to measures installation. The units shutdown duration should be kept to the planned duration. In parallel, contractors work has to be organized, planned and performed to allow successful measures completion. In accordance with the contract requirements, contractors prepare installation documents which comprise all activities to be performed during the installation and testing of the measures. The subcontractors complement these installation documents with the project organization and execution documents, which include the manpower skills, qualifications, work orders, and other important installation instructions and information. Contractors prepared detailed installation schedules, and these were integrated by Parsons E and C in the Integrated installation schedule. The integrated schedule proved to be useful to identify possible area usage conflicts and manpower overlapping, with appropriate results for electrical, instrumentation and control work, and for the utilization of the polar crane in the containment building. Contractors installation schedules were updated on a weekly basis, showing variances versus the target, and manpower histograms for the resource loading. Organization of contractors work was supported by KNPP plant outage meetings, in which status and problems were addressed, and solution and/or corrective actions defined for further implementation. KNPP meetings were planned on a daily basis for most relevant or critical measures, or on a weekly basis for less intensive measures. KNPP meetings proved to be an excellent communication tool for keeping the measures under control and monitoring KNPP defined personnel responsible for authorizing changes, in

  9. Outage Analysis of Asymmetric RF-FSO Systems

    KAUST Repository

    Ansari, Imran Shafique

    2017-03-20

    In this work, the outage performance analysis of a dual-hop transmission system composed of asymmetric radio frequency (RF) channels cascaded with free-space optical (FSO) links is presented. The RF links are modeled by the Rayleigh fading distribution and the FSO links are modeled by Malaga (M) turbulence distribution. The FSO links account for pointing errors and both types of detection techniques (i.e. heterodyne detection as well as intensity modulation/direct detection (IM/DD)). Transmit diversity is applied at the source, selection combining is applied at the destination, and the relay is equipped with single RF receive antenna and single aperture for relaying the information over FSO links. With this model, a new exact closed-form expression is derived for the outage probability of the end-to- end signal-to-noise ratio of such communication systems in terms of the Meijer\\'s G function under fixed amplify-and-forward relay scheme. All new analytical results are verified via computer-based Monte-Carlo simulations and are illustrated by some selected numerical results.

  10. Verification and Enhancement of VIIRS Day-Night Band (DNB) Power Outage Detection Product

    Science.gov (United States)

    Burke, Angela; Schultz, Lori A.; Omitaomu, Olufemi; Molthan, Andrew L.; Cole, Tony; Griffin, Robert

    2017-01-01

    This case study of Hurricane Matthew (October 2016) uses the NASA Short-Term Prediction Research and Transition (SPoRT) Center DNB power outage product (using GSFC VIIRS DNB preliminary Black Marble product, Roman et al.. 2017) and 2013 LandScan Global population data to look for correlations between the post-event %-of-normal radiance and the utility company-reported outage numbers (obtained from EAGLE-1).

  11. Insights from the analyses of risk-informed extension of diesel generator allowed outage time

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Lin, J.C.; He Wei

    2005-01-01

    In recent years, many U.S. nuclear plants have applied and received approval for the risk-informed extension of the Allowed Outage Time (AOT) for Emergency Diesel Generators (EDGs). These risk-informed applications need to meet the regulatory guidance on the risk criteria. This paper discusses in detail insights derived from the risk-informed analyses performed to support these applications. The risk criteria on ΔCDF/ΔLERF evaluate the increase in average risk by extending the AOT for EDGs, induced primarily by an increase in EDG maintenance unavailability due to the introduction of additional EDG preventive maintenance. By performing this preventive maintenance work on-line, the outage duration can be shortened. With proper refinement of the risk model, most plants can meet the ΔCDF/ΔLERF criteria for extending the EDGAOT from, for example, 3 days to 14 days. The key areas for model enhancements to meet these criteria include offsite/onsite power recovery, LERF modeling, etc. The most important LERF model enhancements consist of refinement of the penetrations included in the containment isolation model for the consideration of a large release, and taking credit for operator vessel depressurization during the time period between core damage and vessel failure. A recent study showed that although the frequency of loss of offsite power (LOSP) has decreased, the duration of offsite power recovery has actually increased. However, many of the events used to derive this conclusion may not be applicable to PRAs. One approach develops the offsite power non-recovery factor by first screening the LOSP events for applicability to the plant being analyzed, power operation, and LOSP initiating event, then using the remaining events data for the derivation based on the fraction of events with recovery duration longer than the time window allowed. The risk criteria on ICCDP/ICLERP examine the increase in risk from the average CDF/LERF, based on the increased maintenance

  12. Economic costs of electrical system instability and power outages caused by snakes on the Island of Guam

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fritts, T.H.

    2002-01-01

    The Brown Tree Snake, Boiga irregularis, is an introduced species on Guam where it causes frequent electrical power outages. The snake's high abundance, its propensity for climbing, and use of disturbed habitats all contribute to interruption of Guam's electrical service and the activities that depend on electrical power. Snakes have caused more than 1600 power outages in the 20-yr period of 1978–1997 and most recently nearly 200 outages per year. Single outages spanning the entire island and lasting 8 or more hours are estimated to cost in excess of $3,000,000 in lost productivity, but the costs of outages that involve only parts of the island or those of shorter durations are more difficult to quantify. Costs to the island's economy have exceeded $4.5 M $4.5M"> per year over a 7-yr period without considering repair costs, damage to electrical equipment, and lost revenues. Snakes pose the greatest problem on high voltage transmission lines, on transformers, and inside electrical substations.

  13. Psychosocial work strain of maintenance personnel during annual outage and normal operation in a nuclear power plant

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Jacobsson, L.; Svensson, O.

    1991-01-01

    This paper reports on a study which evaluates psychosocial work demands during the annual outage for a maintenance work group in a nuclear power plant. The study is based on a stress paradigm and it has been asserted that increased work strain would have a negative effect on performance. Nineteen workers, aged 20-55 years, participated in the study. The subjects filled out a questionnaire comparing work strain during annual outage and normal operation. During the outage period a 3-shift 24-hour work schedule, including nightwork, was used (working hours during normal operation was 7-16). Increased demands on concentration and vigilance, increased time pressure and strain on social relations within the group were found to characterize work during annual outage. Interestingly, for specific work tasks an association was found between the risk of making errors and high psychological workload. Increased work strain, shiftwork including nightwork and reduced social support are important psychosocial risk factors that might contribute to human error during the outage period

  14. Proceedings of a joint OECD/NEA-IAEA symposium on human factors and organisation in NPP maintenance outages: impact on safety

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1995-01-01

    The sessions of this conference dealt with outage strategy and methods (in Sweden, France and United States), the organisation and management of outages (organisation during refuelling shutdowns in France, safety approaches in France, in the USA, in Canada, in the United Kingdom and in Sweden), case studies and lessons learned (in France, Korea, Sweden, UK, USA), regulatory aspects of outages (UK, Germany, Mexico, France), the development of outage techniques

  15. Future steam generator designs. Single wall designs

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hayden, O.

    1978-01-01

    The easily removable 'U' tube design style adopted in the UK for the existing PFR Steam Generators, the Replacement Units now in production and for the future CDFR, gives the operator an extremely valuable option in the event of a water/steam leak occurring inside the Steam Generator. He can choose to shut-down, attempt to find the leak, assess damage, repair, revalidate and return to service in situ, or he can elect to remove the defect unit and replace with a 'proven' spare before returning the circuit to power. With the latter approach the resultant outage time is a known entity of about two weeks. If a repair is attempted in situ, predictions of outage time can become a matter of guesswork since one has no 'guaranteed' method of leak location and the assessment of secondary damage may be very time consuming, depending on the size and type of the original leak together with the particular design style of the Steam Generator. A further significant advantage of the removable 'U' tube design concept is that periodic interchanging of bundles with a spare enables routine chemical cleaning and thorough scheduled tube inspections, with specimen tube sample removal if required for monitoring purposes. If necessary, bundle decontamination can be undertaken to assess engineering deterioration to various degrees of thoroughness ranging from 100% equivalent factory final assembly inspection, to partial decontamination operating via a glovebox type of maintenance bag arrangement, examining local points of both shell and tube areas of the bundle. Many lessons from the last five years' experience of PFR will be incorporated into the design of the CDFR and PFR Steam Generators have two very good examples of how the designer can ease or severely handicap the operator in coping with sodium/water leakages. Good, quick access to tube ends is achieved in the existing PFR Evaporator by simply unbolting the steam/water closure head, but on the superheater and reheater hand-caps have

  16. Future steam generator designs. Single wall designs

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Hayden, O [Nuclear Power Company Ltd, Warrington, Cheshire (United Kingdom)

    1978-10-01

    The easily removable 'U' tube design style adopted in the UK for the existing PFR Steam Generators, the Replacement Units now in production and for the future CDFR, gives the operator an extremely valuable option in the event of a water/steam leak occurring inside the Steam Generator. He can choose to shut-down, attempt to find the leak, assess damage, repair, revalidate and return to service in situ, or he can elect to remove the defect unit and replace with a 'proven' spare before returning the circuit to power. With the latter approach the resultant outage time is a known entity of about two weeks. If a repair is attempted in situ, predictions of outage time can become a matter of guesswork since one has no 'guaranteed' method of leak location and the assessment of secondary damage may be very time consuming, depending on the size and type of the original leak together with the particular design style of the Steam Generator. A further significant advantage of the removable 'U' tube design concept is that periodic interchanging of bundles with a spare enables routine chemical cleaning and thorough scheduled tube inspections, with specimen tube sample removal if required for monitoring purposes. If necessary, bundle decontamination can be undertaken to assess engineering deterioration to various degrees of thoroughness ranging from 100% equivalent factory final assembly inspection, to partial decontamination operating via a glovebox type of maintenance bag arrangement, examining local points of both shell and tube areas of the bundle. Many lessons from the last five years' experience of PFR will be incorporated into the design of the CDFR and PFR Steam Generators have two very good examples of how the designer can ease or severely handicap the operator in coping with sodium/water leakages. Good, quick access to tube ends is achieved in the existing PFR Evaporator by simply unbolting the steam/water closure head, but on the superheater and reheater hand-caps have

  17. Optimal utilization of outages. The tasks of the OEM and/or service provider

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Jakobs, Norbert; Grauf, Eberhard

    1998-01-01

    The deregulation of Europe's power market on January 1, 1999 will force many electric utilities and especially nuclear power plant operators to introduce extensive cost-cutting measures in order that they can hold their own in the new competitive environment. Existing plants basically have three potential ways of reducing their power generating costs: by increasing availability, reducing fuel costs and cutting back operating costs. Optimizing plant outages provides considerable potential for raising plant availability but can also lower operating costs by reducing expenditure on maintenance. In order to optimize an outage in terms of performance time and cost, there are a number of starting points based on certain key factors: organization, planning, logistics, performance monitoring, plant and equipment enhancements as well as personnel motivation. To reach this goal it is necessary for the original equipment manufacturer (OEM) and/or service provider to be involved in these activities to a much greater extent than before and for a closer form of partnership to be established with the consumer. For it is only within a team having a common set of goals that the successes of the past have been able to be achieved and new tasks can be efficiently handled in the future. (author)

  18. Impact of Co-Channel Interference on the Outage Performance Under Multiple Type II Relay Environments

    KAUST Repository

    Choi, Seyeong; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim; Nam, Sung Sik

    2017-01-01

    In this paper, through an exact analysis of the outage probability, we investigate the impact of co-channel interference (CCI) on the outage performance of type II (or user equipment) relay under multiple-relay environments considering the selection combining-based relay selection scheme with the decode-and-forward protocol. We consider the signal to interference plus noise ratio (SINR) over both independent and identically distributed and independent but non-identically distributed fading channels. To fully take into account the effect of CCI, we adopt a more practical parameter such as the CCI coefficient. The major difficulty in the analysis resides in the determination of the statistics of the output SINR. To settle this problem, we first present the general but relatively simplified expressions for the statistics and then the related outage probability in closed-form. Furthermore, to consider more practical scenario, based on the fact that the number of participating relays can be random, we investigate the average outage probability by averaging the number of participating relays.

  19. Impact of Co-Channel Interference on the Outage Performance Under Multiple Type II Relay Environments

    KAUST Repository

    Choi, Seyeong

    2017-11-15

    In this paper, through an exact analysis of the outage probability, we investigate the impact of co-channel interference (CCI) on the outage performance of type II (or user equipment) relay under multiple-relay environments considering the selection combining-based relay selection scheme with the decode-and-forward protocol. We consider the signal to interference plus noise ratio (SINR) over both independent and identically distributed and independent but non-identically distributed fading channels. To fully take into account the effect of CCI, we adopt a more practical parameter such as the CCI coefficient. The major difficulty in the analysis resides in the determination of the statistics of the output SINR. To settle this problem, we first present the general but relatively simplified expressions for the statistics and then the related outage probability in closed-form. Furthermore, to consider more practical scenario, based on the fact that the number of participating relays can be random, we investigate the average outage probability by averaging the number of participating relays.

  20. Partner cooperation with decode-and-forward: Closed-form outage analysis and comparison

    KAUST Repository

    Benjillali, Mustapha

    2013-01-01

    In this paper, we investigate the outage performance of "partner cooperation" based on opportunistic Decodeand- Forward with constrained partial selection and reactive relaying strategies in dual-hop cooperative Nakagami-m fading links. The source/destination, which is based on the unique knowledge of local channel state information, selects the best relay to increase the chances of cooperation in both uplink and downlink communications when the direct link is also available. After deriving new expressions for the cumulative distribution functions of the variables of interest, the outage probability of the system is obtained in closed-form. We also derive the ε-outage capacity in different particular cases, and the obtained results - when the channel model is reduced to a Rayleigh fading - either are new or correspond to those previously obtained in other works. Simulation results confirm the accuracy of our analysis for a large selection of system and fading parameters and provide a new insight into the design and optimization of cooperative configurations. © 2012 IEEE.

  1. Protective Controller against Cascade Outages with Selective Harmonic Compensation Function

    Science.gov (United States)

    Abramovich, B. N.; Kuznetsov, P. A.; Sychev, Yu A.

    2018-05-01

    The paper presents data on the power quality and development of protective devices for the power networks with distributed generation (DG).The research has shown that power quality requirements for DG networks differ from conventional ones. That is why main tendencies, protective equipment and filters should be modified. There isa developed algorithm for detection and prevention of cascade outages that can lead to the blackoutin DG networks and there was a proposed structural scheme for a new active power filter for selective harmonics compensation. Analysis of these theories and equipment led to the development of protective device that could monitor power balance and cut off non-important consumers. The last part of the article describes a microcontroller prototype developed for connection to the existing power station control center.

  2. Improvement of availability of PWR nuclear plants through the reduction of the time required for refueling/maintenance outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Mayers, J.B.; Soth, L.G.

    1978-04-01

    The objective of the project, conducted by Commonwealth Research Corporation and Westinghouse Electric Corporation, is to identify improvements in procedures and equipment which will reduce the time required for refueling/maintenance outages at PWR nuclear power plants. The outage of Commonwealth Edison Zion Station Unit 1 in March through May of 1976 was evaluated to identify those items which caused delays and those work activities that offer the potential for significant improvements that could reduce the overall duration of the outage and achieve an improvement in the plant's availability for power production. Modifications in procedures have been developed and were evaluated during one or more outages in 1977. Conceptual designs have been developed for equipment modifications to the refueling system that could reduce the time required for the refueling portion of the outage. The purpose of the interim report is to describe those conceptual designs and to assess their impact upon future outages. Recommendations are included for the implementation of these equipment improvements in a continuation of this program as a demonstration of plant availability benefits that can be realized in PWR nuclear plants already in operation or under construction

  3. Outage Analysis and Optimization of SWIPT in Network-Coded Two-Way Relay Networks

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ruihong Jiang

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper investigates the outage performance of simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT in network-coded two-way relay systems, where a relay first harvests energy from the signals transmitted by two sources and then uses the harvested energy to forward the received information to the two sources. We consider two transmission protocols, power splitting two-way relay (PS-TWR and time switching two-way relay (TS-TWR protocols. We present two explicit expressions for the system outage probability of the two protocols and further derive approximate expressions for them in high and low SNR cases. To explore the system performance limits, two optimization problems are formulated to minimize the system outage probability. Since the problems are nonconvex and have no known solution methods, a genetic algorithm- (GA- based algorithm is designed. Numerical and simulation results validate our theoretical analysis. It is shown that, by jointly optimizing the time assignment and SWIPT receiver parameters, a great performance gain can be achieved for both PS-TWR and TS-TWR. Moreover, the optimized PS-TWR always outperforms the optimized TS-TWR in terms of outage performance. Additionally, the effects of parameters including relay location and transmit powers are also discussed, which provide some insights for the SWIPT-enabled two-way relay networks.

  4. Outage Performance of Decode-and-Forward in Two-Way Relaying with Outdated CSI

    KAUST Repository

    Hyadi, Amal

    2015-01-07

    In this paper, we analyze the outage behavior of decode-and-forward relaying in the context of selective two-way cooperative systems. First, a new relay selection metric is proposed to take into consideration both transmission rates and instantaneous link conditions between cooperating nodes. Afterwards, the outage probability of the proposed system is derived for Nakagami-m fading channels in the case when perfect channel state information is available and then extended to the more realistic scenario where the available channel state information (CSI) is outdated due to fast fading. New expressions for the outage probability are obtained, and the impact of imperfect CSI on the performance is evaluated. Illustrative numerical results, Monte Carlo simulations, and comparisons with similar approaches are presented to assess the accuracy of our analytical derivations and confirm the performance gain of the proposed scheme.

  5. International outage coding system for nuclear power plants. Results of a co-ordinated research project

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2004-05-01

    The experience obtained in each individual plant constitutes the most relevant source of information for improving its performance. However, experience of the level of the utility, country and worldwide is also extremely valuable, because there are limitations to what can be learned from in-house experience. But learning from the experience of others is admittedly difficult, if the information is not harmonized. Therefore, such systems should be standardized and applicable to all types of reactors satisfying the needs of the broad set of nuclear power plant operators worldwide and allowing experience to be shared internationally. To cope with the considerable amount of information gathered from nuclear power plants worldwide, it is necessary to codify the information facilitating the identification of causes of outages, systems or component failures. Therefore, the IAEA established a sponsored Co-ordinated Research Project (CRP) on the International Outage Coding System to develop a general, internationally applicable system of coding nuclear power plant outages, providing worldwide nuclear utilities with a standardized tool for reporting outage information. This TECDOC summarizes the results of this CRP and provides information for transformation of the historical outage data into the new coding system, taking into consideration the existing systems for coding nuclear power plant events (WANO, IAEA-IRS and IAEA PRIS) but avoiding duplication of efforts to the maximum possible extent

  6. Management of planned unit outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Brune, W.

    1984-01-01

    Management of planned unit outages at the Bruno Leuschner Nuclear Power Plant is based on the experience gained with Soviet PWR units of the WWER type over a period of more than 50 reactor-years. For PWR units, planned outages concentrate almost exclusively on annual refuellings and major maintenance of the power plant facilities involved. Planning of such major maintenance work is based on a standardized basic network plan and a catalogue of standardized maintenance and inspection measures. From these, an overall maintenance schedule of the unit and partial process plans of the individual main components are derived (manually or by computer) and, in the temporal integration of major maintenance at every unit, fixed starting times and durations are determined. More than 75% of the maintenance work at the Bruno Leuschner Nuclear Power Plant is carried out by the plant's own maintenance personnel. Large-scale maintenance of every unit is controlled by a special project head. He is assisted by commissioners, each of whom is responsible for his own respective item. A daily control report is made. The organizational centre is a central office which works in shifts around the clock. All maintenance orders and reports of completion pass through this office; thus, the overall maintenance schedule can be corrected daily. To enforce the proposed operational strategy, suitable accompanying technical measures are required with respect to effective facility monitoring and technical diagnosis, purposeful improvement of particularly sensitive components and an increase in the effectiveness of maintenance work by special technologies and devices. (author)

  7. Control Room Tasks During Refueling in Ringhals 1 Nuclear Power Plant - Operator performance during refuelling outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Stroebeck, Einar; Olausson, Jesper; Van Gemst, Paul

    1998-01-01

    This paper discusses the performance and tasks of the operators in the control room during refuelling outages. Analyses of such events have, during the last years, shown that the risk for nuclear accidents is not negligible compared with the risk at higher reactor power levels. Some experts have the opinion that, due to mistakes during an outage, the risk for such accidents during the outage and other accidents later on during power operation is higher than in other plant situations. The high risk level is mainly a result of errors at maintenance actions and supervision of lining up of safety systems. Most of the control rooms in existing NPPs were designed more than 10 years ago. At that time the activities and the tasks for the operators were not very well understood. Procedures for refuelling and other activities during the outages were not described very well. Often the utility organisation for refuelling outages was not established at the start of the control room design. Experience from operation during many years has shown that the performance of operators can be improved in existing plant, and thus risks be reduced, by upgrading the control room. These issues have been studied as a part of the modernisation project for Ringhals 1, an ABB Atom BWR owned by Vattenfall AB in Sweden. The paper will describe the working model for upgrading the control room and important issues to take care of with respect to refuelling outages. The identified issues will be used as the input for improving control room philosophy and the individual technical systems. (authors)

  8. Life extension and replacement management for RAPS type steam generators

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Arya, R.C.; Rastogi, A.K.

    1996-01-01

    The steam generating equipment in first four units of Indian PHWRs Rajasthan Atomic Power Station (RAPS) 1-2 and Madras Atomic Power Station (MAPS) 1-2 are hairpin type and comprise of eight boiler assemblies. Each assembly consists of identical, single pass, inverted and vertical hairpin heat exchangers (10 for RAPS and 11 for MAPS) containing 195 monel-400 U tubes of 12.7 mm dia x 1.242 mm thick. The hot heavy water flows through these tubes and imparts heat to feed, light demineralized water entering the shell at the bottom of preheat leg. The heat is generated on the outer surface of the tubes. Details of studies carried out for life extension and replacement management for RAPS type steam generators are given. 1 fig., 5 tabs

  9. Design and performance of BWC replacement steam generators for PWR systems

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Klarner, R.; Steinmoeller, F.; Millman, J.; Schneider, W.

    1998-01-01

    In recent years, Babcock and Wilcox Canada (BWC) has provided a number of PWR Replacement Steam Generators (RSGS) to replace units that had experienced extensive Alloy 600 tube degradation. BWC RSG units are in operation at Northeast Utilities' Millstone Unit 2, Rochester Gas and Electric's Ginna Station, Duke Energy's Catawba Unit 1, McGuire Unit 1 and 2, Florida Power and Light's St. Lucie Unit 1 and Commonwealth Edison's Byron 1 Station. Extensive start-up performance characteristics have been obtained for Millstone 2, Ginna, McGuire 1, and Catawba 1 RSGS. The Millstone 2, Ginna and Catawba 1 RSGs have also undergone extensive inspections following their first cycle of operation. The design and start-up performance characteristics of these RSGs are presented. The BWC Replacement Steam generators were designed to fit the existing envelope of pressure boundary dimensions to ensure licensability and integration into the Nuclear Steam Supply System. The RSGs were provided with a tube bundle of Alloy 690TT tubing, sized to match or exceed the original steam generator (OSG) thermal performance including provision for the reduced thermal conductivity of Alloy 690 relative to Alloy 600. The RSG tube bundle configurations provide a higher circulation design relative to the OSG, and feature corrosion resistant lattice grid and U-bend tube supports which provide effective anti-vibration support. The tube bundle supports accommodate relatively unobstructed flow and allow unrestrained structural interactions during thermal transients. Efficient steam separators assure low moisture carryover as well as high circulation. Performance measurements obtained during start-up verify that the BWC RSGs meet or exceed the specified thermal and moisture carryover performance requirements. RSG water level stability results at nor-mal operation and during plant transients have been excellent. Visual and ECT inspections have confirmed minimal deposition and 100% tube integrity following

  10. Operational reliability of the Point Lepreau GS standby generators

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Loughead, D. A.; McGregor, A. T. [Safety and Compllance Group, New Brunswick Electric Power Commission, Point Lepreau Generating Station, P.O.Box 10 Lepreau, New Brunswick E0G 2H0 (Canada)

    1986-02-15

    Performance of the two Point Lepreau GS standby generators during the first three years of licensed station operation is reviewed. It is shown that the mandated reliability/availability requirements have been met. The nature of starting and running failures has been examined and the consequences, in terms of design and procedural changes, discussed. A brief review of standby generator outages is included to permit estimates of standby generator availability and total Class III standby power unavailability. A pair of simple equations is introduced as a means of estimating the probable economic penalty, both cumulative and incremental, associated with the running failure of one standby generator while the other is on a maintenance outage. (authors)

  11. Operational reliability of the Point Lepreau GS standby generators

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Loughead, D.A.; McGregor, A.T.

    1986-01-01

    Performance of the two Point Lepreau GS standby generators during the first three years of licensed station operation is reviewed. It is shown that the mandated reliability/availability requirements have been met. The nature of starting and running failures has been examined and the consequences, in terms of design and procedural changes, discussed. A brief review of standby generator outages is included to permit estimates of standby generator availability and total Class III standby power unavailability. A pair of simple equations is introduced as a means of estimating the probable economic penalty, both cumulative and incremental, associated with the running failure of one standby generator while the other is on a maintenance outage. (authors)

  12. A novel fusion methodology to bridge GPS outages for land vehicle positioning

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Chen, Wei; Li, Xu; Song, Xiang; Xu, Qimin; Li, Bin; Song, Xianghui

    2015-01-01

    Many intelligent transportation system applications require accurate, reliable, and continuous vehicle position information whether in open-sky environments or in Global Positioning System (GPS) denied environments. However, there remains a challenging task for land vehicles to achieve such positioning performance using low-cost sensors, especially microelectromechanical system (MEMS) sensors. In this paper, a novel and cost-effective fusion methodology to bridge GPS outages is proposed and applied in the Inertial Navigation System (INS)/GPS/ compass integrated positioning system. In the implementation of the proposed methodology, a key data preprocessing algorithm is first developed to eliminate the noise in inertial sensors in order to provide more accurate information for subsequent modeling. Then, a novel hybrid strategy incorporating the designed autoregressive model (AR model)-based forward estimator (ARFE) with Kalman filter (KF) is presented to predict the INS position errors during GPS outages. To verify the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed methodology, real road tests with various scenarios were performed. The proposed methodology illustrates significant improvement in positioning accuracy during GPS outages. (paper)

  13. Scale models: A proven cost-effective tool for outage planning

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Lee, R. [Commonwealth Edison Co., Morris, IL (United States); Segroves, R. [Sargent & Lundy, Chicago, IL (United States)

    1995-03-01

    As generation costs for operating nuclear stations have risen, more nuclear utilities have initiated efforts to improve cost effectiveness. Nuclear plant owners are also being challenged with lower radiation exposure limits and new revised radiation protection related regulations (10 CFR 20), which places further stress on their budgets. As source term reduction activities continue to lower radiation fields, reducing the amount of time spent in radiation fields becomes one of the most cost-effective ways of reducing radiation exposure. An effective approach for minimizing time spent in radiation areas is to use a physical scale model for worker orientation planning and monitoring maintenance, modifications, and outage activities. To meet the challenge of continued reduction in the annual cumulative radiation exposures, new cost-effective tools are required. One field-tested and proven tool is the physical scale model.

  14. Refueling outage services in Spanish Nuclear Power Plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Landete, J. L.; Soto, M.; Nunuez, A.

    2007-01-01

    DOMINGUIS Group, through its 75 years of business development, has positioned as the Spanish leader Group in Services for the Nuclear Energy and Petrochemical Sectors. In this article, we present the most significant services summary that, through the companies that constitute DOMINGUIS Group, we have developed in Refueling Outage in Spanish Nuclear Power Plants. (Author)

  15. Outage performance of Decode-and-Forward partial selection in Nakagami-m fading channels

    KAUST Repository

    Benjillali, Mustapha

    2010-01-01

    In this paper, we investigate the outage performance of Decode-and-Forward with partial selection relaying in dualhop cooperative Nakagami-m fading links. The source, based on the unique knowledge of local first hop channel state information, selects the best relay to increase the chances of successful decoding and hence the possibility of cooperation when the direct link is also available. After deriving the exact distribution of the sum of two gamma variates with the same shape parameter, the outage probability of the system-with and without the direct link-is obtained in closed-form. We also derive the ε-outage capacity in different particular cases, and the obtained results- when the channel model is reduced to a Rayleigh fading-are either new or correspond to those previously obtained in other works. Simulation results confirm the accuracy of our analysis for a large selection of system and fading parameters. © 2009 IEEE.

  16. Power Allocation and Outage Probability Analysis for SDN-based Radio Access Networks

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zhao, Yongxu; Chen, Yueyun; Mai, Zhiyuan

    2018-01-01

    In this paper, performance of Access network Architecture based SDN (Software Defined Network) is analyzed with respect to the power allocation issue. A power allocation scheme PSO-PA (Particle Swarm Optimization-power allocation) algorithm is proposed, the proposed scheme is subjected to constant total power with the objective of minimizing system outage probability. The entire access network resource configuration is controlled by the SDN controller, then it sends the optimized power distribution factor to the base station source node (SN) and the relay node (RN). Simulation results show that the proposed scheme reduces the system outage probability at a low complexity.

  17. Thermal Hydraulic Assessment for Loss of SDCS Event During the Outage of CANDU Reactor

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Kim, Jonghyun [Gnest, Inc. Taejon (Korea, Republic of); Lee, Kwangho; Oh, Haechol; Jun, Hwangyong [KEPRI, Taejon (Korea, Republic of)

    2006-07-01

    During the outage(overhaul) of the nuclear power plant, there are several operating states other than the full power state, that is 'Hot-Zero Power', 'Depressurized-Cooldown', and 'Partially Drained'. Until now safety assessment has not been done much for this operating state of CANDU type reactor worldwide. For the accuracy and confidence of PSA for the CANDU outage, the safety analysis is necessary. At the first stage, we analyzed the thermal hydraulic characteristics and safety of the postulated event of loss of shutdown cooling system (SDCS) during the partially drained state which is the longest one in the middle of outage period. As an analysis tool, this study uses the best estimate thermal hydraulic code, RELAP5/CANDU which was modified according to the CANDU specific characteristics and based on RELAP5.Mod3.

  18. Outage planning in nuclear power plants. A paradigm shift from an external towards an integrated project planning tool

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Rosemann, Andreas [Gesellschaft fuer integrierte Systemplanung (GiS) mbH, Weinheim (Germany)

    2014-05-15

    In nuclear power plants it is common to carry out the technical planning of the annual outage work orders in an Enterprise Application Management (EAM) system and to schedule the outage tasks in a project planning tool. The reason for this is historical: Former EAM systems did not (or just to some extend) offer the necessary functionalities to realise the scheduling of the outage; graphical support for the planning was not provided at all. Consequently, scheduling the annual outage was performed in a separate planning tool. Modern Enterprise Application Management (EAM) software builds on established project planning tools with respect to the functionalities and timing of work orders. As a standard they provide editable charts as well as a lot of functionalities which are required for scheduling the annual outage. The functional gap between the demanded planning functionalities and the functionalities provided by the EAM system has been significantly reduced. Depending on the deployed software itself it is possible to extend the EAM system with little effort (in comparison to the promising advantages) so that external project timing planning tools are not required any more. By shifting towards an integrated planning tool, efficiency in planning an outage as well as the quality of communication of the current planning status increases. Furthermore, the basis of information for work orders by the control room staff and therefore safety can be enhanced. (orig.)

  19. Outage planning in nuclear power plants. A paradigm shift from an external towards an integrated project planning tool

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Rosemann, Andreas

    2014-01-01

    In nuclear power plants it is common to carry out the technical planning of the annual outage work orders in an Enterprise Application Management (EAM) system and to schedule the outage tasks in a project planning tool. The reason for this is historical: Former EAM systems did not (or just to some extend) offer the necessary functionalities to realise the scheduling of the outage; graphical support for the planning was not provided at all. Consequently, scheduling the annual outage was performed in a separate planning tool. Modern Enterprise Application Management (EAM) software builds on established project planning tools with respect to the functionalities and timing of work orders. As a standard they provide editable charts as well as a lot of functionalities which are required for scheduling the annual outage. The functional gap between the demanded planning functionalities and the functionalities provided by the EAM system has been significantly reduced. Depending on the deployed software itself it is possible to extend the EAM system with little effort (in comparison to the promising advantages) so that external project timing planning tools are not required any more. By shifting towards an integrated planning tool, efficiency in planning an outage as well as the quality of communication of the current planning status increases. Furthermore, the basis of information for work orders by the control room staff and therefore safety can be enhanced. (orig.)

  20. Outage performance of opportunistic two-way amplify-and-forward relaying with outdated channel state information

    KAUST Repository

    Hwang, Kyusung

    2013-09-01

    In this paper, we study the outage performance of an amplify-and-forward (AF)-based two-way relaying (TWR) system with multiple relays where a single relay selection is performed based on outdated channel state information (CSI). Specifically, we propose a single relay selection scheme in AF-based TWR system under outdated CSI conditions. With this policy, we offer a statistical analysis of the signal-to-noise ratio per hop and analyze the outage probability with asymmetric outage thresholds based on CSI-assisted AF protocol. Additionally, we provide the exact and asymptotic expressions based on the provided statistical/joint statistical analyses of a dual-hop AF transmission. Finally, we verify our analytical results with some selected computer-based simulation results. © 1972-2012 IEEE.

  1. Experience on tangent delta norms adopted for repaired generator

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Misra, N.N.; Sood, D.K.

    2005-01-01

    The repair techniques of the generators are very crucial for avoiding prolonged forced outages. The crucial decisions based on sound knowledge and judgement becomes essential in many cases. The unit under discussions had failed on account of flash over in the Exciter end overhang windings. The failure resulted in damaged to the stator bars as well as generator core. The damaged end packets of the stator core were replaced at site. The total winding bars were removed from stator core and damaged bars were replaced with new bars. The rest of the bars were tested for tangent delta tests for reuse. Acceptance norms of 0.6% tip up from 0.2pu to 0.6pu of rated stator voltage were adopted. Some of the bars outside the acceptable limits of tangent delta were shifted close to neutral so that the standard norms of tan delta are met. This was felt necessary because lead-time for procurement of new bars was more than six months. The above-adopted norms for tangent delta will be of much use for the operating utilities. The unit under discussions was of 67.5 MW operating at 50 Hz, 0.85 pf lag and had logged 66160.46 operating hours before failure. (author)

  2. Automation of steam generator services at public service electric & gas

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Cruickshank, H.; Wray, J.; Scull, D. [Public Service Electric & Gas, Hancock`s Bridge, NJ (United States)

    1995-03-01

    Public Service Electric & Gas takes an aggressive approach to pursuing new exposure reduction techniques. Evaluation of historic outage exposure shows that over the last eight refueling outages, primary steam generator work has averaged sixty-six (66) person-rem, or, approximately tewenty-five percent (25%) of the general outage exposure at Salem Station. This maintenance evolution represents the largest percentage of exposure for any single activity. Because of this, primary steam generator work represents an excellent opportunity for the development of significant exposure reduction techniques. A study of primary steam generator maintenance activities demonstrated that seventy-five percent (75%) of radiation exposure was due to work activities of the primary steam generator platform, and that development of automated methods for performing these activities was worth pursuing. Existing robotics systems were examined and it was found that a new approach would have to be developed. This resulted in a joint research and development project between Westinghouse and Public Service Electric & Gas to develop an automated system of accomplishing the Health Physics functions on the primary steam generator platform. R.O.M.M.R.S. (Remotely Operated Managed Maintenance Robotics System) was the result of this venture.

  3. Global NDE Best Practice for Technology Improvement, Outage Management, Foreign Material Exclusion and Dose Control

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Glass, S. W.; Mohr, F.

    2010-01-01

    Non Destructive Examination (NDE) is a critical element of both Boiling Water and Pressurized Water Reactor outages. Frequently this includes critical path activity so both the utility and the inspection vendor are under intense pressure to perform the work quickly. Concurrent with AREVA's new global organization of NDE resources, AREVA NDE SOLUTIONS, efforts have intensified for global application of lessons learned and best practices. These best practices include new developments as well as continuous improvements to well established tools and NDE techniques. Advancements range from steam generator robots, advanced steam generator deposit characterization sensors and method, new phased array approaches for PWR and BWR reactor vessel examination, new sensors and approaches for RPV head examinations, plus advanced internals examination robots and methods. In addition to specialized tools and techniques, best practice includes numerous management innovations. AREVA's multi-disciplined integrated nuclear worker strategy helps to minimize the total number of personnel deployed to multi-task outages. Specific design and on-site practice has been implemented to minimize or eliminate foreign material from the reactor system and vigorous pursuit of dose management practices keeps our nuclear worker dose as low as reasonably achievable. The industry is moving to much more conservative nuclear worker dose limits. While this is proving to be an issue with many vendors, AREVA has had an internal policy of <2R since 2006. Globalizing the organization also helps AREVA manage peaks and unplanned emergency inspections from an enlarged pool of globally qualified inspection personnel and tools. (Author)

  4. Cost of Lightning Strike Related Outages of Visual Navigational Aids at Airports in the United States

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rakas, J.; Nikolic, M.; Bauranov, A.

    2017-12-01

    Lightning storms are a serious hazard that can cause damage to vital human infrastructure. In aviation, lightning strikes cause outages to air traffic control equipment and facilities that result in major disruptions in the network, causing delays and financial costs measured in the millions of dollars. Failure of critical systems, such as Visual Navigational Aids (Visual NAVAIDS), are particularly dangerous since NAVAIDS are an essential part of landing procedures. Precision instrument approach, an operation utilized during the poor visibility conditions, utilizes several of these systems, and their failure leads to holding patterns and ultimately diversions to other airports. These disruptions lead to both ground and airborne delay. Accurate prediction of these outages and their costs is a key prerequisite for successful investment planning. The air traffic management and control sector need accurate information to successfully plan maintenance and develop a more robust system under the threat of increasing lightning rates. To analyze the issue, we couple the Remote Monitoring and Logging System (RMLS) database and the Aviation System Performance Metrics (ASPM) databases to identify lightning-induced outages, and connect them with weather conditions, demand and landing runway to calculate the total delays induced by the outages, as well as the number of cancellations and diversions. The costs are then determined by calculating direct costs to aircraft operators and costs of passengers' time for delays, cancellations and diversions. The results indicate that 1) not all NAVAIDS are created equal, and 2) outside conditions matter. The cost of an outage depends on the importance of the failed system and the conditions that prevailed before, during and after the failure. The outage that occurs during high demand and poor weather conditions is more likely to result in more delays and higher costs.

  5. Methodology if inspections to carry out the nuclear outages model; Metodologia de inspeccciones para cumplir el modelo de paradas nucleares

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Aycart, J.; Mortenson, S.; Fourquet, J. M.

    2005-07-01

    Before the nuclear generation industry was deregulated in the United States, refueling and maintenance outages in nuclear power plants usually lasted orotund 100 days. After deregulation took effect, improved capability factors and performances became more important. As a result, it became essential to reduce the critical path time during the outage, which meant that activities that had typically been done in series had to be executed in parallel. The new outage model required the development of new tools and new processes, The 360-degree platform developed by GE Energy has made it possible to execute multiple activities in parallel. Various in-vessel visual inspection (IVVI) equipments can now simultaneously perform inspections on the pressurized reactor vessel (RPV) components. The larger number of inspection equipments in turn results in a larger volume of data, with the risk of increasing the time needed for examining them and postponing the end of the analysis phase, which is critical for the outage. To decrease data analysis times, the IVVI Digitalisation process has been development. With this process, the IVVI data are sent via a high-speed transmission line to a site outside the Plant called Center of Excellence (COE), where a team of Level III experts is in charge of analyzing them. The tools for the different product lines are being developed to interfere with each other as little as possible, thus minimizing the impact of the critical path on plant refueling activities. Methods are also being developed to increase the intervals between inspection. In accordance with the guidelines of the Boiling Water Reactor Vessel and Internals project (BWRVIP), the intervals between inspections are typically longer if ultrasound volumetric inspections are performed than if the scope is limited to IVVI. (Author)

  6. Outage performance of reactive cooperation in Nakagami-m fading channels

    KAUST Repository

    Benjillali, Mustapha; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

    2010-01-01

    In this paper, we investigate the outage performance of Decode-and-Forward with reactive relaying in dual-hop cooperetive Nakagaml-m fading links. The destination, based on the umque knowledge of local second hop channel state information, selects

  7. Outage performance of cognitive radio systems with Improper Gaussian signaling

    KAUST Repository

    Amin, Osama; Abediseid, Walid; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

    2015-01-01

    design the SU signal by adjusting its transmitted power and the circularity coefficient to minimize the SU outage probability while maintaining a certain PU quality-of-service. Finally, we evaluate the proposed bounds and adaptive algorithms by numerical

  8. Design and performance of BWC replacement steam generators for PWR systems

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Klarner, R.; Steinmoeller, F.; Millman, J.; Schneider, W. [Babcock and Wilcox Canada, Cambridge, Ontario (Canada)

    1998-07-01

    In recent years, Babcock and Wilcox Canada (BWC) has provided a number of PWR Replacement Steam Generators (RSGS) to replace units that had experienced extensive Alloy 600 tube degradation. BWC RSG units are in operation at Northeast Utilities' Millstone Unit 2, Rochester Gas and Electric's Ginna Station, Duke Energy's Catawba Unit 1, McGuire Unit 1 and 2, Florida Power and Light's St. Lucie Unit 1 and Commonwealth Edison's Byron 1 Station. Extensive start-up performance characteristics have been obtained for Millstone 2, Ginna, McGuire 1, and Catawba 1 RSGS. The Millstone 2, Ginna and Catawba 1 RSGs have also undergone extensive inspections following their first cycle of operation. The design and start-up performance characteristics of these RSGs are presented. The BWC Replacement Steam generators were designed to fit the existing envelope of pressure boundary dimensions to ensure licensability and integration into the Nuclear Steam Supply System. The RSGs were provided with a tube bundle of Alloy 690TT tubing, sized to match or exceed the original steam generator (OSG) thermal performance including provision for the reduced thermal conductivity of Alloy 690 relative to Alloy 600. The RSG tube bundle configurations provide a higher circulation design relative to the OSG, and feature corrosion resistant lattice grid and U-bend tube supports which provide effective anti-vibration support. The tube bundle supports accommodate relatively unobstructed flow and allow unrestrained structural interactions during thermal transients. Efficient steam separators assure low moisture carryover as well as high circulation. Performance measurements obtained during start-up verify that the BWC RSGs meet or exceed the specified thermal and moisture carryover performance requirements. RSG water level stability results at nor-mal operation and during plant transients have been excellent. Visual and ECT inspections have confirmed minimal deposition and 100

  9. A Study on the Frequency of Initiating Event of OPR-1000 during Outage Periods

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Hong Jae Beol; Jae, Moo Sung [Hanyang Univ., Seoul (Korea, Republic of)

    2013-10-15

    These sources of data did not reflect the latest event data which have occurred during the PWR outage to the frequencies of initiating event Electric Power Research Institute(EPRI) in USA collected the data of loss of decay heat removal during outage from 1989 to 2009 and published technical report. Domestic operating experiences for LOOP is gathered in Operational Performance Information System for Nuclear Power Plant(OPIS). To reduce conservatism and obtain completeness for LPSD PSA, those data should be collected and used to update the frequencies. The frequencies of LOSDC and LOOP are reevaluated using the data of EPRI and OPIS in this paper. Quantification is conducted to recalculate core damage frequency(CDF), since the rate is changed. The results are discussed below. To make an accurate estimate of the initiating events of LPSD PSA, the event data were collected and the frequencies of initiating events were updated using Bayesian approach. CDF was evaluated through quantification. Δ CDF is -40% and the dominant contributor is pressurizer PSV stuck open event. The most of the event data in EPRI TR were collected from US nuclear power plant industry. Those data are not enough to evaluate outage risk precisely. Therefore, to reduce conservatism and obtain completeness for LPSD PSA, the licensee event report and domestic data should be collected and reflected to the frequencies of the initiating events during outage.

  10. 10 CFR 501.191 - Use of natural gas or petroleum for certain unanticipated equipment outages and emergencies...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 10 Energy 4 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Use of natural gas or petroleum for certain unanticipated... Natural Gas or Petroleum for Emergency and Unanticipated Equipment Outage Purposes § 501.191 Use of natural gas or petroleum for certain unanticipated equipment outages and emergencies defined in section...

  11. Outage Probability Analysis in Power-Beacon Assisted Energy Harvesting Cognitive Relay Wireless Networks

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ngoc Phuc Le

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available We study the performance of the secondary relay system in a power-beacon (PB assisted energy harvesting cognitive relay wireless network. In our system model, a secondary source node and a relay node first harvest energy from distributed PBs. Then, the source node transmits its data to the destination node with the help of the relay node. Also, fading coefficients of the links from the PBs to the source node and relay node are assumed independent but not necessarily identically distributed (i.n.i.d Nakagami-m random variables. We derive exact expressions for the power outage probability and the channel outage probability. Based on that, we analyze the total outage probability of the secondary relay system. Asymptotic analysis is also performed, which provides insights into the system behavior. Moreover, we evaluate impacts of the primary network on the performance of the secondary network with respect to the tolerant interference threshold at the primary receiver as well as the interference introduced by the primary transmitter at the secondary source and relay nodes. Simulation results are provided to validate the analysis.

  12. A heuristic model for risk and cost impacts of plant outage maintenance schedule

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Mohammad Hadi Hadavi, S.

    2009-01-01

    Cost and risk are two major competing criteria in maintenance optimization problems. If a plant is forced to shutdown because of accident or fear of accident happening, beside loss of revenue, it causes damage to the credibility and reputation of the business operation. In this paper a heuristic model for incorporating three compelling optimization criteria (i.e., risk, cost, and loss) into a single evaluation function is proposed. Such a model could be used in any evaluation engine of outage maintenance schedule optimizer. It is attempted to make the model realistic and to address the ongoing challenges facing a schedule planner in a simple and commonly understandable fashion. Two simple competing schedules for the NPP feedwater system are examined against the model. The results show that while the model successfully addresses the current challenges for outage maintenance optimization, it properly demonstrates the dynamics of schedule in regards to risk, cost, and losses endured by maintenance schedule, particularly when prolonged outage and lack of maintenance for equipments in need of urgent care are of concern.

  13. Evaluation of allowed outage time using PRA results

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Johanson, G.

    1985-01-01

    In a probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) different measures of risk importance can be established. These measures can be used as a basis for further evaluation and determination of allowed outage time for specific components, within safety systems of a nuclear power plant. In order to optimize the allowed outage time (AOT) stipulated in the plant's Technical Specification it is necessary to create a methodology which could incorporate existing PRA data into a quantitative extrapolation. In order to evaluate the plant risk status due to AOT in a quantitative manner, the risk achievement worth is utilized. Risk achievement worth is defined as follows: to measure the worth of a feature, in achieving the present risk, one approach is to remove the feature and then determine how much the risk has increased. Thus, the risk achievement worth is formally defined to be the increase in risk if the feature were assumed not be there or to be failed. Another parameter of interest for this analysis is the shutdown risk increase. The shutdown risk achievement worth must be incorporated into the accident sequence risk achievement worth to arrive at an optimal set of plant specific AOTs

  14. Assessment of productivity at four generating plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Saarlas, M.; Nelson, M.

    1976-01-01

    The 1975 FEA study of power plant reliability was undertaken as a first step in improving the productivity of large (larger than 400 MW) generating units by attempting to trace outages to their root causes so that meaningful corrective action can be taken at the root of the problem. Trident Engineering Associates studied the operation, maintenance, management, and manning of two fossil-fueled and two nuclear-fueled units, one each of above average and one below average reliability (high availability and low forced outage rate). It was expected that the differences between a highly reliable unit and a less reliable unit would lead to recommendations which would be useful for improving productivity of units throughout the country. The findings are of two basic types: (1) general concepts covering problem areas, fundamental reasons and immediate symptoms behind the problems, methods used to eliminate or alleviate the problems, and proposed solutions; (2) details which provide statistics that establish the relative lost productivity by fundamental causes. Eight root causes (fundamental reasons for failures or outages) were established into which most failures and outages could be assigned. Twenty nine cause factors (causes of failure) were established which assisted in assigning the failures and outages to a root cause

  15. Electropolishing of replacement steam generator channel heads at Millstone-2 PWR

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hudson, M.J.B.; Raney, H.; Raney, D.; Spalaris, C.N.

    1992-07-01

    A field application of EPRI-developed steam generator electropolishing technique was performed at Millstone-2 PWR. The process was qualified under previous programs on a laboratory scale, but it was thought appropriate to scale up application to full size components. Replacement of steam generators at Millstone-2 provided a unique opportunity to demonstrate that electropolishing can be applied safely and at a cost which was judged to be recoverable after a small number of fuel cycles. The project, preparation, electropolishing and cleanup, was completed at the reactor site in 25 working days. An alternate, less costly electrolyte solution was qualified for use in future applications

  16. Study on European Nuclear Safety Practices during Planned Outages at Nuclear Power Plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2001-12-01

    The present project was aimed at providing: a description of the current status of nuclear safety practices during planned outages at nuclear power plants followed in Europe; the criteria for the safety analysis of future reactors at the design stage; proposing a set of recommendations on good practices and criteria leading to the improvement of nuclear safety during those conditions. The work was organised in 3 phases: Collecting data on current practices; Analysis of questionnaire answers and drawing up of safety good practices references and recommendations; Collecting relevant ideas related to the future reactors at design stage (European Pressurised Water Reactor, European Passive Plant project, European Utilities Requirements and Utilities Requirement Document project). The key element of the performed work was the detailed questionnaire, based on bibliographical review, expert experience and outage practices available in the working team. Different safety areas and activities were covered: outage context; nuclear safety; outage strategy, organisation and control; operating feedback; use of Probabilistic Safety Assessment. The questionnaire was answered by 12 European nuclear power plants, representing 9 different European countries and three different types of reactors (Pressurised Water Reactor, Boiling Water Reactor and Water Water Energy Reactor). Conclusions were drawn under the following headers: Organisational survey and generalities Organisational effectiveness Quality of maintenance Quality of operation Engineering support, management of modification Specific aspects Each analysed subject includes the following topics: Questions background with a summary and the aim of the questions. Current status, that describes common practices, as derived from the answers to the questionnaire, and some examples of good specific practices. Identified good practices. (author)

  17. Management of main generator condition during long term plant shut down at Higashidori Nuclear Power Station Unit 1

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kato, Seiji

    2014-01-01

    Higashidori Nuclear Power Station Unit 1 shut down on February 6, 2011 to start 4th refuel outage. On March 11, 2011, we keep going refuel outage on this moment a large earthquake occurred and tsunami was generated following it which called 'Great East Japan Earthquake'. Refuel outage takes 3 ∼ 5 months normally but Higashidori NPS still keeping shut down over 3 years due to some issues. In this paper, we introduce about management of Main generator condition during long term plant shut down situation in addition to normal plant shut down situation to keep well. (author)

  18. Outage probability of dual-hop partial relay selection with feedback delay in the presence of interference

    KAUST Repository

    Al-Qahtani, Fawaz S.

    2011-09-01

    In this paper, we investigate the outage performance of a dual-hop relaying systems with partial relay selection and feedback delay. The analysis considers the case of Rayleigh fading channels when the relaying station as well as the destination undergo mutually independent interfering signals. Particularly, we derive the cumulative distribution function (c.d.f.) of a new type of random variable involving sum of multiple independent exponential random variables, based on which, we present closed-form expressions for the exact outage probability of a fixed amplify-and-forward (AF) and decode-and-forward (DF) relaying protocols. Numerical results are provided to illustrate the joint effect of the delayed feedback and co-channel interference on the outage probability. © 2011 IEEE.

  19. Siemens capabilities to perform detailed fuel inspections during short outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Knecht, K.; Reparaz, A.

    1999-01-01

    Fuel inspection data are used to support development activities such as corrosion resistant cladding and advanced fuel assembly designs that will reach higher burnups. Increased inspection efforts are necessary to optimize fuel management and performance strategies. Additionally, there is an increasing trend to reduce outage time in Germany and abroad. Siemens has recently developed several timesaving systems for rapid inspection of fuel assemblies and core components. Siemens' focus in developing these systems has been to obtain data in reduced reactor outage time while increasing both the volume and the quality of the measured data. Mast sipping for PWRs is used for identifying leaking fuel assemblies and allows early detection of leaks during downloading of the fuel assemblies from the reactor. An In-Core sipping system for BWRs based on a hood technique to allow testing a full core within 16 hours is under development. (authors)

  20. Study of electrical power facilities and measures for planned outages in Japanese hemodialysis clinics after the Great East Japan Earthquake.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ishida, Kai; Sawa, Manami; Fujiwara, Kousaku; Hirose, Minoru; Tsuruta, Harukazu; Takeuchi, Akihiro; Ikeda, Noriaki

    2013-02-01

    The Great East Japan Earthquake on 11 March 2011 caused major damage in northeastern Japan. The Kanto region experienced a massive electrical power shortage in the summer of 2011. A questionnaire was submitted to 354 hemodialysis clinics in Kanagawa prefecture and the Tokyo metropolitan area, excluding isolated islands, and 176 responses were analyzed (49.7%). The questions included evaluation of the availability of a private electricity generator, countermeasures in case of a planned outage, awareness of saving electricity, and improvement of safety of medical devices or electrical facilities after the earthquake. Only 12% of the clinics had private electricity generators and many clinics had no plans to introduce this facility. However, 96% of the clinics had established countermeasures to deal with a planned outage. Many clinics planned to provide dialysis on a different day or at a different time. All clinics had tried hard to establish procedures to save electricity in the summer of 2011, and 84% of the clinics had reconsidered and improved the safety of medical devices or electricity facilities after the earthquake. These results show that the awareness of crisis management was greatly improved in the wake of the earthquake. © 2012 The Authors. Therapeutic Apheresis and Dialysis © 2012 International Society for Apheresis.

  1. Outage planning in nuclear power plants. A paradigm shift from an external towards an integrated project planning tool

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Rosemann, Andreas [Gesellschaft fuer integrierte Systemplanung (GIS) mbH, Weinheim (Germany)

    2014-07-01

    Latest demands on nuclear plant inspections are the ongoing actualisation of the outage plan on the basis of the current work progress and current events as well as the permanent access to the current planning status and work process of all people involved in the outage. Modern EAM systems (EAM: Enterprise Application Management) made up ground on established project planning tools with regard to functionalities for scheduling work orders. A shift towards an integrated planning in the EAM system increases the efficiency in the outage planning and improves the communication of current states of planning. (orig.)

  2. Outage planning in nuclear power plants. A paradigm shift from an external towards an integrated project planning tool

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Rosemann, Andreas

    2014-01-01

    Latest demands on nuclear plant inspections are the ongoing actualisation of the outage plan on the basis of the current work progress and current events as well as the permanent access to the current planning status and work process of all people involved in the outage. Modern EAM systems (EAM: Enterprise Application Management) made up ground on established project planning tools with regard to functionalities for scheduling work orders. A shift towards an integrated planning in the EAM system increases the efficiency in the outage planning and improves the communication of current states of planning. (orig.)

  3. Outage probability analysis of a secondary user in an underlay dual hop cognitive amplify and forward relay network

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Kiran Chandra

    2016-09-01

    Full Text Available This paper presents the performance evaluation of a secondary user (SU in an underlay cognitive dual-hop relaying system considering instantaneous as well as average channel information of the interfering links (from the secondary source and relay to the primary receiver and the data link from the secondary source to relay, to calculate transmit power and amplifying gain of secondary system. Comparison of above mentioned cases is done for two different scenarios – with direct path and without direct path. We evaluate the performance considering two different diversity techniques namely as selection combining (SC and maximum ratio combining (MRC. The effect of different fading channels (Rayleigh and Nakagami on the outage performance of the SU for the two diversity techniques is also shown. The outage probability of the SU is reduced when the diversity techniques are used (with direct path as compared to the outage probability of SU without direct path. We find that the outage performance is better for instantaneous channel information as compared to average channel information for the links. We observe that MRC provides better performance than SC. Furthermore, this work shows that the outage performance of the SU has been improved when the Nakagami fading channel (m = 2 is considered instead of Rayleigh fading channel.

  4. Resolution of torsional vibration issue for large turbine generators

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Evans, D.G.; Giesecke, H.D.; Willman, E.C.; Moffitt, S.P.

    1995-01-01

    The excitation of turbine generator torsional natural frequencies in the region near 120 Hz by electrical transients in the power system has resulted in blade failures for several large 1,800 rpm nuclear turbines. At Cleveland Electric's Perry Nuclear Power plant a combination of advanced measurement techniques and analyses were used to identify and resolve a potential torsional vibration problem without adverse impact on the plant availability. The Perry turbine generator consists of a high pressure turbine, three low pressure turbines with 43 inch last stage blades, and a 1,250 MWe four pole generator operating at 1,800 rpm. Torsional vibration measurements obtained from random vibration during operation were acquired just prior to the 1994 refueling outage. The measurements indicated that the 26th torsional mode of vibration was just under 120 Hz and within the range of frequencies for which the manufacturer recommends modifying the unit to shift the problem torsional natural frequency. Extensive analytical modeling was used to design a modification to shift the torsional natural frequencies away from 120 Hertz and the modification was implemented during the refueling outage without affecting outage critical path. An off-line ramp test and additional on-line monitoring performed at the conclusion of the outage confirmed that the on-line method provided accurate measurements of the torsional natural frequencies and demonstrated that, with the modification, the torsional natural frequencies were sufficiently removed from 120 Hertz to allow turbine generator operation. The modification, which involved brazing of the tie wires on all last stage blades, also significantly reduces the stress on the last stage blades that result from negative sequence currents, further increasing the operating margin of the turbine generator with respect to electrical transients and faults

  5. Efficient Simulation of the Outage Probability of Multihop Systems

    KAUST Repository

    Ben Issaid, Chaouki; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim; Tempone, Raul

    2017-01-01

    In this paper, we present an efficient importance sampling estimator for the evaluation of the outage probability of multihop systems with amplify-and-forward channel state-information-assisted. The proposed estimator is endowed with the bounded relative error property. Simulation results show a significant reduction in terms of number of simulation runs compared to naive Monte Carlo.

  6. Efficient Simulation of the Outage Probability of Multihop Systems

    KAUST Repository

    Ben Issaid, Chaouki

    2017-10-23

    In this paper, we present an efficient importance sampling estimator for the evaluation of the outage probability of multihop systems with amplify-and-forward channel state-information-assisted. The proposed estimator is endowed with the bounded relative error property. Simulation results show a significant reduction in terms of number of simulation runs compared to naive Monte Carlo.

  7. Outages of electric power supply resulting from cable failures Boston Edison Company system

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    None

    1980-07-01

    Factual data are provided regarding 5 electric power supply interruptions that occurred in the Boston Metropolitan area during April to June, 1979. Common to all of these outages was the failure of an underground cable as the initiating event, followed by multiple equipment failures. There was significant variation in the voltage ratings and types of cables which failed. The investigation was unable to delineate a single specific Boston Edison design operating or maintenance practice that could be cited as the cause of the outages. After reviewing the investigative report the following actions were recommended: the development and implementation of a plan to eliminate the direct current cable network; develop a network outage restoration plan; regroup primary feeder cables wherever possible to minimize the number of circuits in manholes, and to separate feeders to high load density areas; develop a program to detect incipient cable faults; evaluate the separation of the north and south sections of Back Bay network into separate networks; and, as a minimum, install the necessary facilities to make it possible to re-energize one section without interfering with the other; and re-evaluate the cathodic protection scheme where necessary. (LCL)

  8. Outage performance analysis of underlay cognitive RF and FSO wireless channels

    KAUST Repository

    Ansari, Imran Shafique; Abdallah, Mohamed M.; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim; Qaraqe, Khalid A.

    2014-01-01

    In this work, the outage performance analysis of a dual-hop transmission system composed of asymmetric radio frequency (RF) channel cascaded with a free-space optical (FSO) link is presented. For the RF link, an underlay cognitive network

  9. Modernization of electric power systems of the Laguna Verde Nuclear Power Plant

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Gabaldon, M. A.; Gonzalez, J. J.; Prieto, I.

    2011-01-01

    The Power Increase Project of Laguna Verde Nuclear Plant has entailed the replacement, in one unique outage, of the main power electrical systems of the Plant (Isolated Phase Bars, Generator Circuit Breaker and Main Transformer) as well as the replacement of the Turbo-group. The simultaneous substitution of these entire system has never been done by any other Plant in the world, representing an engineering challenge that embraced the design of the new equipment up to the planning, coordination and management of the construction and commissioning works, which were successfully carried out by Iberdrola within the established outage period /47 days) for both units. (Author)

  10. Modernization of electric power systems of the Laguna Verde Nuclear Power Plant; Modernizacion de los sistemas electricos de potencia de la Central Nuclear de Laguna Verde

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Gabaldon, M. A.; Gonzalez, J. J.; Prieto, I.

    2011-07-01

    The Power Increase Project of Laguna Verde Nuclear Plant has entailed the replacement, in one unique outage, of the main power electrical systems of the Plant (Isolated Phase Bars, Generator Circuit Breaker and Main Transformer) as well as the replacement of the Turbo-group. The simultaneous substitution of these entire system has never been done by any other Plant in the world, representing an engineering challenge that embraced the design of the new equipment up to the planning, coordination and management of the construction and commissioning works, which were successfully carried out by Iberdrola within the established outage period /47 days) for both units. (Author)

  11. Investigation on cause of outage of Wide Range Monitor (WRM) in High Temperature engineering Test Reactor (HTTR). Transport operation toward investigation for cause of outage

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Shinohara, Masanori; Sawahata, Hiroaki; Kawamoto, Taiki; Saito, Kenji; Takada, Shoji; Yoshida, Naoaki; Isozaki, Ryosuke; Katsuyama, Kozo; Motegi, Toshihiro

    2012-08-01

    An event, in which one of WRMs were disabled to detect the neutron flux in the reactor core, occurred during the period of reactor shut down of HTTR in March, 2010. The actual life time of WRM was unexpectedly shorter than the past developed life time. Investigation of the cause of the outage of WRM toward the recovery of the life time up to the developed life is one of the issues to develop the technology basis of High Temperature Gas cooled Reactor (HTGR). Then, a post irradiation examination was planned to specify the damaged part causing the event in the WRM was also planned. For the investigation, the X-ray computed tomography scanner in Fuels Monitoring Facility (FMF). This report describes the preliminary investigation on the cause of outage of the WRM. The results of study for transportation method of the irradiated WRM from HTTR to FMF is also reported with the record to complete the transport operation. (author)

  12. A RLS-SVM Aided Fusion Methodology for INS during GPS Outages.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Yao, Yiqing; Xu, Xiaosu

    2017-02-24

    In order to maintain a relatively high accuracy of navigation performance during global positioning system (GPS) outages, a novel robust least squares support vector machine (LS-SVM)-aided fusion methodology is explored to provide the pseudo-GPS position information for the inertial navigation system (INS). The relationship between the yaw, specific force, velocity, and the position increment is modeled. Rather than share the same weight in the traditional LS-SVM, the proposed algorithm allocates various weights for different data, which makes the system immune to the outliers. Field test data was collected to evaluate the proposed algorithm. The comparison results indicate that the proposed algorithm can effectively provide position corrections for standalone INS during the 300 s GPS outage, which outperforms the traditional LS-SVM method. Historical information is also involved to better represent the vehicle dynamics.

  13. A RLS-SVM Aided Fusion Methodology for INS during GPS Outages

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Yiqing Yao

    2017-02-01

    Full Text Available In order to maintain a relatively high accuracy of navigation performance during global positioning system (GPS outages, a novel robust least squares support vector machine (LS-SVM-aided fusion methodology is explored to provide the pseudo-GPS position information for the inertial navigation system (INS. The relationship between the yaw, specific force, velocity, and the position increment is modeled. Rather than share the same weight in the traditional LS-SVM, the proposed algorithm allocates various weights for different data, which makes the system immune to the outliers. Field test data was collected to evaluate the proposed algorithm. The comparison results indicate that the proposed algorithm can effectively provide position corrections for standalone INS during the 300 s GPS outage, which outperforms the traditional LS-SVM method. Historical information is also involved to better represent the vehicle dynamics.

  14. On the Outage Performance of Full-Duplex Selective Decode-and-Forward Relaying

    KAUST Repository

    Khafagy, Mohammad Galal

    2013-02-25

    We evaluate the outage performance in a three-terminal full-duplex relay channel that adopts a selective decode-and-forward protocol, taking relay self-interference into account. Previous work focused on coverage extension scenarios where direct source-destination transmissions are neglected or considered as interference. In this work, we account for the relay self-interference, and exploit the cooperative diversity offered by the independently fading source/relay message replicas that arrive at the destination. We present an approximate, yet accurate, closed-form expression for the end-to-end outage probability that captures their joint effect. With the derived expression in hand, we propose a relay transmit power optimization scheme that only requires the relay knowledge of channel statistics. Finally, we corroborate our analysis with simulations.

  15. Outage Performance of Hybrid FSO/RF System with Low-Complexity Power Adaptation

    KAUST Repository

    Rakia, Tamer

    2016-02-26

    Hybrid free-space optical (FSO) / radio-frequency (RF) systems have emerged as a promising solution for high data- rate wireless communication systems. We consider truncated channel inversion based power adaptation strategy for coherent and non- coherent hybrid FSO/RF systems, employing an adaptive combining scheme. Specifically, we activate the RF link along with the FSO link when FSO link quality is unacceptable, and adaptively set RF transmission power to ensure constant combined signal-to-noise ratio at receiver terminal. Analytical expressions for the outage probability of the hybrid system with and without power adaptation are derived. Numerical examples show that, the hybrid FSO/RF systems with power adaptation achieve considerable outage performance improvement over conventional hybrid FSO/RF systems without power adaptation. © 2015 IEEE.

  16. Radio resource management scheme and outage analysis for network-assisted multi-hop D2D communications

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Leila Melki

    2016-11-01

    Full Text Available In a cellular network it's very difficult to make spectrum resource more efficiently. Device-to-Device (D2D technology enables new service opportunities, and provides high throughput and reliable communication while reducing the base station load. For better total performance, short-range D2D links and cellular links share the same radio resource and the management of interference becomes a crucial task. Here we argue that single-hop D2D technology can be used to further improve cellular networks performance if the key D2D radio resource management algorithms are suitably extended to support multi-hop D2D communications. Aiming to establish a new paradigm for the analysis and design of multi-hop D2D communications, We propose a radio resource allocation for multi-hop D2D routes based on interference avoidance approach in LTE-A networks. On top of that, we investigate the outage probability of D2D communication. We first introduce a new definition of outage probability by considering the maximum distance to be allowable for single-hop transmission. Then we study and analyze the outage performance of a multi-hop D2D route. We derive the general closed form expression of outage probability of the multi-hop D2D routes. The results demonstrate that the D2D radio, sharing the same resources as the cellular network, provide higher capacity compared to pure cellular communication where all the data is transmitted through the base station. They also demonstrate that the new method of calculation of D2D multi hop outage probability has better performance than classical method defined in the literature.

  17. Power plant and utility performance: how world-record outages are being achieved in the USA

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Anon.

    1997-01-01

    Two record-breaking refuelling outages at power reactors in the USA are described. The first, at Browns Ferry 3 BWR, was accomplished in 19 days 39 minutes - a shorter time than for an General Electric BWR anywhere in the world hitherto. The management attribute this success to planning, personnel and performance. As well as refuelling, inspections and maintenance, major modifications were carried out. These included the completion of the installation of digital feedwater reactor level control and digital feedwater heater level control. The second outage, at South Texas Project 2 BWR, at 17 days 14 hours and 10 minutes was the fastest yet recorded for any US nuclear unit. This achievement is ascribed to excellent outage preparation and scheduling, the superior condition of the plant equipment and teamwork and safety consciousness on behalf of the plant personnel. Finally, brief consideration is given to the nuclear performance recovery programme of Commonwealth Edison and Ontario Hydro Nuclear. (UK)

  18. Performance Analysis of Secrecy Outage Probability for AF-Based Partial Relay Selection with Outdated Channel Estimates

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Kyu-Sung Hwang

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available We study the secrecy outage probability of the amplify-and-forward (AF relaying protocol, which consists of one source, one destination, multiple relays, and multiple eavesdroppers. In this system, the aim is to transmit the confidential messages from a source to a destination via the selected relay in presence of eavesdroppers. Moreover, partial relay selection scheme is utilized for relay selection based on outdated channel state information where only neighboring channel information (source-relays is available and passive eavesdroppers are considered where a transmitter does not have any knowledge of eavesdroppers’ channels. Specifically, we offer the exact secrecy outage probability of the proposed system in a one-integral form as well as providing the asymptotic secrecy outage probability in a closed-form. Numerical examples are given to verify our provided analytical results for different system conditions.

  19. Rancho Seco Nuclear Generating Station, Unit 1. Annual report for 1976

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1977-03-01

    Net electrical energy generated was 2,205,091 MWH with the generator on line 2,662 hrs. Information is presented concerning operations, changes, tests, maintenance, fuel performance, refueling, shutdowns and outages, containment local leak rate testing, and power generation

  20. Replacement of steam generators at Dampierre 1 France

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Bacot, J.; Chorain, M.; Collot, Y.; Dorimini, G.

    1991-01-01

    1990 was the year of the first steam generator replacement operation on EdF's facilities. The site chosen was Dampierre 1 (900 MW PWR unit with 3 primary coolant loops). The project was a thorough success characterized by: (1) A work schedule which was entirely met and even improved on: 70 work days from the end of fuel unloading authorizing start of work in the reactor building up to the end of refitting in readiness for the primary circuit hydraulic tests, i.e. a gain of one week compared with the forecast work schedule, (2) A final dosimetry less than 230 man-rem for a target of 450 man-rem, (3) Safety: no serious accidents during the 300,000 hours worked. It also provided practical proof of French industry's capacity to undertake an SGR operation. (author)

  1. Resolving piping analysis issues to minimize impact on installation activities during refueling outage at nuclear power plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Bhavnani, D.

    1996-01-01

    While it is required to maintain piping code compliance for all phases of installation activities during outages at a nuclear plant, it is equally essential to reduce challenges to the installation personnel on how plant modification work should be performed. Plant betterment activities that incorporate proposed design changes are continually implemented during the outages. Supporting analysis are performed to back these activities for operable systems. The goal is to reduce engineering and craft man-hours and minimize outage time. This paper outlines how plant modification process can be streamlined to facilitate construction teams to do their tasks that involve safety related piping. In this manner, installation can proceed by minimizing on the spot analytical effort and reduce downtime to support the proposed modifications. Examples are provided that permit performance of installation work in any sequence. Piping and hangers including the branch lines are prequalified and determined operable. The system is up front analyzed for all possible scenarios. The modification instructions in the work packages is flexible enough to permit any possible installation sequence. The benefit to this approach is large enough in the sense that valuable outage time is not extended and on site analytical work is not required

  2. Plant process computer replacements - techniques to limit installation schedules and costs

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Baker, M.D.; Olson, J.L.

    1992-01-01

    Plant process computer systems, a standard fixture in all nuclear power plants, are used to monitor and display important plant process parameters. Scanning thousands of field sensors and alarming out-of-limit values, these computer systems are heavily relied on by control room operators. The original nuclear steam supply system (NSSS) vendor for the power plant often supplied the plant process computer. Designed using sixties and seventies technology, a plant's original process computer has been obsolete for some time. Driven by increased maintenance costs and new US Nuclear Regulatory Commission regulations such as NUREG-0737, Suppl. 1, many utilities have replaced their process computers with more modern computer systems. Given that computer systems are by their nature prone to rapid obsolescence, this replacement cycle will likely repeat. A process computer replacement project can be a significant capital expenditure and must be performed during a scheduled refueling outage. The object of the installation process is to install a working system on schedule. Experience gained by supervising several computer replacement installations has taught lessons that, if applied, will shorten the schedule and limit the risk of costly delays. Examples illustrating this technique are given. This paper and these examples deal only with the installation process and assume that the replacement computer system has been adequately designed, and development and factory tested

  3. Areva: experiences in outage services

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Wiemeier, R.; Mueller, N.; Blanco, I. J.

    2010-01-01

    As the world leader in the nuclear industry, Areva is firmly committed to the safe and reliable operation of the Spanish nuclear power plants. Following this commitment, Areva has established the subsidiary Areva NP Services Spain as a local platform to provide nuclear services for the Spanish nuclear power plants. being integrated and supported by the global Areva Group, Areva NP Services Spain is able to offer services solutions to all customers demands while maintaining close and sustainable relationships with them. This integration also allows the Spanish personnel of Areva to employ their skills by working in multinational teams in international projects. This article will present the capacities, and the most important recent national and international project performed by Areva NP Services Spain in the field of outage services. (Author)

  4. Loss of benefits resulting from nuclear-power-plant outages. Volume 1. Approach and analysis

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Buehring, W.A.; Peerenboom, J.P.

    1982-03-01

    This report discusses and analyzes some of the important consequences of nuclear-power-plant unavailability, and quantifies a number of technical measures of loss of benefits that may help the Nuclear Regulatory Commission make decisions involving nuclear-power-plant licensing and operation. The consequences include increased costs of system generation, increased demand for nonnuclear and often scarce fuels, and reduced system reliability. Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) developed case studies to investigate the effects of hypothetical nuclear-plant shutdowns. The studies developed quantitative measures of both short- and long-term economic, fuel use, and reliability effects that could result from the unavailability of nuclear generating units. Results showed that production costs (fuel costs plus operation and maintenance costs) increase significantly whenever an operating reactor is shut down. Production-cost increases ranged from less than 10% to over 60%; the normalized increases for the first year of reactor outage ranged from $0.125 million per MWe-year to $0.33 million per MWe-year

  5. PWR steam generators tube integrity: plugging criteria for PWSCC in roll transition zone

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Mattar Neto, Miguel; Cruz, Julio R.B.

    1999-01-01

    One of the most important causes for tube plugging in PWR (Pressurized Water Reactor) steam generators is the degradation mechanism called Primary Water Stress Corrosion Cracking (PWSCC) in roll transition zone (RTZ) near the tubesheet, mainly for Alloy 600 tubes. To avoid an excessive tube plugging, alternative criteria have been developed based on an approach that consists in withdrawing from service any tube containing a defect for which there is a high probability of a critical size under accident conditions to be reached during next operation cycle. Predictions of the number of tubes to be plugged can be done aiming at preventive maintenance and tube repair, and even a steam generator replacement, without a large and non-planned plant outage. This work presents important aspects related to tube plugging criteria for PWSCC in RTZ based on the risk of break after a leak detection. Calculations of allowable crack length and allowable leak rate for a particular situation are also shown. (author)

  6. Outage analysis for underlay cognitive networks using incremental regenerative relaying

    KAUST Repository

    Tourki, Kamel

    2013-02-01

    Cooperative relay technology has recently been introduced into cognitive radio (CR) networks to enhance the network capacity, scalability, and reliability of end-to-end communication. In this paper, we investigate an underlay cognitive network where the quality of service (QoS) of the secondary link is maintained by triggering an opportunistic regenerative relaying once it falls under an unacceptable level. Analysis is conducted for two schemes, referred to as the channel-state information (CSI)-based and fault-tolerant schemes, respectively, where different amounts of CSI were considered. We first provide the exact cumulative distribution function (cdf) of the received signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) over each hop with colocated relays. Then, the cdf\\'s are used to determine a very accurate closed-form expression for the outage probability for a transmission rate $R$. In a high-SNR region, a floor of the secondary outage probability occurs, and we derive its corresponding expression. We validate our analysis by showing that the simulation results coincide with our analytical results in Rayleigh fading channels. © 1967-2012 IEEE.

  7. Final report of MoReMO 2011-2012. Modelling resilience for maintenance and outage

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Gotcheva, N.; Macchi, L.; Oedewald, P.; Eitrheim, M.H.R.; Axelsson, C.; Reiman, T.; Pietikaeinen, E.

    2013-04-01

    The project Modelling Resilience for Maintenance and Outage (MoReMO) represents a two-year joint effort by VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, Institute for Energy Technology (IFE, Norway) and Vattenfall (Sweden) to develop and test new approaches for safety management. The overall goal of the project was to present concepts on how resilience can be operationalized and built in a safety critical and socio-technical context. Furthermore, the project also aimed at providing guidance for other organizations that strive to develop and improve their safety performance in a business driven industry. We have applied four approaches in different case studies: Organisational Core Task modelling (OCT), Functional Resonance Analysis Method (FRAM), Efficiency Thoroughness Trade-Off (ETTO) analysis, and Work Practice and Culture Characterisation. During 2011 and 2012 the MoReMO project team has collected data through field observations, interviews, workshops, and document analysis on the work practices and adjustments in maintenance and outage in Nordic NPPs. The project consisted of two sub-studies, one focused on identifying and assessing adjustments and supporting resilient work practices in maintenance activities, while the other focused on handling performance trade-offs in maintenance and outage, as follows: A. Adjustments in maintenance work in Nordic nuclear power plants (VTT and Vattenfall). B. Handling performance trade-offs - the support of adaptive capacities (IFE and Vattenfall). The historical perspective of maintenance and outage management (Chapter 1.1) was provided by Vattenfall. Together, the two sub-studies have provided valuable insights for understanding the rationale behind work practices and adjustments, their effects on resilience, promoting flexibility and balancing between flexibility and reliability. (Author)

  8. Final report of MoReMO 2011-2012. Modelling resilience for maintenance and outage

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Gotcheva, N.; Macchi, L.; Oedewald, P. [Technical Research Centre of Finland (VTT), Espoo (Finland); Eitrheim, M.H.R. [Institute for Energy Technology (IFE) (Norway); Axelsson, C.; Reiman, T.; Pietikaeinen, E. [Ringhals AB (NPP), Vattenfall AB (Sweden)

    2013-04-15

    The project Modelling Resilience for Maintenance and Outage (MoReMO) represents a two-year joint effort by VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, Institute for Energy Technology (IFE, Norway) and Vattenfall (Sweden) to develop and test new approaches for safety management. The overall goal of the project was to present concepts on how resilience can be operationalized and built in a safety critical and socio-technical context. Furthermore, the project also aimed at providing guidance for other organizations that strive to develop and improve their safety performance in a business driven industry. We have applied four approaches in different case studies: Organisational Core Task modelling (OCT), Functional Resonance Analysis Method (FRAM), Efficiency Thoroughness Trade-Off (ETTO) analysis, and Work Practice and Culture Characterisation. During 2011 and 2012 the MoReMO project team has collected data through field observations, interviews, workshops, and document analysis on the work practices and adjustments in maintenance and outage in Nordic NPPs. The project consisted of two sub-studies, one focused on identifying and assessing adjustments and supporting resilient work practices in maintenance activities, while the other focused on handling performance trade-offs in maintenance and outage, as follows: A. Adjustments in maintenance work in Nordic nuclear power plants (VTT and Vattenfall). B. Handling performance trade-offs - the support of adaptive capacities (IFE and Vattenfall). The historical perspective of maintenance and outage management (Chapter 1.1) was provided by Vattenfall. Together, the two sub-studies have provided valuable insights for understanding the rationale behind work practices and adjustments, their effects on resilience, promoting flexibility and balancing between flexibility and reliability. (Author)

  9. Evolution of management activities and performance of the Point Lepreau Steam Generators

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Slade, J.; Keating, J.; Gendron, T.

    2007-01-01

    The Point Lepreau steam generators have been in service since 1983 when the plant was commissioned. During the first thirteen years of operation, Point Lepreau steam generator maintenance issues led to 3-4% unplanned plant incapability Steam generator fouling, corrosion, and the introduction of foreign materials during maintenance led to six tube leaks, two unplanned outages, two lengthy extended outages, and degraded thermal performance during this period. In recognition of the link between steam generator maintenance activities and plant performance, improvements to steam generator management activities have been continuously implemented since 1987. This paper reviews the evolution of steam generator management activities at Point Lepreau and the resulting improved trends in performance. Plant incapability from unplanned steam generator maintenance has been close to zero since 1996. The positive trends have provided a strong basis for the management strategies developed for post-refurbishment operation. (author)

  10. Outage Analysis of Practical FSO/RF Hybrid System With Adaptive Combining

    KAUST Repository

    Rakia, Tamer

    2015-08-01

    Hybrid free-space optical (FSO)/radio-frequency (RF) systems have emerged as a promising solution for high-data-rate wireless transmission. We present and analyze a transmission scheme for the hybrid FSO/RF communication system based on adaptive combining. Specifically, only FSO link is active as long as the instantaneous signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) at the FSO receiver is above a certain threshold level. When it falls below this threshold level, the RF link is activated along with the FSO link and the signals from the two links are combined at the receiver using a dual-branch maximal ratio combiner. Novel analytical expression for the cumulative distribution function (CDF) of the received SNR for the proposed hybrid system is obtained. This CDF expression is used to study the system outage performance. Numerical examples are presented to compare the outage performance of the proposed hybrid FSO/RF system with that of the FSO-only and RF-only systems. © 1997-2012 IEEE.

  11. Zero-Outage Cellular Downlink with Fixed-Rate D2D Underlay

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Kiilerich Pratas, Nuno; Popovski, Petar

    2015-01-01

    . D2D connections can be instrumental in localized aggregation of uplink M2M traffic to a more capable cellular device, before being finally delivered to the Base Station (BS). In this paper we show that a fixed M2M rate is an enabler of efficient Machine-Type D2D underlay operation taking place......, but not the interfering channels from the MTDs to U, we prove that there is a positive downlink rate that can always be decoded by U, leading to zero-outage of the downlink signal. This is a rather surprising consequence of the features of the multiple access channel and the fixed rate RM. We also consider the case...... of a simpler, single-user decoder at U with successive interference cancellation. However, with single-user decoder, a positive zero-outage rate exists only when NM = 1 and is zero when NM > 1. This implies that joint decoding is instrumental in enabling fixed-rate underlay operation....

  12. OPG's approach of crediting natural circulation in outage heat sinks

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Fung, K.K.; Mackinnon, J.C.

    2001-01-01

    A review of crediting natural circulation as a backup means of removing the reactor core decay heat during an outage in Ontario Power Generation's nuclear stations was completed in 2000. The objective was to define the configurations and conditions under which natural circulation can be confidently credited as an effective heat transport mechanism for use in shutdown heat sink management. The project was an interdisciplinary program, and involved analyses in the areas of heat transport system thermalhydaulics, fuel and fuel channel thermal and mechanical behaviour, radiation physics, and probabilistic risks. The assessment shows that it is economically acceptable to credit natural circulation as a backup means of removing the core decay heat whenever the no fuel failure criteria are met. The economic risks associated with such a potential use decrease with time after shutdown. The waiting times after shutdown when there would be various levels of risks of damaging the pressure tubes and fuel bundles were derived for use in planning maintenance activities so as to minimize the economic risks. (author)

  13. Outage probability of distributed beamforming with co-channel interference

    KAUST Repository

    Yang, Liang

    2012-03-01

    In this letter, we consider a distributed beamforming scheme (DBF) in the presence of equal-power co-channel interferers for both amplify-and-forward and decode-and-forward relaying protocols over Rayleigh fading channels. We first derive outage probability expressions for the DBF systems. We then present a performance analysis for a scheme relying on source selection. Numerical results are finally presented to verify our analysis. © 2011 IEEE.

  14. On the outage capacity of the block fading channel at low-power regime

    KAUST Repository

    Rezki, Zouheir

    2014-06-01

    Outage performance of the M-block fading with additive white Gaussian noise (BF-AWGN) is investigated at low-power regime. We consider delay-constrained constant-rate communications with perfect channel state information (CSI) at both the transmitter and the receiver (CSI-TR), under a short-term power constraint. We show that selection diversity that allocates all the power to the strongest block is asymptotically optimal. Then, we provide a simple characterization of the outage probability in the regime of interest. We quantify the reward due to CSI-TR over the constant-rate constant-power scheme and show that this reward increases with the delay constraint. For instance, for Rayleigh fading, we find that a power gain up to 4.3 dB is achievable. © 2014 IEEE.

  15. Outage probability analysis of wireless sensor networks in the presence of channel fading and spatial correlation

    KAUST Repository

    Al-Murad, Tamim M.

    2011-07-01

    Evaluating the reliability of wireless sensor networks is becoming more important as theses networks are being used in crucial applications. The outage probability defined as the probability that the error in the system exceeds a maximum acceptable threshold has recently been used as a measure of the reliability of such systems. In this work we find the outage probability of wireless sensor network in different scenarios of distributed sensing where sensors\\' readings are affected by spatial correlation and in the presence of channel fading. © 2011 IEEE.

  16. Economic and Environmental Impacts of the Columbia-Snake River Extended Lock Outage

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-03-01

    This reports main objective is to analyze the change in rates and modal costs for shippers, commodity industries and ports prior to, during and after the fifteen week lock outage and to determine the impacts on the environment in the form of energ...

  17. On the Outage Performance of Full-Duplex Selective Decode-and-Forward Relaying

    KAUST Repository

    Khafagy, Mohammad Galal; Ismail, Amr; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim; Aissa, Sonia

    2013-01-01

    expression for the end-to-end outage probability that captures their joint effect. With the derived expression in hand, we propose a relay transmit power optimization scheme that only requires the relay knowledge of channel statistics. Finally, we corroborate our analysis with simulations.

  18. Outage Analysis of Mixed Underlay Cognitive RF MIMO and FSO Relaying with Interference Reduction

    KAUST Repository

    Al-Qahtani, Fawaz S.; El-Malek, Ahmed H. Abd; Ansari, Imran S.; Radaydeh, Redha Mahmoud Mesleh; Zummo, Salam A.

    2017-01-01

    In this paper, we study the outage performance of multiuser mixed underlay radio frequency (RF)/multidestinations free-space optical (FSO) links. For RF links, we consider a secondary network with multiple users that can communicate with multiple destinations through a relaying node. The relay is equipped with an antenna array at the RF side, and it uses the amplify-and-forward (AF) protocol. The primary users (PUs) are equipped with multiple antennas at transmit and receive nodes. The RF link is subjected to the aggregate PUs interference effect on the secondary network. To reduce the effect of PUs interference on secondary network at the relay node, two interference cancellation (IC) schemes are adopted, which vary in terms of complexity and achieved performance. On the other hand, the multidestination FSO links can be exploited to further enhance the quality of the second hop, and their associated channel models account for pointing errors, intensity modulation/direct detection, and heterodyne detection. For the aforementioned system model, we obtain exact and asymptotic closed-form expressions for the end-to-end outage probability. To further enhance system performance, optimal power allocation between the two hops is obtained based on the derived asymptotic outage probability expressions.

  19. Outage Analysis of Cooperative Transmission with Energy Harvesting Relay: Time Switching versus Power Splitting

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Guanyao Du

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper investigates the multiuser transmission network with an energy harvesting (EH cooperative relay, where a source transmits independent information to multiple destinations with the help of an energy constrained relay. The relay can harvest energy from the radio frequency (RF signals transmitted from the source, and it helps the multiuser transmission only by consuming the harvested energy. By adopting the time switching and the power splitting relay receiver architectures, we firstly propose two protocols, the time switching cooperative multiuser transmission (TSCMT protocol and the power splitting cooperative multiuser transmission (PSCMT protocol, to enable the simultaneous information processing and EH at the relay for the system. To evaluate the system performance, we theoretically analyze the system outage probability for the two proposed protocols and then derive explicit expressions for each of them, respectively. Numerical results are provided to demonstrate the accuracy of our analytical results and reveal that compared with traditional noncooperative scheme our proposed protocols are green solutions to offer reliable communication and lower system outage probability without consuming additional energy. In particular, for the same transmit power at the source, the PSCMT protocol is superior to the TSCMT protocol to obtain lower system outage probability.

  20. Outage Analysis of Mixed Underlay Cognitive RF MIMO and FSO Relaying with Interference Reduction

    KAUST Repository

    Al-Qahtani, Fawaz S.

    2017-03-22

    In this paper, we study the outage performance of multiuser mixed underlay radio frequency (RF)/multidestinations free-space optical (FSO) links. For RF links, we consider a secondary network with multiple users that can communicate with multiple destinations through a relaying node. The relay is equipped with an antenna array at the RF side, and it uses the amplify-and-forward (AF) protocol. The primary users (PUs) are equipped with multiple antennas at transmit and receive nodes. The RF link is subjected to the aggregate PUs interference effect on the secondary network. To reduce the effect of PUs interference on secondary network at the relay node, two interference cancellation (IC) schemes are adopted, which vary in terms of complexity and achieved performance. On the other hand, the multidestination FSO links can be exploited to further enhance the quality of the second hop, and their associated channel models account for pointing errors, intensity modulation/direct detection, and heterodyne detection. For the aforementioned system model, we obtain exact and asymptotic closed-form expressions for the end-to-end outage probability. To further enhance system performance, optimal power allocation between the two hops is obtained based on the derived asymptotic outage probability expressions.

  1. Method for estimating power outages and restoration during natural and man-made events

    Science.gov (United States)

    Omitaomu, Olufemi A.; Fernandez, Steven J.

    2016-01-05

    A method of modeling electric supply and demand with a data processor in combination with a recordable medium, and for estimating spatial distribution of electric power outages and affected populations. A geographic area is divided into cells to form a matrix. Within the matrix, supply cells are identified as containing electric substations and demand cells are identified as including electricity customers. Demand cells of the matrix are associated with the supply cells as a function of the capacity of each of the supply cells and the proximity and/or electricity demand of each of the demand cells. The method includes estimating a power outage by applying disaster event prediction information to the matrix, and estimating power restoration using the supply and demand cell information of the matrix and standardized and historical restoration information.

  2. Recent Performance of and Plasma Outage Studies with the SNS H- Source

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Stockli, Martin P [ORNL; Han, Baoxi [ORNL; Murray Jr, S N [ORNL; Pennisi, Terry R [ORNL; Piller, Chip [ORNL; Santana, Manuel [ORNL; Welton, Robert F [ORNL

    2016-01-01

    SNS ramps to higher power levels that can be sustained with high availability. The goal is 1.4 MW despite a compromised RFQ, which requires higher RF power than design levels to approach the nominal beam transmission. Unfortunately at higher power the RFQ often loses its thermal stability, a problem apparently enhanced by beam losses and high influxes of hydrogen. Delivering as much H- beam as possible with the least amount of hydrogen led to plasma outages. The root cause is the dense 1-ms long ~55-kW 2-MHz plasma pulses reflecting ~90% of the continuous ~300W, 13-MHz power, which was mitigated with a 4-ms filter for the reflected power signal and an outage resistant, slightly-detuned 13-MHz match. Lowering the H2 also increased the H- beam current to ~55 mA, and increased the transmission by ~7%.

  3. APPROACH TO ASSESSING THE PREPAREDNESS OF HOSPITALS TO POWER OUTAGES

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Lenka BREHOVSKÁ

    2017-06-01

    Full Text Available Within the secondary impacts of electricity blackouts, it is necessary to pay attention to facilities providing medical care for the population, namely the hospitals. Hospitals represent a key position in the provision of health care also in times of crisis. These facilities must provide constant care; it is therefore essential that the preparedness of such facilities is kept at a high level. The basic aim of this article is to analyse the preparedness of hospitals to power outages (power failures, blackouts within a pilot study. On that basis, a SWOT analysis is used to determine strengths and weaknesses of the system of preparedness of hospitals to power outages and solutions for better security of hospitals are defined. The sample investigated consists of four hospitals founded by the Regional Authority (hospitals Nos. 1-4 and one hospital founded by the Ministry of Health of the Czech Republic (hospital No. 5. The results of the study shows that most weaknesses of the preparedness of hospitals are represented by inadequately addressed reserves of fuel for the main backup power supply, poor knowledge of employees who are insufficiently retrained, and old backup power supplies (even 35 years in some cases.

  4. Cooperative AF Relaying in Spectrum-Sharing Systems: Outage Probability Analysis under Co-Channel Interferences and Relay Selection

    KAUST Repository

    Xia, Minghua

    2012-11-01

    For cooperative amplify-and-forward (AF) relaying in spectrum-sharing wireless systems, secondary users share spectrum resources originally licensed to primary users to communicate with each other and, thus, the transmit power of secondary transmitters is strictly limited by the tolerable interference powers at primary receivers. Furthermore, the received signals at a relay and at a secondary receiver are inevitably interfered by the signals from primary transmitters. These co-channel interferences (CCIs) from concurrent primary transmission can significantly degrade the performance of secondary transmission. This paper studies the effect of CCIs on outage probability of the secondary link in a spectrum-sharing environment. In particular, in order to compensate the performance loss due to CCIs, the transmit powers of a secondary transmitter and its relaying node are respectively optimized with respect to both the tolerable interference powers at the primary receivers and the CCIs from the primary transmitters. Moreover, when multiple relays are available, the technique of opportunistic relay selection is exploited to further improve system performance with low implementation complexity. By analyzing lower and upper bounds on the outage probability of the secondary system, this study reveals that it is the tolerable interference powers at primary receivers that dominate the system performance, rather than the CCIs from primary transmitters. System designers will benefit from this result in planning and designing next-generation broadband spectrum-sharing systems.

  5. Replacement strategy for obsolete plant computers

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Schaefer, J.P.

    1985-01-01

    The plant computers of the first generation of larger nuclear power plants are reaching the end of their useful life time with respect to the hardware. The software would be no reason for a system exchange but new tasks for the supervisory computer system, availability questions of maintenance personnel and spare parts and the demand for improved operating procedures for the computer users have stimulated the considerations on how to exchange a computer system in a nuclear power plant without extending plant outage times due to exchange works. In the Federal Republic of Germany the planning phase of such backfitting projects is well under way, some projects are about to be implemented. The base for these backfitting projects is a modular supervisory computer concept which has been designated for the new line of KWU PWR's. The main characteristic of this computer system is the splitting of the system into a data acquisition level and a data processing level. This principle allows an extension of the processing level or even repeated replacements of the processing computers. With the existing computer system still in operation the new system can be installed in a step-by-step procedure. As soon as the first of the redundant process computers of the data processing level is in operation and the data link to the data acquisition computers is established the old computer system can be taken out of service. Then the back-up processing computer can be commissioned to complete the new system. (author)

  6. Outage Analysis of Train-to-Train Communication Model over Nakagami-m Channel in High-Speed Railway

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Pengyu Liu

    2013-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper analyzes the end-to-end outage performance of high-speed-railway train-to-train communication model in high-speed railway over independent identical and nonidentical Nakagami-m channels. The train-to-train communication is inter-train communication without an aid of infrastructure (for base station. Source train uses trains on other rail tracks as relays to transmit signals to destination train on the same track. The mechanism of such communication among trains can be divided into three cases based on occurrence of possible-occurrence relay trains. We first present a new closed form for the sum of squared independent Nakagami-m variates and then derive an expression for the outage probability of the identical and non-identical Nakagami-m channels in three cases. In particular, the problem is improved by the proposed formulation that statistic for sum of squared Nakagami-m variates with identical m tends to be infinite. Numerical analysis indicates that the derived analytic results are reasonable and the outage performance is better over Nakagami-m channel in high-speed railway scenarios.

  7. Embalse steam generators - status in 2009

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Luna, P.; Yetisir, M.; Roy, S.; MacEacheron, R.

    2009-01-01

    The Embalse Nuclear Generating Station (ENGS) is a CANDU 6, a pressurized heavy water plant, with a net capacity of 648 MW. The primary heat transport system at Embalse includes four Steam Generators (SGs) manufactured by Babcock and Wilcox Canada (B and W). These steam generators are vertical recirculating heat exchangers with Incoloy 800 inverted U-tubes and an integral preheater. Embalse SGs performed very well until the late 1990s, when an increase in tube fretting was noticed in the U-bend region. In-service inspection in 2002 and 2004 confirmed that the cause of the tube fretting was flow accelerated corrosion (FAC) damage of scallop bar supports in the U-bend region. The straight leg tube support plates (TSPs) have also been degrading. Degradation was worst at the top support plates, and it was in the form of material loss on the cold leg. The hot leg TSPs were heavily fouled with deposits and flow areas were blocked. Visual inspections and subsequent studies showed that the cause of the TSP degradation was also FAC. The Embalse SGs have carbon steel supports that make them susceptible to FAC. To mitigate the effects of degraded tube support structures, three additional sets of anti-vibration bars were installed in the U-bend regions of all four steam generators in 2004. In 2007, an improved secondary-side chemistry specification was implemented to reduce the FAC rate and the hot leg TSPs was waterlanced. A root cause analysis and condition assessment was performed for the tube supports in 2007. Fitness for Service (FFS) evaluation was completed using the Canadian Industry Guidelines for steam generator tubes. The steam generators were returned to service and the plan has operated without another forced outage to date. The FAC degradation of the carbon steel U-bend tube support systems has had the most significant impact on the plant operation causing a number of forced outages. The discovery of the extent of TSP degradation and difficulties to repair TSPs

  8. Electrosleeve process for in-situ nuclear steam generator repair

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Renaud, E.; Brennenstuhl, A.M.; Stewart, D.R.; Gonzalez, F.

    2000-01-01

    Degradation of steam generator tubing by localized corrosion is a widespread problem in the nuclear industry that can lead to costly forced outages, unit derating, steam generator replacement or even the permanent shutdown of a reactor. In response to the onset of steam generator degradation at Ontario Power Generation's Pickering Nuclear Generating Station (PNGS) Unit 5, and the determined unsuitability of conventional repair methods (mechanically expanded or welded sleeves) for Alloy 400, an alternative repair technology was developed. Electrosleeve is a non-intrusive, low-temperature process that involves the electrodeposition of a nanocrystalline nickel microalloy forming a continuously bonded, structural layer over the internal diameter of the degraded region. This technology is designed to provide a long-term pressure boundary repair, fully restoring the structural integrity of the damaged region to its original state. This paper describes the Electrosleeve process for steam generator tubing repair and the unique properties of the advanced sleeve material. The successful installation of fourteen Electrosleeves that have been in service for more than six years in Alloy 400 tubing at the Pickering-S CANDU unit, and the more recent (Nov. 99) extension of the technology to Alloy 600 by the installation of 57 sleeves in a U.S. pressurized water reactor (PWR) at Callaway, is presented. The Electrosleeve process has been granted a conditional license by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). In Canada, the process of licensing Electrosleeve with the CNSC / TSSA has begun. (author)

  9. Outage and BER analysis for ultrawideband-based WPAN in Nakagami-m fading channels

    KAUST Repository

    Mehbodniya, Abolfazl; Aissa, Sonia

    2011-01-01

    layer. Approximate expressions for the outage probability and average bit error rate (BER) are derived in closed form for the MB-OFDM target receiver, taking into account multi-user interference (MUI), as well as external interference in the form of time

  10. On the outage capacity of the block fading channel at low-power regime

    KAUST Repository

    Rezki, Zouheir; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

    2014-01-01

    the transmitter and the receiver (CSI-TR), under a short-term power constraint. We show that selection diversity that allocates all the power to the strongest block is asymptotically optimal. Then, we provide a simple characterization of the outage probability

  11. Exact Outage Probability of Dual-Hop CSI-Assisted AF Relaying Over Nakagami-m Fading Channels

    KAUST Repository

    Xia, Minghua

    2012-10-01

    In this correspondence, considering dual-hop channel state information (CSI)-assisted amplify-and-forward (AF) relaying over Nakagami- m fading channels, the cumulative distribution function (CDF) of the end-to-end signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) is derived. In particular, when the fading shape factors m1 and m2 at consecutive hops take non-integer values, the bivariate H-function and G -function are exploited to obtain an exact analytical expression for the CDF. The obtained CDF is then applied to evaluate the outage performance of the system under study. The analytical results of outage probability coincide exactly with Monte-Carlo simulation results and outperform the previously reported upper bounds in the low and medium SNR regions.

  12. Alternative methodology for assessing part-through-wall cracks in carbon steel bends removed from Point Lepreau Generating Station

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Duan Xinjian, E-mail: duanx@aecl.c [Senior Engineer, Reactor Engineering Department, Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd., Mississauga, ON (Canada); Kozluk, Michael J., E-mail: kozlukm@aecl.c [Independent Consultant, Oakville, ON (Canada); Gendron, Tracy [Manager-HTS Materials Integrity, Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd., Chalk River, ON (Canada); Slade, John [Senior Technical Advisor, Point Lepreau Generating Station, Lepreau, NB (Canada)

    2011-03-15

    In 2008 April Point Lepreau Generating Station entered an extended refurbishment outage that will involve the replacement of key reactor components (fuel channels and connecting feeder pipes). Prior to the refurbishment outage, New Brunswick Power Nuclear had been successfully managing intergranular, axial cracking of carbon steel feeder piping, that were also experiencing thinning, in the Point Lepreau Generating Station, primarily by an aggressive program of inspection, repair and testing of ex-service material. For the previous three maintenance outages, a probabilistic safety evaluation (PSE) had been used to demonstrate that annual inspection of the highest risk locations maintains the nuclear safety risk from cracking at an acceptably low level. The PSE makes use of the Failure Assessment Diagram (FAD) model to predict the failure of part-through-wall cracks. Burst-pressure testing of two ex-service feeder pipe sections with part-through-wall cracks showed that this FAD model significantly under predicts the failure pressure measured in the component tests. Use of this FAD model introduces undesirable conservatism into PSE assessments that are used to optimize feeder piping inspection and maintenance plans. This paper describes an alternative finite element approach, which could be used to provide more representative structural models for use in PSE assessments. This alternative approach employs the elasto-plastic large strain finite element formulation; uses representative material properties; considers the spatial microstructural distribution; accounts for the effect of work hardening rate; models all deformation processes, i.e., uniform deformation, localized necking, and failure imitation and propagation. Excellent pre-test prediction was shown for the burst-pressure test performed in 2006. Although cold-worked feeder bends have reduced fracture toughness compared to the parent straight pipe, post-test metallurgical examinations showed that failure at the

  13. On Secrecy Outage of Relay Selection in Underlay Cognitive Radio Networks over Nakagami-m Fading Channels

    KAUST Repository

    Lei, Hongjiang; Zhang, Huan; Ansari, Imran Shafique; Ren, Zhi; Pan, Gaofeng; Qaraqe, Khalid A.; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

    2017-01-01

    In this paper, the secrecy outage performance of an underlay cognitive decode-and-forward relay network over independent but not necessarily identical distributed (i.n.i.d) Nakagami-m fading channels is investigated, in which the secondary user transmitter communicates with the secondary destination via relays, and an eavesdropper attempts to overhear the information. Based on whether the channel state information (CSI) of the wiretap links is available or not, we analyze the secrecy outage performance with optimal relay selection (ORS) and suboptimal relay selection (SRS) schemes, and multiple relays combining scheme (MRC) scheme is considered for comparison purpose. The exact and asymptotic closed-form expressions for the secrecy outage probability with three different relay selection schemes are derived and verified by Monte-Carlo simulations. The numerical results illustrate that ORS scheme always outperforms SRS and MRC schemes, and SRS scheme is better than MRC scheme in the lower fading parameters scenario. Furthermore, through asymptotic analysis, we find that these three different schemes achieve the same secrecy diversity order, which is determined by the number of the relays, and the fading parameters of the links among the relays and the destination.

  14. On Secrecy Outage of Relay Selection in Underlay Cognitive Radio Networks over Nakagami-m Fading Channels

    KAUST Repository

    Lei, Hongjiang

    2017-10-02

    In this paper, the secrecy outage performance of an underlay cognitive decode-and-forward relay network over independent but not necessarily identical distributed (i.n.i.d) Nakagami-m fading channels is investigated, in which the secondary user transmitter communicates with the secondary destination via relays, and an eavesdropper attempts to overhear the information. Based on whether the channel state information (CSI) of the wiretap links is available or not, we analyze the secrecy outage performance with optimal relay selection (ORS) and suboptimal relay selection (SRS) schemes, and multiple relays combining scheme (MRC) scheme is considered for comparison purpose. The exact and asymptotic closed-form expressions for the secrecy outage probability with three different relay selection schemes are derived and verified by Monte-Carlo simulations. The numerical results illustrate that ORS scheme always outperforms SRS and MRC schemes, and SRS scheme is better than MRC scheme in the lower fading parameters scenario. Furthermore, through asymptotic analysis, we find that these three different schemes achieve the same secrecy diversity order, which is determined by the number of the relays, and the fading parameters of the links among the relays and the destination.

  15. Outage Probability versus Fairness Trade-off in Opportunistic Relay Selection with Outdated CSI

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Vicario JoseLopez

    2009-01-01

    Full Text Available We analyze the existing trade-offs in terms of system performance versus fairness of a cooperative system based on opportunistic relay selection (ORS and with outdated channel state information (CSI. In particular, system performance is analytically evaluated in terms of outage probability, and the fairness behavior is assessed based on the power consumption at the different relays. In order to improve the fairness behavior of ORS while keeping the selection diversity gain, we propose a relay selection mechanism where the relay with the highest normalized signal-to-noise ratio (SNR is selected for relaying the source's information. The proposed strategy is compared with existing relay selection strategies by adopting a novel graphical representation inspired by expected profit versus risk plots used in modern portfolio theory. As shown in the paper, this strategy allows operating the system in more favorable points of the outage versus fairness region.

  16. Algorithms for balancing demand-side load and micro-generation in Islanded Operation

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Molderink, Albert; Bakker, Vincent; Hurink, Johann L.; Smit, Gerardus Johannes Maria

    2008-01-01

    Micro-generators are devices installed in houses pro- ducing electricity at kilowatt level. These appliances can increase energy ef��?ciency signi��?cantly, especially when their runtime is optimized. During power outages micro- generators can supply critical systems and decrease dis- comfort. In

  17. A Unified Simulation Approach for the Fast Outage Capacity Evaluation over Generalized Fading Channels

    KAUST Repository

    Rached, Nadhir B.; Kammoun, Abla; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim; Tempone, Raul

    2016-01-01

    The outage capacity (OC) is among the most important performance metrics of communication systems over fading channels. The evaluation of the OC, when equal gain combining (EGC) or maximum ratio combining (MRC) diversity techniques are employed

  18. Transcatheter Aortic Valve Replacement With Early- and New-Generation Devices in Bicuspid Aortic Valve Stenosis

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Yoon, Sung Han; Lefèvre, Thierry; Ahn, Jung Ming

    2016-01-01

    Background Few studies have evaluated the clinical outcomes of transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) in patients with bicuspid aortic valve stenosis (AS). Particularly, limited data exist comparing the results of TAVR with new-generation devices versus early-generation devices.  Objectives...... This study sought to evaluate the clinical outcomes of TAVR for bicuspid AS with early- and new-generation devices.  Methods The Bicuspid TAVR Registry is an international multicenter study enrolling consecutive patients with bicuspid AS undergoing TAVR between April 2005 and May 2015.  Results Of 301...... patients, 199 patients (71.1%) were treated with early-generation devices (Sapien XT [Edwards Lifesciences Corporation, Irvine, California]: n = 87; CoreValve [Medtronic, Minneapolis, Minnesota]: n = 112) and 102 with new-generation devices (Sapien 3 [Edwards Lifesciences Corporation]: n = 91; Lotus...

  19. A study on assessment methodology of surveillance test interval and Allowed Outage Time

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Che, Moo Seong; Cheong, Chang Hyeon; Ryu, Yeong Woo; Cho, Jae Seon; Heo, Chang Wook; Kim, Do Hyeong; Kim, Joo Yeol; Kim, Yun Ik; Yang, Hei Chang [Seoul National Univ., Seoul (Korea, Republic of)

    1997-07-15

    Objectives of this study is the development of methodology by which assesses the optimization of Surveillance Test Interval(STI) and Allowed Outage Time(AOT) using PSA method that can supplement the current deterministic methods and the improvement of Korean nuclear power plants safety. In the first year of this study, the survey about the assessment methodologies, modeling and results performed by domestic and international researches are performed as the basic step before developing the assessment methodology of this study. The assessment methodology that supplement the revealed problems in many other studies is presented and the application of new methodology into the example system assures the feasibility of this method. In the second year of this study, the sensitivity analyses about the failure factors of the components are performed in the bases of the assessment methodologies of the first study, the interaction modeling of the STI and AOT is quantified. And the reliability assessment methodology about the diesel generator is reviewed and applied to the PSA code.

  20. A study on assessment methodology of surveillance test interval and Allowed Outage Time

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Che, Moo Seong; Cheong, Chang Hyeon; Ryu, Yeong Woo; Cho, Jae Seon; Heo, Chang Wook; Kim, Do Hyeong; Kim, Joo Yeol; Kim, Yun Ik; Yang, Hei Chang

    1997-07-01

    Objectives of this study is the development of methodology by which assesses the optimization of Surveillance Test Interval(STI) and Allowed Outage Time(AOT) using PSA method that can supplement the current deterministic methods and the improvement of Korean nuclear power plants safety. In the first year of this study, the survey about the assessment methodologies, modeling and results performed by domestic and international researches are performed as the basic step before developing the assessment methodology of this study. The assessment methodology that supplement the revealed problems in many other studies is presented and the application of new methodology into the example system assures the feasibility of this method. In the second year of this study, the sensitivity analyses about the failure factors of the components are performed in the bases of the assessment methodologies of the first study, the interaction modeling of the STI and AOT is quantified. And the reliability assessment methodology about the diesel generator is reviewed and applied to the PSA code

  1. A study on assessment methodology of surveillance test interval and allowed outage time

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Chung, Chang Hyun; You, Young Woo; Cho, Jae Seon; Huh, Chang Wook; Kim, Do Hyoung; Kim, Ju Youl; Kim, Yoon Ik; Yang, Hui Chang; Park, Kang Min [Seoul National Univ., Seoul (Korea, Republic of)

    1998-03-15

    The objectives of this study is the development of methodology by which assesses the optimization of Surveillance Test Internal(STI) and Allowed Outage Time(AOT) using PSA method that can supplement the current deterministic methods and the improvement of Korean nuclear power plant safety. In this study, the survey about the assessment methodologies, modelings and results performed by domestic and international researches are performed as the basic step before developing the assessment methodology of this study. The assessment methodology that supplement the revealed problems in many other studies is presented and the application of new methodology into the example system assures the feasibility of this method. The sensitivity analyses about the failure factors of the components are performed in the bases of the and AOT is quantified. And the reliability assessment methodology about the diesel generator is reviewed and applied to the PSA code. The qualitative assessment for the STI/AOR of RPS/ESFAS assured safety the most important system in the nuclear power plant are performed.

  2. Outage and Capacity Performance Evaluation of Distributed MIMO Systems over a Composite Fading Channel

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Wenjie Peng

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available The exact closed-form expressions regarding the outage probability and capacity of distributed MIMO (DMIMO systems over a composite fading channel are derived. This is achieved firstly by using a lognormal approximation to a gamma-lognormal distribution when a mobile station (MS in the cell is in a fixed position, and the so-called maximum ratio transmission/selected combining (MRT-SC and selected transmission/maximum ratio combining (ST-MRC schemes are adopted in uplink and downlink, respectively. Then, based on a newly proposed nonuniform MS cell distribution model, which is more consistent with the MS cell hotspot distribution in an actual communication environment, the average outage probability and capacity formulas are further derived. Finally, the accuracy of the approximation method and the rationality of the corresponding theoretical analysis regarding the system performance are proven and illustrated by computer simulations.

  3. Turbine Control System Replacement at NPP NEK; System Specifics, Project Experience and Lessons Learned

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Mandic, D.; Zilavy, M. J.

    2010-01-01

    The main intention of this paper is to present feedback from the implementation of the new Turbine Control System (TCS) replacement project at Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) NEK - Krsko. From the plant construction time and the first plant start-up in 1981, the NPP NEK TG (Turbine-Generator) set was controlled and monitored by DEH (Digital Electro Hydraulic) Mod II Control System designed in 70's based on P2500 CPU and number of I/O controllers and modules. The P2500 CPU and associated controllers were built with discrete TTL components (TTL logic chips) and the P2500 CPU had 64k of 16 bit words of ferrite core memory. For that time, DEH Mod II had sophisticated MCR (Main Control Room) HMI (Human Machine Interface) based on digital functional keyboards, one alphanumeric black and white CRT monitor and printer. After twenty eight years of operation and because of several other reasons that are explained in the paper, NEK decided to replace the old DEH Mod II Control system with the new Emerson Ovation based DCS (Distributed Control System) on redundant platform for the control and monitoring of secondary plant systems in the NPP Krsko (NEK), and the new system was named PDEH (Programmable Digital Electro Hydraulic) TCS. In May 2007, NEK signed the turn-key contract with Westinghouse Electric Company (WEC) for the project of replacement of the TCS, Turbine Emergency Trip System (ETS), Moisture Separator Reheater (MSR) control and some other control and monitoring functions. WEC subcontracted a number of other companies for equipment delivery, AE (Architect Engineering Design) activities, specific software development tasks (changes of KFSS - Krsko Full Scope Simulator and PIS - Process Information System interface) and field installation activities. The subject project enveloped implementation of PDEH system on three application platforms: BG KFSS (Background KFSS), FG KFSS (Foreground KFSS) and PDEH system installed in the plant. The HMI for the BG KFSS platform

  4. Computer Refurbishment

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Ichiyen, Norman; Chan, Dominic; Thompson, Paul

    2004-01-01

    The major activity for the 18-month refurbishment outage at the Point Lepreau Generating Station is the replacement of all 380 fuel channel and calandria tube assemblies and the lower portion of connecting feeder pipes. New Brunswick Power would also take advantage of this outage to conduct a number of repairs, replacements, inspections and upgrades (such as rewinding or replacing the generator, replacement of shutdown system trip computers, replacement of certain valves and expansion joints, inspection of systems not normally accessible, etc.). This would allow for an additional 25 to 30 years. Among the systems to be replaced are the PDC's for both shutdown systems. Assessments have been completed for both the SDS1 and SDS2 PDC's, and it has been decided to replace the SDS2 PDCs with the same hardware and software approach that has been used successfully for the Wolsong 2, 3, and 4 and the Qinshan 1 and 2 SDS2 PDCs. For SDS1, it has been decided to use the same software development methodology that was used successfully for the Wolsong and Qinshan called the I A and to use a new hardware platform in order to ensure successful operation for the 25-30 year station operating life. The selected supplier is Triconex, which uses a triple modular redundant architecture that will enhance the robustness/fault tolerance of the design with respect to equipment failures

  5. Qualification Practices in Nuclear Industry: Steam Generator Eddy Current Probe Qualification

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Vavrous, M.; Gracin, R.

    2010-01-01

    Through history of nuclear power plant operation, a large number of nuclear power plant forced outages related to tube failures occurred. It resulted with large amount of repair and outage costs, what initiated implementation of regulated practice of periodical tube examination and tube condition monitoring. Purpose of examinations is to detect existing or potential tube degradations that could affect tube integrity and therefore result in forced outages and unwanted costs related to emergency repair activities and loss of ability for electrical power production. With increased examination activities, additional information about steam generator tube condition became available and additional methods for ensuring tube integrity became available. As the number of examination solutions increased, need for validation and assessment of examination methods occurred. For that purpose, a large number of standards and guidelines with its requirements were implemented in nuclear industry regulatory requirements to ensure that adequately validated examinations are applied. With this purpose, qualification requirements for inspection activities were implemented with other requirements. With progress of technology, progress was also achieved in examination methods and more advanced examination methods and advanced inspection systems were developed. This advancement is accompanied by advancement in regulatory requirements regarding inspection and monitoring of tube integrity and condition. Ultimate goal of implementation of qualification processes and its requirements in all aspects of nuclear industry is to achieve minimal rate of forced outages, which would ensure maximum electrical power production capabilities and maximum optimization of operational costs while maintaining safe operation in accordance with environmental policies. This article will focus on qualification of steam generator eddy current bobbin probe.(author).

  6. CASTOR - Advanced System for VVER Steam Generator Inspection

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Mateljak, Petar

    2014-01-01

    From the safety point of view, steam generator is a very important component of a nuclear power plant. Only a thin tube wall prevents leakage of radioactive material from the primary side into the environment. Therefore, it is very important to perform inspections in order to detect pipe damage and apply appropriate corrective actions during outage. Application of the nondestructive examination (NDE) technique, that can locate degradation and measure its size and orientation, is an integral part of nuclear power plant maintenance. The steam generator inspection system is consisted of remotely controlled manipulator, testing instrument and software for data acquisition and analysis. Recently, the inspection systems have evolved to a much higher level of automation, efficiency and reliability resulting in a lower cost and shorter outage time. Electronic components have become smaller and deal with more complex algorithms. These systems are very fast, precise, reliable and easy to handle. The whole inspection, from the planning, examination, data analysis and final report, is now a highly automated process, which makes inspection much easier and more reliable. This paper presents the new generation of INETEC's VVER steam generator inspection system as ultimate solution for steam generator inspection and repair. (author)

  7. Steam generator tube degradation at the Doel 4 plant influence on plant operation and safety

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Scheveneels, G.

    1997-01-01

    The steam generator tubes of Doel 4 are affected by a multitude of corrosion phenomena. Some of them have been very difficult to manage because of their extremely fast evolution, non linear evolution behavior or difficult detectability and/or measurability. The exceptional corrosion behavior of the steam generator tubes has had its drawbacks on plant operation and safety. Extensive inspection and repair campaigns have been necessary and have largely increased outage times and radiation exposure to personnel. Although considerable effort was invested by the utility to control corrosion problems, non anticipated phenomena and/or evolution have jeopardized plant safety. The extensive plugging and repairs performed on the steam generators have necessitated continual review of the design basis safety studies and the adaptation of the protection system setpoints. The large asymmetric plugging has further complicated these reviews. During the years many preventive and recently also defence measures have been implemented by the utility to manage corrosion and to decrease the probability and consequences of single or multiple tube rupture. The present state of the Doel 4 steam generators remains troublesome and further examinations are performed to evaluate if continued operation until June '96, when the steam generators will be replaced, is justified

  8. Sampled-data-based vibration control for structural systems with finite-time state constraint and sensor outage.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Weng, Falu; Liu, Mingxin; Mao, Weijie; Ding, Yuanchun; Liu, Feifei

    2018-05-10

    The problem of sampled-data-based vibration control for structural systems with finite-time state constraint and sensor outage is investigated in this paper. The objective of designing controllers is to guarantee the stability and anti-disturbance performance of the closed-loop systems while some sensor outages happen. Firstly, based on matrix transformation, the state-space model of structural systems with sensor outages and uncertainties appearing in the mass, damping and stiffness matrices is established. Secondly, by considering most of those earthquakes or strong winds happen in a very short time, and it is often the peak values make the structures damaged, the finite-time stability analysis method is introduced to constrain the state responses in a given time interval, and the H-infinity stability is adopted in the controller design to make sure that the closed-loop system has a prescribed level of disturbance attenuation performance during the whole control process. Furthermore, all stabilization conditions are expressed in the forms of linear matrix inequalities (LMIs), whose feasibility can be easily checked by using the LMI Toolbox. Finally, numerical examples are given to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed theorems. Copyright © 2018 ISA. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  9. Replacement of heavy components of the Main Primary System (MPS). Recent innovations made by Framatome ANP

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Chanussot, J.M.; Thevenet, R.

    2006-01-01

    The replacement of heavy components is the result of widespread stress corrosion of Inconel 600 (and alloys 82/182) in the primary system. Following the corrosion of steam generator tubes, which led to the first steam generator replacement (SGR) operations, work has begun on reactor vessel head replacements (RVHR) and pressurizer replacements, pending treatment of the dissimilar butt welds (DBW). The replacement of sections of the Main Primary System is one way of optimizing plant lifetime besides preventing stress corrosion in primary components and combating phenomena as thermal fatigue or certain metallurgical weaknesses. The increase in the number of major operations carried out in the reactor building on PWR and BWR reactor geometries has called for major technical innovations. AREVA, has over the past twenty years carried out more than forty SGRs throughout the world, including the supply of 115 steam generators of all types. This equates to over 60% of all SGR operations performed in Europe and the USA. Today, most SGR operations are performed in the USA, though some still continue in Europe and Asia. Operations have been planned until 2015. The first RVHR operations were carried out in France in 1993, and have been widespread in Europe since 1996 (Spain and Belgium), and in the USA since 2002 (Davis Besse). Since 1993 AREVA, through its subsidiaries Framatome ANP, Jeumont SA and SGT, has performed 72 RVHRs, i.e. most of those carried out in Europe and the USA. Today, RVHR operations take place throughout the world and have been planned until 2014. The first pressurizer replacement took place in the fall of 2005 in Saint Lucie, USA. Others are to follow (Fort Calhoun, Millestone). A significant number of partial or complete pressurizer replacements are now being scheduled. Special focus must be given to this new operation, as a decision is required between the following types of replacements, taking into account the number of pressurizer heaters and the

  10. Outage and ser performance of spectrum sharing system with TAS/MRC

    KAUST Repository

    Khan, Fahd Ahmed

    2013-06-01

    Capacity of the secondary network degrades due to the interference constraint from the primary network. The secondary network capacity can be enhanced by means of spatial diversity, that can be achieved by adding multiple antennas on the terminals. In this paper, the performance of a multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) secondary link with transmit antenna selection (TAS) at the transmitter and maximum ratio combining (MRC) at the receiver is analysed. A peak transmit power constraint is considered in addition to the interference power constraint. For a Rayleigh faded channel, closed-form expression for the outage probability of a MIMO cognitive system (MIMO-CS) with TAS/MRC is derived. In addition, closed-form expressions of the moment generating function and the symbol error rate are also obtained. The performance of this system is analyzed for asymptotic regimes and it is shown that TAS/MRC in a MIMO-CS achieves a generalized diversity order of nTnR, where nT and nR are the number of transmit and receive antennas, respectively. Numerical results are also presented to corroborate the derived analytical results. © 2013 IEEE.

  11. Piping hydrodynamic loads for a PWR power up-rate with steam generator replacement

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Julie M Jarvis; Allen T Vieira; James M Gilmer

    2005-01-01

    Full text of publication follows: Pipe break hydrodynamic loads are calculated for various systems in a PWR for a Power Up-rate (PUR) with a Steam Generator Replacement (SGR). PUR with SGR can change the system pressures, mass flowrates and pipe routing/configuration. These changes can alter the steam generator piping steam/water hammer loads. This paper discusses the need to benchmark against the original design basis, the use of different modeling techniques, and lessons learned. Benchmarking for licensing in the United States is vital in consideration of 10CFR50.59 and other licensing and safety issues. RELAP5 and its force post-processor R5FORCE are used to model the transient loads for various piping systems such as main feedwater and blowdown systems. Other modeling applications, including the Bechtel GAFT program, are used to evaluate loadings in the main steam piping. Forces are calculated for main steam turbine stop valve closure, feedwater pipe breaks and subsequent check valve slam, and blowdown isolation valve closure. These PUR/SGR forces are compared with the original design basis forces. Modeling techniques discussed include proper valve closure modeling, sonic velocity changes due to pipe material changes, and two phase flow effects. Lessons learned based on analyses done for several PWR PUR with SGR are presented. Lessons learned from these analyses include choosing the optimal replacement piping size and routing to improve system performance without resulting in excessive piping loads. (authors)

  12. Point Lepreau refurbishment - update 5

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    White, R.M.; Eagles, E.R.; Hickman, C.N.; Baker, R.; Thompson, P.D.; Howieson, J.Q.; Ichiyen, N.

    2005-01-01

    NB Power Nuclear is planning to conduct a 18-month maintenance outage of the Point Lepreau Generating Station (PLGS) beginning in April 2008. The major activity would be the replacement of all 380 Fuel Channel and Calandria Tube assemblies and connecting feeder pipes. This activity is referred to as Retube. NB Power Nuclear would also take advantage of this outage to conduct a number of repairs, replacements, inspection and upgrades (such as rewinding or replacing the generator, replacement of shutdown system trip computers, replacement of certain valves and expansion joints, inspection of systems not normally accessible, etc.). These collective activities are referred to as Refurbishment. This would allow the station to operate for an additional 25 to 30 years. The scope or the project was determined [mm the outcome of a two year study involving a detailed condition assessment of the station which examined Issues relating to ageing and obsolescence, along with a detailed review or Safety and Licensing issues associated with extended operation. The Refurbishment outage would be preceded by a detailed Engineering Project Phase that would: Finalize details of the Retube process including modeling, tooling development, site facilities and training of personnel. Perform necessary engineering activities related to design modifications. Construct the new waste storage structures to house Retube Waste and other additional waste storage structures for the extended life of the station. Setup necessary temporary construction facilities (offices, storage areas, change moms, decontamination an maintenance areas) to support Retube. Procure equipment and components. Perform detailed outage planning. Initiate development of detailed commissioning as well as lay-up, monitoring and return to service procedures. At the present time, the NB Power Nuclear Board of Directors and the New Brunswick Provincial government are reviewing a proposal for a lease arrangement from Bruce Power

  13. Consequences of long-term power outages and high electricity prices lasting for months; Konsekvenser av langvarige stroemutfall og hoeye kraftpriser i flere maaneder

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    NONE

    2005-07-01

    Several areas in the world have experienced electricity outages for longer periods of time, but the consequences of these are sparsely documented. There is a need for further analysis of the socioeconomic consequences of the outages. In addition to KILE (Quality adjusted revenue framework for un supplied energy) costs one has to take into account that the costs often increase proportionally with the durance of the outage, and that KILE tariffs do not reflect lost consumer's surplus for products that are not produced during an outage. A good example is the public underground transport, where the company's economical loss can be significantly smaller than the loss of utility value for the travellers. If the authorities act with reasonability it is difficult to see that periods with very high prices represent a big problem. The most important problems are related to diffused effects, especially for households with a weak economy. These problems can be solved with improved contractual forms (price guarantees) or by transfers to the households, without weakening the incentives for electricity economising (ml)

  14. Placement of Synchronized Measurements for Power System Observability during Cascaded Outages

    Science.gov (United States)

    Thirugnanasambandam, Venkatesh; Jain, Trapti

    2017-11-01

    Cascaded outages often result in power system islanding followed by a blackout and therefore considered as a severe disturbance. Maintaining the observability of each island may help in taking proper control actions to preserve the stability of individual islands thus, averting system collapse. With this intent, a strategy for placement of synchronized measurements, which can be obtained from phasor measurement units (PMU), has been proposed in this paper to keep the system observable during cascaded outages also. Since, all the cascaded failures may not lead to islanding situations, therefore, failures leading to islanding as well as non-islanding situations have been considered. A topology based algorithm has been developed to identify the islanding/non-islanding condition created by a particular cascaded event. Additional contingencies such as single line loss and single PMU failure have also been considered after the occurrence of cascaded events. The proposed method is further extended to incorporate the measurement redundancy, which is desirable for a reliable state estimation. The proposed scheme is tested on IEEE 14-bus, IEEE 30-bus and a practical Indian 246-bus networks. The numerical results ensure the observability of the power system under system intact as well as during cascaded islanding and non-islanding disturbances.

  15. Outage performance analysis of underlay cognitive RF and FSO wireless channels

    KAUST Repository

    Ansari, Imran Shafique

    2014-09-01

    In this work, the outage performance analysis of a dual-hop transmission system composed of asymmetric radio frequency (RF) channel cascaded with a free-space optical (FSO) link is presented. For the RF link, an underlay cognitive network is considered where the secondary users share the spectrum with licensed primary users. Indoor femtocells act as a practical example for such networks. More specifically, it is assumed that the RF link applies power control to maintain the interference at the primary network below a predetermined threshold. While the RF channel is modeled by the Rayleigh fading distribution, the FSO link is modeled by a unified Gamma-Gamma turbulence distribution. The FSO link accounts for pointing errors and both types of detection techniques (i.e. heterodyne detection as well as intensity modulation/direct detection (IM/DD)). With this model, a new exact closed-form expression is derived for the outage probability of the end-To-end signal-To-noise ratio of these systems in terms of the Meijer\\'s G function and the Fox\\'s H functions under fixed amplify-and-forward relay scheme. All new analytical results are verified via computer-based Monte-Carlo simulations and are illustrated by some selected numerical results.

  16. ARP/wARP and molecular replacement: the next generation

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Cohen, Serge X.; Ben Jelloul, Marouane; Long, Fei; Vagin, Alexei; Knipscheer, Puck; Lebbink, Joyce; Sixma, Titia K.; Lamzin, Victor S.; Murshudov, Garib N.; Perrakis, Anastassis

    2008-01-01

    A systematic test shows how ARP/wARP deals with automated model building for structures that have been solved by molecular replacement. A description of protocols in the flex-wARP control system and studies of two specific cases are also presented. Automatic iterative model (re-)building, as implemented in ARP/wARP and its new control system flex-wARP, is particularly well suited to follow structure solution by molecular replacement. More than 100 molecular-replacement solutions automatically solved by the BALBES software were submitted to three standard protocols in flex-wARP and the results were compared with final models from the PDB. Standard metrics were gathered in a systematic way and enabled the drawing of statistical conclusions on the advantages of each protocol. Based on this analysis, an empirical estimator was proposed that predicts how good the final model produced by flex-wARP is likely to be based on the experimental data and the quality of the molecular-replacement solution. To introduce the differences between the three flex-wARP protocols (keeping the complete search model, converting it to atomic coordinates but ignoring atom identities or using the electron-density map calculated from the molecular-replacement solution), two examples are also discussed in detail, focusing on the evolution of the models during iterative rebuilding. This highlights the diversity of paths that the flex-wARP control system can employ to reach a nearly complete and accurate model while actually starting from the same initial information

  17. Status of the steam generator tube circumferential ODSCC degradation experienced at the Doel 4 plant

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Roussel, G.

    1997-01-01

    Since the 1991 outage, the Doel Unit 4 nuclear power plant is known to be affected by circumferential outside diameter intergranular stress corrosion cracking at the hot leg tube expansion transition. Extensive non destructive examination inspections have shown the number of tubes affected by this problem as well as the size of the cracks to have been increasing for the three cycles up to 1993. As a result of the high percentage of tubes found non acceptable for continued service after the 1993 in-service inspection, about 1,700 mechanical sleeves were installed in the steam generators. During the 1994 outage, all the tubes sleeved during the 1993 outage were considered as potentially cracked to some extent at the upper hydraulic transition and were therefore not acceptable for continued service. They were subsequently repaired by laser welding. Furthermore all the tubes not sleeved during the 1993 outage were considered as not acceptable for continued service and were repaired by installing laser welded sleeves. During the 1995 outage, some unexpected degradation phenomena were evidenced in the sleeved tubes. This paper summarizes the status of the circumferential ODSCC experienced in the SG tubes of the Doel 4 plant as well as the other connected degradation phenomena

  18. 24-month fuel cycles

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Rosenstein, R.G.; Sipes, D.E.; Beall, R.H.; Donovan, E.J.

    1986-01-01

    Twenty-four month reload cycles can potentially lessen total power generation costs. While 24-month cores increase purchased fuel costs, the longer cycles reduce the number of refueling outages and thus enhance plant availability; men-rem exposure to site personnel and other costs associated with reload core design and licensing are also reduced. At dual unit sites an operational advantage can be realized by refueling each plant alternately on a 1-year offset basis. This results in a single outage per site per year which can be scheduled for off-peak periods or when replacement power costs are low

  19. Improvement of availability of PWR nuclear plants through the reduction of the time required for refueling/maintenance outages, Phase 1. Final report

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Thompson, C.A.

    1978-08-01

    The objective of this project is to identify improvements in procedures and equipment which will reduce the time required for refueling/maintenance outages at PWR nuclear power plants. The outage of Commonwealth Edison Zion Station Unit 1 in March through May of 1976 was evaluated to identify those items which caused delays and those work activities that offer the potential for significant improvements toward reducing its overall duration. Thus, the plant's availability for power production would be increased. Revisions in procedures and some equipment modifications were implemented and evaluated during the Zion Unit 2 refueling/maintenance outage beginning in January 1977. Analysis of the observed data has identified benefits available through improved refueling equipment and also areas where additional new, innovative refueling, or refueling-related equipment should be beneficial. A number of specific design concepts are recommended as a result of Phase 1. In addition, a new master planning mechanism is described for implementation during subsequent planned outages at Zion Station. This final report describes the recommended conceptual designs and planning mechanism and assesses their impact upon future outages. Their effect on savings in refueling time, labor, and radiation exposure is discussed. The estimated economic payoff for these concepts was found to be of such significance that an additional phase of the program is warranted. During this extended phase, a more detailed engineering study should be undertaken to determine the cost of implementation along with more specific estimates of the benefits for PWR plants already in operation or under construction

  20. Experience of oil in CANDU moderator during A831 planned outage at Bruce Power

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Ma, G.; Nashiem, R.; Matheson, S.; Stuart, C.; Roberts, J.G.

    2011-01-01

    In their address to the Nuclear Plant Chemistry Conference 2009, Bruce Power staff will describe the effects of oil ingress to the moderator of a CANDU reactor. During the A831 planned outage of Bruce Power Unit 3, an incident of oil ingress into moderator was discovered on Oct 17, 2008. An investigation identified the cause of the oil ingress. Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. (AECL) assessed operability of the reactor with the oil present and made recommendations with respect to the effect on unit start-up with oil present. The principal concern was the radiolytic generation of deuterium from the breakdown of the oil in-core. Various challenges were presented during start-up which were overcome via innovative approaches. The subsequent actions and consequential effects on moderator chemistry are discussed in this paper. Examination of the plant chemistry data revealed some interesting aspects of moderator system chemistry under upset conditions which will also be presented. (author)

  1. Experience of oil in CANDU® moderator during A831 planned outage at Bruce Power

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Ma, G.; Nashiem, R.; Matheson, S.; Stuart, C.; Roberts, J.G.

    2010-01-01

    In their address to the Nuclear Plant Chemistry Conference 2009, Bruce Power staff will describe the effects of oil ingress to the moderator of a CANDU® reactor. During the A831 planned outage of Bruce Power Unit 3, an incident of oil ingress into moderator was discovered on Oct 17, 2008. An investigation identified the cause of the oil ingress. Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. (AECL) assessed operability of the reactor with the oil present and made recommendations with respect to the effect on unit start-up with oil present. The principal concern was the radiolytic generation of deuterium from the breakdown of the oil in-core. Various challenges were presented during start-up which were overcome via innovative approaches. The subsequent actions and consequential effects on moderator chemistry are discussed in this paper. Examination of the plant chemistry data revealed some interesting aspects of moderator system chemistry under upset conditions which will also be presented. (author)

  2. Experience of oil in CANDU® moderator during A831 planned outage at Bruce Power

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Ma, G.; Nashiem, R.; Matheson, S. [Bruce Power, Tiverton, Ontario (Canada); Stuart, C. [Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, Chalk River, Ontario (Canada); Roberts, J.G. [CANTECH Associates Ltd., Burlington, Ontario (Canada)

    2010-07-01

    In their address to the Nuclear Plant Chemistry Conference 2009, Bruce Power staff will describe the effects of oil ingress to the moderator of a CANDU® reactor. During the A831 planned outage of Bruce Power Unit 3, an incident of oil ingress into moderator was discovered on Oct 17, 2008. An investigation identified the cause of the oil ingress. Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. (AECL) assessed operability of the reactor with the oil present and made recommendations with respect to the effect on unit start-up with oil present. The principal concern was the radiolytic generation of deuterium from the breakdown of the oil in-core. Various challenges were presented during start-up which were overcome via innovative approaches. The subsequent actions and consequential effects on moderator chemistry are discussed in this paper. Examination of the plant chemistry data revealed some interesting aspects of moderator system chemistry under upset conditions which will also be presented. (author)

  3. Experience of oil in CANDU moderator during A831 planned outage at Bruce Power

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Ma, G.; Nashiem, R.; Matheson, S. [Bruce Power, Tiverton, Ontario (Canada); Stuart, C. [Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, Chalk River, Ontario (Canada); Roberts, J.G. [CANTECH Associates Ltd., Burlington, Ontario (Canada)

    2011-03-15

    In their address to the Nuclear Plant Chemistry Conference 2009, Bruce Power staff will describe the effects of oil ingress to the moderator of a CANDU reactor. During the A831 planned outage of Bruce Power Unit 3, an incident of oil ingress into moderator was discovered on Oct 17, 2008. An investigation identified the cause of the oil ingress. Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. (AECL) assessed operability of the reactor with the oil present and made recommendations with respect to the effect on unit start-up with oil present. The principal concern was the radiolytic generation of deuterium from the breakdown of the oil in-core. Various challenges were presented during start-up which were overcome via innovative approaches. The subsequent actions and consequential effects on moderator chemistry are discussed in this paper. Examination of the plant chemistry data revealed some interesting aspects of moderator system chemistry under upset conditions which will also be presented. (author)

  4. Assessment and Application of the ROSE Code for Reactor Outage Thermal-Hydraulic and Safety Analysis

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Liang, Thomas K.S.; Ko, F.-K.; Dai, L.-C.

    2001-01-01

    The currently available tools, such as RELAP5, RETRAN, and others, cannot easily and correctly perform the task of analyzing the system behavior during plant outages. Therefore, a medium-sized program aiming at reactor outage simulation and evaluation, such as midloop operation (MLO) with loss of residual heat removal (RHR), has been developed. Important thermal-hydraulic processes involved during MLO with loss of RHR can be properly simulated by the newly developed reactor outage simulation and evaluation (ROSE) code. The two-region approach with a modified two-fluid model has been adopted to be the theoretical basis of the ROSE code.To verify the analytical model in the first step, posttest calculations against the integral midloop experiments with loss of RHR have been performed. The excellent simulation capacity of the ROSE code against the Institute of Nuclear Energy Research Integral System Test Facility test data is demonstrated. To further mature the ROSE code in simulating a full-sized pressurized water reactor, assessment against the WGOTHIC code and the Maanshan momentary-loss-of-RHR event has been undertaken. The successfully assessed ROSE code is then applied to evaluate the abnormal operation procedure (AOP) with loss of RHR during MLO (AOP 537.4) for the Maanshan plant. The ROSE code also has been successfully transplanted into the Maanshan training simulator to support operator training. How the simulator was upgraded by the ROSE code for MLO will be presented in the future

  5. An Efficient Simulation Scheme of the Outage Probability with Co-Channel Interference

    KAUST Repository

    Rached, Nadhir B.

    2016-03-28

    © 2015 IEEE. The outage probability (OP) of the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) is an important metric used to evaluate the performance of wireless communication systems operating over fading channels. One major difficulty toward assessing the OP is that, in most of the realistic scenarios, closed-form expressions cannot be derived. This is for instance the case of Log-normal fading environments, in which evaluating the OP of the SINR amounts to computing the probability that a sum of correlated Log-normal variates exceeds a given threshold. Since such a probability is not known to admit a closed-form expression, it has thus far been evaluated by several approximation techniques, the accuracies of which are unfortunately not guaranteed in the interesting region of small outage probabilities. For these regions, simulation techniques based on variance reduction algorithms can represent a good alternative, being well-recognized to be quick and highly accurate for estimating rare event probabilities. This constitutes the major motivation behind our work. More specifically, we propose an efficient importance sampling approach which is based on a covariance matrix scaling technique and illustrate its computational gain over naive Monte Carlo simulations through some selected simulation results.

  6. Characteristics of U-tube assembly design for CANDU 6 type steam generators

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Park, Jun Su; Jeong, Seung Ha

    1996-06-01

    Since the first operation of nuclear steam generator early 1960s, its performance requirements have been met but the steam generator problems have been met but the steam generator problems have been major cause of reducing the operational reliability, plant safety and availability. U-tube assembly of steam generator forms the primary system pressure boundary of the plant and have experienced several types of tube degradation problems. Tube failure and leakage resulting from the degradation will cause radioactive contamination of secondary system by the primary coolant, and this may lead to unplanned plant outages and costly repair operations such as tube plugging or steam generator replacement. For the case of steam generators for heavy water reactors, e.g. Wolsong 2, 3, and 4 NPP, a high cost of heavy water will be imposed additionally. During the plant operation, steam generator tubes can potentially be subject to adverse environmental conditions which will cause damages to U-tube assembly. Types of the damage depend upon the combined effects of design factors, materials and chemical environment of steam generator, and they are the pure water stress corrosion cracking, intergranular attack, pitting, wastage, denting, fretting and fatigue, etc. In this report, a comprehensive review of major design factors of recirculating steam generators has been performed against the potential tube damages. Then the design characteristics of CANDU-type Wolsong steam generator were investigated in detail, including tube material, thermalhydraulic aspects, tube-to-tubesheet joint, tube supports, water chemistry and sludge management. 9 tabs., 18 figs., 38 refs. (Author) .new

  7. Nonparametric Tree-Based Predictive Modeling of Storm Outages on an Electric Distribution Network.

    Science.gov (United States)

    He, Jichao; Wanik, David W; Hartman, Brian M; Anagnostou, Emmanouil N; Astitha, Marina; Frediani, Maria E B

    2017-03-01

    This article compares two nonparametric tree-based models, quantile regression forests (QRF) and Bayesian additive regression trees (BART), for predicting storm outages on an electric distribution network in Connecticut, USA. We evaluated point estimates and prediction intervals of outage predictions for both models using high-resolution weather, infrastructure, and land use data for 89 storm events (including hurricanes, blizzards, and thunderstorms). We found that spatially BART predicted more accurate point estimates than QRF. However, QRF produced better prediction intervals for high spatial resolutions (2-km grid cells and towns), while BART predictions aggregated to coarser resolutions (divisions and service territory) more effectively. We also found that the predictive accuracy was dependent on the season (e.g., tree-leaf condition, storm characteristics), and that the predictions were most accurate for winter storms. Given the merits of each individual model, we suggest that BART and QRF be implemented together to show the complete picture of a storm's potential impact on the electric distribution network, which would allow for a utility to make better decisions about allocating prestorm resources. © 2016 Society for Risk Analysis.

  8. Fast Outage Probability Simulation for FSO Links with a Generalized Pointing Error Model

    KAUST Repository

    Ben Issaid, Chaouki

    2017-02-07

    Over the past few years, free-space optical (FSO) communication has gained significant attention. In fact, FSO can provide cost-effective and unlicensed links, with high-bandwidth capacity and low error rate, making it an exciting alternative to traditional wireless radio-frequency communication systems. However, the system performance is affected not only by the presence of atmospheric turbulences, which occur due to random fluctuations in the air refractive index but also by the existence of pointing errors. Metrics, such as the outage probability which quantifies the probability that the instantaneous signal-to-noise ratio is smaller than a given threshold, can be used to analyze the performance of this system. In this work, we consider weak and strong turbulence regimes, and we study the outage probability of an FSO communication system under a generalized pointing error model with both a nonzero boresight component and different horizontal and vertical jitter effects. More specifically, we use an importance sampling approach which is based on the exponential twisting technique to offer fast and accurate results.

  9. Outage performance of opportunistic two-way amplify-and-forward relaying with outdated channel state information

    KAUST Repository

    Hwang, Kyusung; Ju, Minchul; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

    2013-01-01

    In this paper, we study the outage performance of an amplify-and-forward (AF)-based two-way relaying (TWR) system with multiple relays where a single relay selection is performed based on outdated channel state information (CSI). Specifically, we

  10. Optimal Thermal Unit Commitment Solution integrating Renewable Energy with Generator Outage

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    S. Sivasakthi

    2017-06-01

    Full Text Available The increasing concern of global climate changes, the promotion of renewable energy sources, primarily wind generation, is a welcome move to reduce the pollutant emissions from conventional power plants. Integration of wind power generation with the existing power network is an emerging research field. This paper presents a meta-heuristic algorithm based approach to determine the feasible dispatch solution for wind integrated thermal power system. The Unit Commitment (UC process aims to identify the best feasible generation scheme of the committed units such that the overall generation cost is reduced, when subjected to a variety of constraints at each time interval. As the UC formulation involves many variables and system and operational constraints, identifying the best solution is still a research task. Nowadays, it is inevitable to include power system reliability issues in operation strategy. The generator failure and malfunction are the prime influencing factor for reliability issues hence they have considered in UC formulation of wind integrated thermal power system. The modern evolutionary algorithm known as Grey Wolf Optimization (GWO algorithm is applied to solve the intended UC problem. The potential of the GWO algorithm is validated by the standard test systems. Besides, the ramp rate limits are also incorporated in the UC formulation. The simulation results reveal that the GWO algorithm has the capability of obtaining economical resolutions with good solution quality.

  11. Steam generator life management

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    King, P.; McGillivray, R.; Reinhardt, W.; Millman, J.; King, B.; Schneider, W.

    2003-01-01

    'Full-Text:' Steam Generator Life Management responsibility embodies doing whatever is necessary to maintain the steam generation equipment of a nuclear plant in effective, reliable service. All comes together in that most critical deliverable, namely the submission of the documentation which wins approval for return to service after an outage program. Life management must address all aspects of SG reliability over the life of the plant. Nevertheless, the life management activities leading up to return to service approval is where all of it converges. Steam Generator Life Management activities entail four types of work, all equally important in supporting the objective of successful operation. These activities are i) engineering functions; including identification of inspection and maintenance requirements, outage planning and scope definition plus engineering assessment, design and analysis as necessary to support equipment operation, ii) fitness of service work; including the expert evaluation of degradation mechanisms, disposition of defects for return to service or not, and the fitness for service analysis as required to justify ongoing operation with acceptable defects, iii) inspection work; including large scale eddy current inspection of tubing, the definition of defect size and character, code inspections of pressure vessel integrity and visual inspections for integrity and iv) maintenance work; including repairs, retrofits, cleaning and modifications, all as necessary to implement the measures defined during activities i) through iii). The paper discusses the approach and execution of the program for the achievement of the above objectives and particularly of items i) and ii). (author)

  12. Proposal of organisation and ALARA procedures for maintenance site: application to replacement of steam generator

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Lochard, J.; Lefaure, C.

    1989-08-01

    This report proposes generic organization and ALARA procedures for preparing a maintenance site at a NPP. After a short description of the ALARA principle, it describes the proposition for French sites. They are grouped according to the following: motivation, organisation, means. They are illustrated by the example of steam generator replacement. Three special points concerning preparation of the site are developed: education; training of operators; review of the project

  13. Development of an Agent Based Model to Estimate and Reduce Time to Restoration of Storm Induced Power Outages

    Science.gov (United States)

    Walsh, T.; Layton, T.; Mellor, J. E.

    2017-12-01

    Storm damage to the electric grid impacts 23 million electric utility customers and costs US consumers $119 billion annually. Current restoration techniques rely on the past experiences of emergency managers. There are few analytical simulation and prediction tools available for utility managers to optimize storm recovery and decrease consumer cost, lost revenue and restoration time. We developed an agent based model (ABM) for storm recovery in Connecticut. An ABM is a computer modeling technique comprised of agents who are given certain behavioral rules and operate in a given environment. It allows the user to simulate complex systems by varying user-defined parameters to study emergent, unpredicted behavior. The ABM incorporates the road network and electric utility grid for the state, is validated using actual storm event recoveries and utilizes the Dijkstra routing algorithm to determine the best path for repair crews to travel between outages. The ABM has benefits for both researchers and utility managers. It can simulate complex system dynamics, rank variable importance, find tipping points that could significantly reduce restoration time or costs and test a broad range of scenarios. It is a modular, scalable and adaptable technique that can simulate scenarios in silico to inform emergency managers before and during storm events to optimize restoration strategies and better manage expectations of when power will be restored. Results indicate that total restoration time is strongly dependent on the number of crews. However, there is a threshold whereby more crews will not decrease the restoration time, which depends on the total number of outages. The addition of outside crews is more beneficial for storms with a higher number of outages. The time to restoration increases linearly with increasing repair time, while the travel speed has little overall effect on total restoration time. Crews traveling to the nearest outage reduces the total restoration time

  14. Outage Performance Analysis of Relay Selection Schemes in Wireless Energy Harvesting Cooperative Networks over Non-Identical Rayleigh Fading Channels.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Do, Nhu Tri; Bao, Vo Nguyen Quoc; An, Beongku

    2016-02-26

    In this paper, we study relay selection in decode-and-forward wireless energy harvesting cooperative networks. In contrast to conventional cooperative networks, the relays harvest energy from the source's radio-frequency radiation and then use that energy to forward the source information. Considering power splitting receiver architecture used at relays to harvest energy, we are concerned with the performance of two popular relay selection schemes, namely, partial relay selection (PRS) scheme and optimal relay selection (ORS) scheme. In particular, we analyze the system performance in terms of outage probability (OP) over independent and non-identical (i.n.i.d.) Rayleigh fading channels. We derive the closed-form approximations for the system outage probabilities of both schemes and validate the analysis by the Monte-Carlo simulation. The numerical results provide comprehensive performance comparison between the PRS and ORS schemes and reveal the effect of wireless energy harvesting on the outage performances of both schemes. Additionally, we also show the advantages and drawbacks of the wireless energy harvesting cooperative networks and compare to the conventional cooperative networks.

  15. 77 FR 63757 - Extension of the Commission's Rules Regarding Outage Reporting to Interconnected Voice Over...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-10-17

    ... telephone subscriptions in the United States were users of interconnected VoIP providers--an increase of 21... Commission's Rules Regarding Outage Reporting to Interconnected Voice Over Internet Protocol Service Providers and Broadband Internet Service Providers AGENCY: Federal Communications Commission. ACTION: Final...

  16. Steam Generator Inspection Planning Expert System

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Rzasa, P.

    1987-01-01

    Applying Artificial Intelligence technology to steam generator non-destructive examination (NDE) can help identify high risk locations in steam generators and can aid in preparing technical specification compliant eddy current test (ECT) programs. A steam Generator Inspection Planning Expert System has been developed which can assist NDE or utility personnel in planning ECT programs. This system represents and processes its information using an object oriented declarative knowledge base, heuristic rules, and symbolic information processing, three artificial intelligence based techniques incorporated in the design. The output of the system is an automated generation of ECT programs. Used in an outage inspection, this system significantly reduced planning time

  17. Exact outage analysis of incremental decode-and-forward opportunistic relaying

    KAUST Repository

    Tourki, Kamel; Yang, Hongchuan; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

    2010-01-01

    In this paper, we investigate a dual-hop decode-andforward opportunistic relaying scheme where the selected relay chooses to cooperate only if the source-destination channel is of an unacceptable quality. In our study, we derive exact closed-form expression for the outage probability based on the exact statistics of each hop. Furthermore, we perform asymptotic analysis and we deduce the diversity order of the scheme. We validate our analysis by showing that performance simulation results coincide with our analytical results over different network architectures. © 2010 IEEE.

  18. Exact outage analysis of incremental decode-and-forward opportunistic relaying

    KAUST Repository

    Tourki, Kamel

    2010-11-01

    In this paper, we investigate a dual-hop decode-andforward opportunistic relaying scheme where the selected relay chooses to cooperate only if the source-destination channel is of an unacceptable quality. In our study, we derive exact closed-form expression for the outage probability based on the exact statistics of each hop. Furthermore, we perform asymptotic analysis and we deduce the diversity order of the scheme. We validate our analysis by showing that performance simulation results coincide with our analytical results over different network architectures. © 2010 IEEE.

  19. The steam generator repair project of the Donald C. Cook Nuclear Plant, Unit 2

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    White, J.D.

    1993-01-01

    Donald C. Cook Nuclear Plant Unit 2 is part of a two unit nuclear complex located in southwestern Michigan and owned and operated by the Indiana Michigan Power Company. The Cook Nuclear Plant is a pressurized water reactor (PWR) plant with four Westinghouse Series 51 steam generators housed in an ice condenser containment. This paper describes the program undertaken by Indiana Michigan Power and the American Electric Power Service Corporation (AEPSC) to repair the Unit 2 steam generators. (Both Indiana Michigan Power and AEPSC arc subsidiaries of American Electric Power Company, Incorporated (AEP). AEPSC provides management and technical support services to Indiana Michigan Power and the other AEP operating companies.) Eddy current examinations, in a series of refueling and forced outages between November 1983 and July 1986 resulted in 763 (5.6%) plugged tubes. In order to maintain adequate reactor core cooling, a limit of 10% is placed on the allowable percentage of steam generator tubes that can be removed from service by plugging. Additionally, sections of tubes were removed for metallurgical analysis and confirmed that the degradation was due to intergranular stress corrosion cracking. In developing the decision on how to repair the steam generators, four alternative actions were considered for addressing these problems: retubing in place, sleeving, operating at 80% reactor power to lower temperature and thus reduce the rate of corrosion, replacing steam generator lower assemblies

  20. Outage analysis for underlay relay-assisted cognitive networks

    KAUST Repository

    Tourki, Kamel; Qaraqe, Khalid A.; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

    2012-01-01

    Cooperative relay technology was recently introduced into cognitive radio networks in order to enhance network capacity, scalability, and reliability of end-to-end communication. In this paper, we investigate an underlay cognitive network where the quality of service of the secondary link is maintained by triggering an opportunistic regenerative relaying once it falls under an unacceptable level. We first provide the exact cumulative density function (CDF) of received signal-to-noise (SNR) over each hop with co-located relays. Then, the CDFs are used to determine very accurate closed-form expression for the outage probability for a transmission rate R. We validate our analysis by showing that simulation results coincide with our analytical results in Rayleigh fading channels. © 2012 IEEE.

  1. Outage analysis for underlay relay-assisted cognitive networks

    KAUST Repository

    Tourki, Kamel

    2012-12-01

    Cooperative relay technology was recently introduced into cognitive radio networks in order to enhance network capacity, scalability, and reliability of end-to-end communication. In this paper, we investigate an underlay cognitive network where the quality of service of the secondary link is maintained by triggering an opportunistic regenerative relaying once it falls under an unacceptable level. We first provide the exact cumulative density function (CDF) of received signal-to-noise (SNR) over each hop with co-located relays. Then, the CDFs are used to determine very accurate closed-form expression for the outage probability for a transmission rate R. We validate our analysis by showing that simulation results coincide with our analytical results in Rayleigh fading channels. © 2012 IEEE.

  2. Packaging, Transportation and Recycling of NPP Condenser Modules - 12262

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Polley, G.M. [Perma-Fix Environmental Services, 575 Oak Ridge Turnpike, Oak Ridge, TN 37830 (United States)

    2012-07-01

    Perma-Fix was awarded contract from Energy Northwest for the packaging, transportation and disposition of the condenser modules, water boxes and miscellaneous metal, combustibles and water generated during the 2011 condenser replacement outage at the Columbia Generating Station. The work scope was to package the water boxes and condenser modules as they were removed from the facility and transfer them to the Perma-Fix Northwest facility for processing, recycle of metals and disposition. The condenser components were oversized and overweight (the condenser modules weighed ∼102,058 kg [225,000 lb]) which required special equipment for loading and transport. Additional debris waste was packaged in inter-modals and IP-1 boxes for transport. A waste management plan was developed to minimize the generation of virtually any waste requiring landfill disposal. The Perma-Fix Northwest facility was modified to accommodate the ∼15 m [50-ft] long condenser modules and equipment was designed and manufactured to complete the disassembly, decontamination and release survey. The condenser modules are currently undergoing processing for free release to a local metal recycler. Over three millions pounds of metal will be recycled and over 95% of the waste generated during this outage will not require land disposal. There were several elements of this project that needed to be addressed during the preparation for this outage and the subsequent packaging, transportation and processing. - Staffing the project to support 24/7 generation of large components and other wastes. - The design and manufacture of the soft-sided shipping containers for the condenser modules that measured ∼15 m X 4 m X 3 m [50 ft X 13 ft X 10 ft] and weighed ∼102,058 kg [225,000 lbs] - Developing a methodology for loading the modules into the shipping containers. - Obtaining a transport vehicle for the modules. - Designing and modifying the processing facility. - Movement of the modules at the processing

  3. Perspective of the Westinghouse steam generator secondary side maintenance approach

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Ramaley, D. [Westinghouse Electric Company LLC, Cranberry Township, Pennsylvania (United States)

    2012-07-01

    Historically, Westinghouse had developed a set of steam generator secondary maintenance guidelines focused around performing recurring activities each outage without direct regards to the age, deposit loading, operational status, or corrosion status of the steam generator. Through the evolution of steam generator design and steam generator condition data, Westinghouse now uses a proactive assessment and planning approach for utilities. Westinghouse works with utilities to develop steam generator secondary maintenance plans for long term steam generator viability. Westinghouse has developed a portfolio of products to allow utilities to optimize steam generator operability and develop programs aimed at maintaining the steam generator secondary side in a favorable condition for successful long term operation. Judicious use of the means available for program development should allow for corrosion free operation, long term full power operation at optimum thermal efficiency, and leveling of outage expenditures over a long period of time. This paper will review the following required elements for an effective steam generator secondary side strategy: • Assessment: In order to develop an appropriate maintenance strategy, actions must be taken to obtain an accurate picture of the SG secondary side condition. • Forecasting: Using available data predictions are developed for future steam generator conditions and required maintenance actions. • Action: Cost effective engineering and maintenance actions must be completed at the appropriate time as designated by the plan. • Evaluation of Results: Following execution of maintenance tactics, it is necessary to revise strategy and develop technology enhancements as appropriate. (author)

  4. Providing Limited Local Electric Service During a Major Grid Outage: A First Assessment Based on Customer Willingness to Pay.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Baik, Sunhee; Morgan, M Granger; Davis, Alexander L

    2018-02-01

    While they are rare, widespread blackouts of the bulk power system can result in large costs to individuals and society. If local distribution circuits remain intact, it is possible to use new technologies including smart meters, intelligent switches that can change the topology of distribution circuits, and distributed generation owned by customers and the power company, to provide limited local electric power service. Many utilities are already making investments that would make this possible. We use customers' measured willingness to pay to explore when the incremental investments needed to implement these capabilities would be justified. Under many circumstances, upgrades in advanced distribution systems could be justified for a customer charge of less than a dollar a month (plus the cost of electricity used during outages), and would be less expensive and safer than the proliferation of small portable backup generators. We also discuss issues of social equity, extreme events, and various sources of underlying uncertainty. © 2017 Society for Risk Analysis.

  5. Steam generator waterlancing at Darlington NGS (system development and field application)

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Seppala, D.; Malaugh, J.; Kiisel, E.; Kamler, F.

    1996-01-01

    From the initial steam generator (SG) inspections at Darlington Nuclear Generating Station (DNGS), the authors know that the sludge accumulations on the secondary side tubesheets have been minimal. DNGS is a fairly new station but the experience at the older Ontario Hydro plants have shown that significant accumulations will happen. A pro-active strategy has been adopted for maintaining SGs that will minimize corrosion product accumulation and the potential for component degradation. During the four year planned Unit maintenance outages, SGs will be inspected and waterlanced using a waterlance system designed and built by Babcock and Wilcox International. This automated state-of-the-art system also allows fully recorded inspections of the tubesheet/first half-lattice supports. Some of the key elements covered include results of the initial field application (May, 1995), system development and design, system qualification, cleaning performance, and lessons learned for future outages

  6. Worldwide OMEGA and Very Low Frequency (VLF) Transmitter Outages, January to December 1980.

    Science.gov (United States)

    1981-05-01

    WORLDWIDE OMEGA AND VERY LOW FREQUENCY IVLF) TRANSMITTER OUTAGE--ETC, MAY 81 L RZONCA ,’,L.ASSI LED FAA-CT-81-26 FAA-RD- B1 -29 UL7 A-I’ l15FDRL AIO...computer for the time period GBR - Rugby , England (16.00 kHz) January to December 1980. (For the purposes of this report, any downtime NA - Cutler, Maine

  7. Lifetime extension: what challenges for industrialists?

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Cudelou, C.

    2014-01-01

    Lifetime extension upgrading imposes to compel with ASN (Nuclear Safety Authority) requirements such as: -) to assess the conformity of the installation in a very broad sense by looking for and processing any discrepancy, -) to demonstrate that the facility can face an accident, -) to justify an efficient monitoring of the components that can not be replaced (reactor vessel, containment building), -) to anticipate the replacement of important components like steam generators, -) to study measures for diminishing the thermal and chemical stresses of components, and -) to maintain knowledge and technical competencies. All these requirements are a big challenge for the nuclear industry that will face in the few years to come important tasks. Between 2015 and 2020, it is expected that fifteen 900 MW units and twenty 1300 MW units will have their third decennial outage program. During this period there will also be the second decennial outage program for some 1450 MW units and the first fourth decennial outage program for a 900 MW unit. To succeed in all these challenges, nuclear industry will have to focus on innovation and on a better work organisation. (A.C.)

  8. Fundamental Limits of Parallel Optical Wireless Channels: Capacity Results and Outage Formulation

    KAUST Repository

    Chaaban, Anas; Rezki, Zouheir; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

    2016-01-01

    Multi-channel (MC) optical wireless communication (OWC) systems employing wave-division multiplexing for outdoors free-space optical communications, or multi-user timedivision multiple access for indoors visible-light communications, e.g., can be modeled as parallel channels. Multi-input multioutput OWC systems can also be transformed, possibly with some performance loss, to parallel channels using pre-/postcoding. Studying the performance of such MC-OWC systems requires characterizing the capacity of the underlying parallel channels. In this paper, upper and lower bounds on the capacity of constant parallel OWC channels with a total average intensity constraint are derived. Then, the paper focuses on finding intensity allocations that maximize the lower bounds given channel-state information at the transmitter (CSIT). Due to its nonconvexity, the KKT conditions are used to describe a list of candidate allocations. Instead searching exhaustively for the best solution, low-complexity near-optimal algorithms are proposed. The resulting optimized lower bound nearly coincides with capacity at high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). Under a quasi-static channel model and in the absence of CSIT, outage probability upper and lower bounds are derived. Those bounds also meet at high SNR, thus characterizing the outage capacity in this regime. Finally, the results are extended to a system with both average and peak intensity constraints.

  9. Fundamental Limits of Parallel Optical Wireless Channels: Capacity Results and Outage Formulation

    KAUST Repository

    Chaaban, Anas

    2016-10-26

    Multi-channel (MC) optical wireless communication (OWC) systems employing wave-division multiplexing for outdoors free-space optical communications, or multi-user timedivision multiple access for indoors visible-light communications, e.g., can be modeled as parallel channels. Multi-input multioutput OWC systems can also be transformed, possibly with some performance loss, to parallel channels using pre-/postcoding. Studying the performance of such MC-OWC systems requires characterizing the capacity of the underlying parallel channels. In this paper, upper and lower bounds on the capacity of constant parallel OWC channels with a total average intensity constraint are derived. Then, the paper focuses on finding intensity allocations that maximize the lower bounds given channel-state information at the transmitter (CSIT). Due to its nonconvexity, the KKT conditions are used to describe a list of candidate allocations. Instead searching exhaustively for the best solution, low-complexity near-optimal algorithms are proposed. The resulting optimized lower bound nearly coincides with capacity at high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). Under a quasi-static channel model and in the absence of CSIT, outage probability upper and lower bounds are derived. Those bounds also meet at high SNR, thus characterizing the outage capacity in this regime. Finally, the results are extended to a system with both average and peak intensity constraints.

  10. Outage Performance Analysis of Relay Selection Schemes in Wireless Energy Harvesting Cooperative Networks over Non-Identical Rayleigh Fading Channels †

    Science.gov (United States)

    Do, Nhu Tri; Bao, Vo Nguyen Quoc; An, Beongku

    2016-01-01

    In this paper, we study relay selection in decode-and-forward wireless energy harvesting cooperative networks. In contrast to conventional cooperative networks, the relays harvest energy from the source’s radio-frequency radiation and then use that energy to forward the source information. Considering power splitting receiver architecture used at relays to harvest energy, we are concerned with the performance of two popular relay selection schemes, namely, partial relay selection (PRS) scheme and optimal relay selection (ORS) scheme. In particular, we analyze the system performance in terms of outage probability (OP) over independent and non-identical (i.n.i.d.) Rayleigh fading channels. We derive the closed-form approximations for the system outage probabilities of both schemes and validate the analysis by the Monte-Carlo simulation. The numerical results provide comprehensive performance comparison between the PRS and ORS schemes and reveal the effect of wireless energy harvesting on the outage performances of both schemes. Additionally, we also show the advantages and drawbacks of the wireless energy harvesting cooperative networks and compare to the conventional cooperative networks. PMID:26927119

  11. On the sum of Gamma-Gamma variates with application to the fast outage probability evaluation over fading channels

    KAUST Repository

    Ben Issaid, Chaouki

    2017-04-01

    The Gamma-Gamma distribution has recently emerged in a number of applications ranging from modeling scattering and reverbation in sonar and radar systems to modeling atmospheric turbulence in wireless optical channels. In this respect, assessing the outage probability achieved by some diversity techniques over this kind of channels is of major practical importance. In many circumstances, this is intimately related to the difficult question of analyzing the statistics of a sum of Gamma-Gamma random variables. Answering this question is not a simple matter. This is essentially because outage probabilities encountered in practice are often very small, and hence the use of classical Monte Carlo methods is not a reasonable choice. This lies behind the main motivation of the present work. In particular, this paper proposes a new approach to estimate the left tail of the sum of independent and identically distributed Gamma-Gamma variates. More specifically, we propose a mean-shift importance sampling scheme that efficiently evaluates the outage probability of L-branch maximum ratio combining diversity receivers over Gamma-Gamma fading channels. The proposed estimator satisfies the well-known bounded relative error criterion. We show the accuracy and the efficiency of our approach compared to naive Monte Carlo via some selected numerical simulations.

  12. On the sum of Gamma-Gamma variates with application to the fast outage probability evaluation over fading channels

    KAUST Repository

    Ben Issaid, Chaouki; Rached, Nadhir B.; Kammoun, Abla; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim; Tempone, Raul

    2017-01-01

    The Gamma-Gamma distribution has recently emerged in a number of applications ranging from modeling scattering and reverbation in sonar and radar systems to modeling atmospheric turbulence in wireless optical channels. In this respect, assessing the outage probability achieved by some diversity techniques over this kind of channels is of major practical importance. In many circumstances, this is intimately related to the difficult question of analyzing the statistics of a sum of Gamma-Gamma random variables. Answering this question is not a simple matter. This is essentially because outage probabilities encountered in practice are often very small, and hence the use of classical Monte Carlo methods is not a reasonable choice. This lies behind the main motivation of the present work. In particular, this paper proposes a new approach to estimate the left tail of the sum of independent and identically distributed Gamma-Gamma variates. More specifically, we propose a mean-shift importance sampling scheme that efficiently evaluates the outage probability of L-branch maximum ratio combining diversity receivers over Gamma-Gamma fading channels. The proposed estimator satisfies the well-known bounded relative error criterion. We show the accuracy and the efficiency of our approach compared to naive Monte Carlo via some selected numerical simulations.

  13. Use of workstations in the ANAV outage tasks course access

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Gómez Rodriguez, Carlos A.

    2016-01-01

    The access course for the Asco and Vandellos II Nuclear Power Plants contains all of the training that is considered necessary in compliance with the stipulations of current legislation for the pupils to carry out their activity at the plants. Given the heterogeneity of the special characteristics of those workers who take part in the outage tasks at our plants we have sought to improve the learning values of their access course with the inclusion of Work Stations since 2013. Several changes have been made in the training action since that date to make it more interactive.

  14. 76 FR 36892 - Proposed Extension of Part 4 of the Commission's Rules Regarding Outage Reporting to...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2011-06-23

    ...: None. Title: Communications Outage Reporting for Interconnected Voice over Internet Protocol Service.... Type of Review: New collection. Respondents: Businesses (Interconnected Voice over Internet Protocol... FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION 47 CFR Part 4 [PS Docket No. 11-82; FCC 11-74] Proposed...

  15. Three steam generator replacement projects in 1995: Consortium Siemens Framatome is well prepared to contribute its experience to the SGR at the Krsko NPP

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Holz, R.; Clavier, G.

    1996-01-01

    Since the companies Siemens AG and Framatome S.A. joined their experience and efforts in the field of steam generators replacements and formed a consortium in 1991, the following projects were performed in 1995: Ringhals 3, Tihange 3 and Asco 2. Further projects will follow in 1996, i.e., Doel 4 and Asco 2. Currently, this European consortium is bidding for the contract to replace the steam generators at the Krsko NPP and hopes to be awarded in 1996. An overview of the way the Consortium Siemens and Framatome approaches SG replacement projects is given based on the projects performed in 1995. Various aspects of project planning, management, licensing, personnel qualification and techniques used on site will be discussed. (author)

  16. Pre-service baseline inspection using x-probe of Oconee replacement steam generators

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Addario, M.; Shipp, P.; Davis, K.; Fogal, C.

    2003-01-01

    The eddy current method has been the industry standard for inspecting steam generator tubing for many years and the level of sophistication of coil technology has continued to evolve during that time. State of the art array probe systems now employ multiple sensitivity zones in the probe to better detect and characterize defects in an efficient manner. Owners and regulators of nuclear power plants are interested in the most effective and efficient inspection possible. The ultimate goal has been to meet or exceed new and existing regulatory and design requirements by maximizing the quantity and quality of eddy current data collected while minimizing both the time needed to perform the inspection and the radiation exposure. The X-Probe is an example of this new eddy current array technology. Qualified to detect all types of known defects in steam generator tubing, the technology is comprised of a system of probe, data acquisition instrumentation, computer and human interface software. Recently, Duke Power, along with Babcock and Wilcox Canada and the system developer R/D Tech, collaborated to implement this technology in a first of a kind full scale pre-service inspection of replacement steam generators for Duke Power's Oconee nuclear generating station at Babcock and Wilcox Canada's Cambridge plant. The discussion in this paper will briefly describe the X-Probe technology, describe the system required to perform the inspection, present the general results of the inspection and finally draw some comparative benefit conclusions for both pre-service and in-service applications. (author)

  17. Solving the maintenance dilemma of ageing controls in nuclear standby generators. The decision to retro-fit the control system with 'off the shelf technology'

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Jackson, Neil; Rees, Christpher; Yeremain, Joseph

    2010-01-01

    Blackouts - Are we 2 Steps away from Nuclear meltdown owing to Aging Controls? The intent of this white paper is to high-light the need to:- 1. Replace the aging control systems associated with critical safety equipment of Standby Generators in the nuclear environment. 2. Explain how 'off the shelf' standard control equipment may be suitably selected, integrated and tested for a nuclear environment. 3. High-light the lessons learned in respect of: - a. Qualification of COTS (commercial off the shelf) equipment for use in a nuclear application. b. Software quality assurance program. c. Reducing plant outage time. 4. Guide you on the selection criteria of credible partners that can implement such mission critical control systems. Causes for Concern - The control systems of some of the Standby Generators are 30+ years old and aging equipment is no longer available from the OEM's. Maintenance crews are evolving with young engineers who have no experience, or chance to be trained, on the old installed control base. The writer has no doubt that the extent of the black outs of North America, Aug 2003, and the standby generators ever reducing availability, has compromised their ability to provide essential service and communications to maintain the safety of the nuclear plant. These concerns prompted Ontario Power Generator and Bruce Power to review the reliability of their standby generators and this review prompted them to locate a suitable supplier for the task of replacing the control system. OPG's previous attempts to have the controls replaced by I and C dedicated companies weighed heavy on their minds. Worsening the dilemma was the fact that it used dedicated controls and what might be considered 'Propriety Software'. Black Outs - Not only is it possible, the probability of it happening is getting stronger The Northeast Blackout of 2003 was a massive widespread power outage that occurred throughout parts of the North-eastern and Midwestern United States and Ontario

  18. Advances in steam generator service technology

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Perez, Ric

    1998-01-01

    The most recent advances in pressurized water reactor steam generator service technology are discussed in this article. Focus is on new developments in robotics, including the Remotely Operated Service Arm (ROSA III); repair and maintenance services on the SG secondary side; and the newest advances in SG inspection. These products and services save utility costs, shorten outage durations, enhance plant performance and safety, and reduce radiation exposure. (author)

  19. Advances in steam generator service technology

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Nair, B. R.; Bastin, J. J.

    1997-01-01

    This paper will discuss the most recent and innovative advances in the areas of pressurized water reactor (PWR) steam generator service technology. The paper will include detail of new products such as the Remotely Operated Service Arm (ROSA-III), laser welded sleeving, and laser welded Direct Tube Repair (DTR) - products and services that save utility costs, shorten outage durations, enhance plant performance and safety, and reduce radiation exposure. (author)

  20. Optimization of station battery replacement

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Jancauskas, J.R.; Shook, D.A.

    1994-01-01

    During a loss of ac power at a nuclear generating station (including diesel generators), batteries provide the source of power which is required to operate safety-related components. Because traditional lead-acid batteries have a qualified life of 20 years, the batteries must be replaced a minimum of once during a station's lifetime, twice if license extension is pursued, and more often depending on actual in-service dates and the results of surveillance tests. Replacement of batteries often occurs prior to 20 years as a result of systems changes caused by factors such as Station Blackout Regulations, control system upgrades, incremental load growth, and changes in the operating times of existing equipment. Many of these replacement decisions are based on the predictive capabilities of manual design basis calculations. The inherent conservatism of manual calculations may result in battery replacements occurring before actually required. Computerized analysis of batteries can aid in optimizing the timing of replacements as well as in interpreting service test data. Computerized analysis also provides large benefits in maintaining the as-configured load profile and corresponding design margins, while also providing the capability of quickly analyze proposed modifications and response to internal and external audits

  1. Fault Sample Generation for Virtual Testability Demonstration Test Subject to Minimal Maintenance and Scheduled Replacement

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Yong Zhang

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available Virtual testability demonstration test brings new requirements to the fault sample generation. First, fault occurrence process is described by stochastic process theory. It is discussed that fault occurrence process subject to minimal repair is nonhomogeneous Poisson process (NHPP. Second, the interarrival time distribution function of the next fault event is proposed and three typical kinds of parameterized NHPP are discussed. Third, the procedure of fault sample generation is put forward with the assumptions of minimal maintenance and scheduled replacement. The fault modes and their occurrence time subject to specified conditions and time period can be obtained. Finally, an antenna driving subsystem in automatic pointing and tracking platform is taken as a case to illustrate the proposed method. Results indicate that both the size and structure of the fault samples generated by the proposed method are reasonable and effective. The proposed method can be applied to virtual testability demonstration test well.

  2. Efficient Outage Probability Evaluation of Diversity Receivers Over Generalized Gamma Channels

    KAUST Repository

    Ben Issaid, Chaouki

    2016-10-01

    In this paper, we are interested in determining the cumulative distribution function of the sum of generalized Gamma in the setting of rare event simulations. To this end, we present an efficient importance sampling estimator. The main result of this work is the bounded relative property of the proposed estimator. This result is used to accurately estimate the outage probability of multibranch maximum ratio combining and equal gain combining diversity receivers over generalized Gamma fading channels. Selected numerical simulations are discussed to show the robustness of our estimator compared to naive Monte Carlo.

  3. Efficient Outage Probability Evaluation of Diversity Receivers Over Generalized Gamma Channels

    KAUST Repository

    Ben Issaid, Chaouki; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim; Tempone, Raul

    2016-01-01

    In this paper, we are interested in determining the cumulative distribution function of the sum of generalized Gamma in the setting of rare event simulations. To this end, we present an efficient importance sampling estimator. The main result of this work is the bounded relative property of the proposed estimator. This result is used to accurately estimate the outage probability of multibranch maximum ratio combining and equal gain combining diversity receivers over generalized Gamma fading channels. Selected numerical simulations are discussed to show the robustness of our estimator compared to naive Monte Carlo.

  4. Use of mock-up training to reduce personnel exposure at the North Anna Unit 1 Steam Generator Replacement Project

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Henry, H.G. [Virginia Power, Mineral, VA (United States); Reilly, B.P. [Bechtel Power Corp., Gaithersburg, MD (United States)

    1995-03-01

    The North Anna Power Station is located on the southern shore of Lake Anna in Louisa County, approximately forty miles northwest of Richmond, Virginia. The two 910 Mw nuclear units located on this site are owned by Virginia Electric and Power Company (Virginia Power) and Old Dominion Electric Cooperative and operated by Virginia Power. Fuel was loaded into Unit 1 in December 1977, and it began commercial operation in June 1978. Fuel was loaded into Unit 2 in April 1980 and began commercial operation in December 1980. Each nuclear unit includes a three-coolant-loop pressurized light water reactor nuclear steam supply system that was furnished by Westinghouse Electric Corporation. Included within each system were three Westinghouse Model 51 steam generators with alloy 600, mill-annealed tubing material. Over the years of operation of Unit 1, various corrosion-related phenomena had occurred that affected the steam generators tubing and degraded their ability to fulfill their heat transfer function. Advanced inspection and repair techniques helped extend the useful life of the steam generators, but projections based on the results of the inspections indicated that the existing steam generators tubing and degraded their ability to fullfill their heat transfer function. Advanced inspection and repair techniques helped extend the useful life of the steam generators, but projections based on the results of the inspections indicated that the existing steam generators would not last their design life and must be repaired. To this end Virginia Power determined that a steam generator replacement (SGR) program was necessary to remove the old steam generator tube bundles and lower shell sections, including the channel heads (collectively called the lower assemblies), and replace them with new lower assemblies incorporating design features that will prevent the degradation problems that the old steam generators had experienced.

  5. Anti vibration bars replacement in Vandellos II steam generators

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Vinyes, R.; Leal, R.

    1994-01-01

    C.N. Vandellos II is equipped with three steam generators Westinghouse model F. The number of tubes is 5626 each SG and the material Inconel 600TT. During the first inservice inspection, in 1989, tube wall thickness reductions were observed due to fretting in zones of contact with the tubes anti vibration bars. In the 2 nd shutdown for refueling (1990) all the tubes subject to this type of degradation were inspected by eddy currents, occurring a significative increase in number of tubes affected as well as the quantity of plugged tubes for that reason. Additionally, Westinghouse performed visual inspection and dimensional control of gaps in the tube bundles. Taking in account the results, the replacement with AVBs of new design was decided. AVBs new design is more complex than the original due to the combination of flexible and expandable bars in order to eliminate gaps between tubes an bars an assure proper bundle support. Given that the installation has to be done under water for shielding, all unions are bolted so that no welding is required. Each one of the bars, 333 per SG, is attached to a support structure consisting in 6 retaining plates and 4 bridge plates. (Author)

  6. Frequency of pacemaker malfunction associated with monopolar electrosurgery during pulse generator replacement or upgrade surgery.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lin, Yun; Melby, Daniel P; Krishnan, Balaji; Adabag, Selcuk; Tholakanahalli, Venkatakrishna; Li, Jian-Ming

    2017-08-01

    The aim of this study is to investigate the frequency of electrosurgery-related pacemaker malfunction. A retrospective study was conducted to investigate electrosurgery-related pacemaker malfunction in consecutive patients undergoing pulse generator (PG) replacement or upgrade from two large hospitals in Minneapolis, MN between January 2011 and January 2014. The occurrence of this pacemaker malfunction was then studied by using MAUDE database for all four major device vendors. A total of 1398 consecutive patients from 2 large tertiary referral centers in Minneapolis, MN undergoing PG replacement or upgrade surgery were retrospectively studied. Four patients (0.3% of all patients), all with pacemakers from St Jude Medical (2.8%, 4 of 142) had output failure or inappropriately low pacing rate below 30 bpm during electrosurgery, despite being programmed in an asynchronous mode. During the same period, 1174 cases of pacemaker malfunctions were reported on the same models in MAUDE database, 37 of which (3.2%) were electrosurgery-related. Twenty-four cases (65%) had output failure or inappropriate low pacing rate. The distribution of adverse events was loss of pacing (59.5%), reversion to backup pacing (32.4%), inappropriate low pacing rate (5.4%), and ventricular fibrillation (2.7%). The majority of these (78.5%) occurred during PG replacement at ERI or upgrade surgery. No electrosurgery-related malfunction was found in MAUDE database on 862 pacemaker malfunction cases during the same period from other vendors. Electrosurgery during PG replacement or upgrade surgery can trigger output failure or inappropriate low pacing rate in certain models of modern pacemakers. Cautions should be taken for pacemaker-dependent patients.

  7. Sludge Lancing and Visual Inspection of Steam Generator for KORI Nuclear Power Plant Unit 3

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Jeong, Woo-Tae [Korea Hydro and Nuclear Power Co. Ltd. Central Research Institute, Daejeon(Korea, Republic of); Kim, Sang-Tae; Hong, Jae-Yung; Jeong, Yun-Soon [Sae-An Engineering Corporation, Seoul (Korea, Republic of)

    2015-05-15

    Annulus, tube-lane, and in-bundle area of the steam generators were searched for possible foreign objects. No new foreign objects were found. Two foreign objects which were found during previous outage were impossible to remove. Mock-up training before the operation was helpful to finish the service as scheduled. Sludge lancing of the three steam generators was made using FOLAS-I lancing system. FOSAR operations were done using video probe and special tools of Sae-An Engineering Cooperation. The weight of sludge removed from SG 'A', 'B', and 'C' was 177kg, 134kg, 117kg respectively. Bag filters for and cartridge filters consumed for SG 'A', 'B', and 'C' was (53,414), (75,243), and (61,171) respectively. Foreign object search operation for the annulus, the tube lane, and in-bundle area of the steam generators found nothing. Retrieval of the two remaining foreign objects from the previous outage was tried but failed.

  8. Sludge Lancing and Visual Inspection of Steam Generator for KORI Nuclear Power Plant Unit 3

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Jeong, Woo-Tae; Kim, Sang-Tae; Hong, Jae-Yung; Jeong, Yun-Soon

    2015-01-01

    Annulus, tube-lane, and in-bundle area of the steam generators were searched for possible foreign objects. No new foreign objects were found. Two foreign objects which were found during previous outage were impossible to remove. Mock-up training before the operation was helpful to finish the service as scheduled. Sludge lancing of the three steam generators was made using FOLAS-I lancing system. FOSAR operations were done using video probe and special tools of Sae-An Engineering Cooperation. The weight of sludge removed from SG 'A', 'B', and 'C' was 177kg, 134kg, 117kg respectively. Bag filters for and cartridge filters consumed for SG 'A', 'B', and 'C' was (53,414), (75,243), and (61,171) respectively. Foreign object search operation for the annulus, the tube lane, and in-bundle area of the steam generators found nothing. Retrieval of the two remaining foreign objects from the previous outage was tried but failed

  9. Replacement of sub-systems

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Rosen, S.E.

    1992-01-01

    This paper describes a number of quality aspects related to replacement of important systems or components in a nuclear power station. Reference is given to the steam generator replacement and power uprating performed at Ringhals 2 in Sweden in 1989. Since quality is a wide concept there has been put special emphasis in this paper to the important aspects that traditionally are not connected to quality. (author) 1 fig

  10. Ring thermal shield piping modification at Pickering Nuclear Generating Station 'A' Unit 1

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Brown, R.; Cobanoglu, M.M.

    1995-01-01

    Each of the four Pickering Nuclear Generating Station A (PNGSA) CANDU units was constructed with its reactor and dump tank surrounded by a concrete Calandria Vault (CV). The Ring Thermal Shield (RTS) system at PNGSA units is a water cooled structure with internal cooling channels with the purpose of attenuating excessive heat flux from the calandria shell to the end shield rings and adjoining concrete (Figure 1). In newer CANDU units the reactor calandria vessel is surrounded by a large water filled shield tank which eliminates the requirement for the RTS system. The RTS structures are situated in the space between the calandria and the vault walls. Each RTS is assembled from eight flat sided carbon steel segments, tilted towards the calandria and supported from the end shield rings. Cooling water to the RTS is supplied by carbon steel cooling pipes with a portion of the pipe run embedded in the vault walls. Flow through each RTS is divided into two independent circuits, having an inlet and an outlet cooling line. There are four locations of RTS inlet and outlet cooling lines. The inlet lines are located at the bottom and the outlet lines at the top of the RTS. The 'L' shaped section of RTS inlet and outlet cooling lines, from the RTS waterbox to the start of embedded portion at the concrete wall, had become defective due to corrosion induced by excessive Moisture levels in the calandria vaults. An on-line leak sealing capability was developed and placed in service in all four PNGSA units. However, a leak found during the 1994 Unit 1 outage was too large,to seal with the current capability, forcing Ontario Hydro (OH) to develop a method to replace the corroded pipes. The repair project was subject to some lofty performance targets. All tools had to be able to withstand dose rates of up to 3000 Rem/hour. These tools, along with procedures and personnel had to successfully repair the RTS system within 6 months otherwise a costly outage extension would result. This

  11. An Internet of Things Approach to Electrical Power Monitoring and Outage Reporting

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Koch, Daniel B [ORNL

    2017-01-01

    The so-called Internet of Things concept has captured much attention recently as ordinary devices are connected to the Internet for monitoring and control purposes. One enabling technology is the proliferation of low-cost, single board computers with built-in network interfaces. Some of these are capable of hosting full-fledged operating systems that provide rich programming environments. Taken together, these features enable inexpensive solutions for even traditional tasks such as the one presented here for electrical power monitoring and outage reporting.

  12. Key issues for the control of refueling outage duration and costs in PWR nuclear power plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Degrave, C.; Martin-Onraet, M.

    2000-01-01

    For several years, EDF, within the framework of the CIDEM project and in collaboration with some German Utilities, has undertaken a detailed review of the operating experience both of its own NPP and of foreign units, in order to improve the performances of future units under design, particularly the French-German European Pressurized Reactor (EPR) project. This review made it possible to identify the key issues allowing to decrease the duration of refueling and maintenance outages. These key issues can be classified in 3 categories: Design; Maintenance and Logistic Support; Outage Management. Most key issues in the design field and some in the logistic support field have been studied and could be integrated into the design of any future PWR unit, as for the EPR project. Some of them could also be adapted to current plants, provided they are feasible and profitable. The organization must be tailored to each country, utility or period: it widely depends on the power production environment, particularly in a deregulation context. (author)

  13. LIDAR AND INS FUSION IN PERIODS OF GPS OUTAGES FOR MOBILE LASER SCANNING MAPPING SYSTEMS

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    I. Klein

    2012-09-01

    Full Text Available Mobile laser scanning systems are becoming an increasingly popular means to obtain 3D coverage on a large scale. To perform the mapping, the exact position of the vehicle must be known throughout the trajectory. Exact position is achieved via integration of Global Positioning Systems (GPS and Inertial Navigation Systems (INS. Yet, in urban environments, cases of complete or even partial GPS outages may occur leaving the navigation solution to rely only on the INS. The INS navigation solution degrades with time as the Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU measurements contains noise, which permeates into the navigation equations. Degradation of the position determination leads to loss of data in such segments. To circumvent such drift and its effects, we propose fusing INS with lidar data by using building edges. This detection of edges is then translated into position data, which is used as an aiding to the INS. It thereby enables the determination of the vehicle position with a satisfactory level accuracy, sufficient to perform the laser-scanning based mapping in those outage periods.

  14. 15 years steam generator experience in German PWR power plants; part II: replacement of two completely assembled steam generators within ten weeks

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Scheuktanz, G.; Bouecker, R.; Riess, R.; Soellner, P.; Stieding, L.; Termeuhlen, H.

    1984-01-01

    This paper reports on the replacement of two steam generators at the Obrigheim power plant during a 10-week period, including a description of the methods and equipment used to do so. It is concluded that the method should be used only if transportation conditions within the reactor building preclude a complete system exchange and that one of the main reasons for the success of this operation was the very close relationship established between plant personnel and the equipment supplier and contractor, a relationship which began when the project was in the planning stage

  15. Market led: Forsmark looks to 2000

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Anon.

    1994-01-01

    The Forsmark nuclear power plant in Sweden includes three BWR reactors totalling 3200 MWe. From a design level of 70% the average capability factor has been increased to 90%. This has been achieved by a market-orientated approach with efficient outages and a total production cost identified with each unit in order to show how each stands in relation to the market price level and to outside competition. Forsmark's performance, as indicated by capacity factors, refuelling outage length and electricity production costs is better than most. Strategic planning is important and a refurbishment programme up to 2000 is planned to renew the electricity generators, replace the process computers and upgrade the preheater systems. (UK)

  16. Exact closed form expressions for outage probability of GSC receivers over Rayleigh fading channel subject to self-interference

    KAUST Repository

    Nam, Sungsik; Hasna, Mazen Omar; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

    2010-01-01

    in mind, we capitalize in this paper on some new order statistics results to derive exact closed-form expressions for outage probability of GSC RAKE receivers subject to self-interference over independent and identically distributed Rayleigh fading

  17. High flux testing reactor Petten. Replacement of the reactor vessel and connected components. Overall report

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Chrysochoides, N.G.; Cundy, M.R.; Von der Hardt, P.; Husmann, K.; Swanenburg de Veye, R.J.; Tas, A.

    1985-01-01

    The project of replacing the HFR originated in 1974 when results of several research programmes confirmed severe neutron embrittlement of aluminium alloys suggesting a limited life of the existing facility. This report contains the detailed chronology of events concerning preparation and execution of the replacement. After a 14 months' outage the reactor resumed routine operation on 14th February, 1985. At the end of several years of planning and preparation the reconstruction proceded in the following steps: unloading of the old core, decay of short-lived radioactivity in December 1983, removal of the old tank and of its peripheral equipment in January-February 1984, segmentation and waste disposal of the removed components in March-April, decontamination of the pools, bottom penetration overhauling in May-June, installation of the new tank and other new components in July-September, testing and commissioning, including minor modifications in October-December, and, trials runs and start-up preparation in January-February 1985. The new HFR Petten features increased and improved experimental facilities. Among others the obsolete thermal columns was replaced by two high flux beam tubes. Moreover the new plant has been designed for future increases of reactor power and neutron fluxes. For the next three to four years the reactor has to cope with a large irradiation programme, claiming its capacity to nearly 100%

  18. 47 CFR 4.11 - Notification and initial and final communications outage reports that must be filed by...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-10-01

    ... Notification shall provide: The name of the reporting entity; the date and time of onset of the outage; a brief... FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION GENERAL DISRUPTIONS TO COMMUNICATIONS Reporting Requirements for... and contact telephone number by which the Commission's technical staff may contact the reporting...

  19. Operational readiness verification, phase 1: A study on safety during outage and restart of nuclear power plants

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Hollnagel, E. [Linkoeping Univ. (Sweden). Dept. of Computer and Information Science; Gauthereau, V. [Linkoeping Univ. (Sweden). Dept. of Industrial Engineering

    2001-06-01

    This report contains the findings from the first phase of a study on safety during outage and restart of nuclear power plants. Operational Readiness Verification (ORV) - in Swedish called Driftklarhetsverifiering (DKV) - refers to the test and verification activities that are necessary to ensure that plant systems are able to provide their required functions when needed - more concretely that all plant systems are in their correct functional state when the plant is restarted after an outage period. The concrete background for this work is that nine ORV related incidents were reported in Sweden between July 1995 and October 1998. The work reported here comprised a literature survey of research relevant for ORV issues, and an assessment of the present situation at Swedish NPPs with respect to ORV. The literature survey was primarily aimed at research related to NPPs, but also looked at domains where similar problems have occurred, such as maintenance in commercial aviation. The survey looked specifically for organisational and MTO aspects relevant to the present situation in Swedish NPPs. One finding was that ORV should be seen as an integral part of maintenance, rather than as a separate activity. Another, that there is a characteristic distribution of error modes for maintenance and ORV, with many sequence errors and omissions, rather than a set of unique error modes. An international study further showed that there are important differences in how procedures are used, and in the balance between decentralisation and centralisation. Several studies also suggested that ORV could usefully be described as a barrier system in relation to the flow of work, for instance using the following five stages: (1) preventive actions during maintenance/outage, (2) post-test after completion of work, (3) pre-test before start-up, (4) the start-up sequence itself, and (5) preventive actions during power operation - possibly including automatic safety systems. In the field survey

  20. Operational readiness verification, phase 1: A study on safety during outage and restart of nuclear power plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hollnagel, E.; Gauthereau, V.

    2001-06-01

    This report contains the findings from the first phase of a study on safety during outage and restart of nuclear power plants. Operational Readiness Verification (ORV) - in Swedish called Driftklarhetsverifiering (DKV) - refers to the test and verification activities that are necessary to ensure that plant systems are able to provide their required functions when needed - more concretely that all plant systems are in their correct functional state when the plant is restarted after an outage period. The concrete background for this work is that nine ORV related incidents were reported in Sweden between July 1995 and October 1998. The work reported here comprised a literature survey of research relevant for ORV issues, and an assessment of the present situation at Swedish NPPs with respect to ORV. The literature survey was primarily aimed at research related to NPPs, but also looked at domains where similar problems have occurred, such as maintenance in commercial aviation. The survey looked specifically for organisational and MTO aspects relevant to the present situation in Swedish NPPs. One finding was that ORV should be seen as an integral part of maintenance, rather than as a separate activity. Another, that there is a characteristic distribution of error modes for maintenance and ORV, with many sequence errors and omissions, rather than a set of unique error modes. An international study further showed that there are important differences in how procedures are used, and in the balance between decentralisation and centralisation. Several studies also suggested that ORV could usefully be described as a barrier system in relation to the flow of work, for instance using the following five stages: (1) preventive actions during maintenance/outage, (2) post-test after completion of work, (3) pre-test before start-up, (4) the start-up sequence itself, and (5) preventive actions during power operation - possibly including automatic safety systems. In the field survey

  1. Operational readiness verification, phase 1: A study on safety during outage and restart of nuclear power plants

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Hollnagel, E [Linkoeping Univ. (Sweden). Dept. of Computer and Information Science; Gauthereau, V [Linkoeping Univ. (Sweden). Dept. of Industrial Engineering

    2001-06-01

    This report contains the findings from the first phase of a study on safety during outage and restart of nuclear power plants. Operational Readiness Verification (ORV) - in Swedish called Driftklarhetsverifiering (DKV) - refers to the test and verification activities that are necessary to ensure that plant systems are able to provide their required functions when needed - more concretely that all plant systems are in their correct functional state when the plant is restarted after an outage period. The concrete background for this work is that nine ORV related incidents were reported in Sweden between July 1995 and October 1998. The work reported here comprised a literature survey of research relevant for ORV issues, and an assessment of the present situation at Swedish NPPs with respect to ORV. The literature survey was primarily aimed at research related to NPPs, but also looked at domains where similar problems have occurred, such as maintenance in commercial aviation. The survey looked specifically for organisational and MTO aspects relevant to the present situation in Swedish NPPs. One finding was that ORV should be seen as an integral part of maintenance, rather than as a separate activity. Another, that there is a characteristic distribution of error modes for maintenance and ORV, with many sequence errors and omissions, rather than a set of unique error modes. An international study further showed that there are important differences in how procedures are used, and in the balance between decentralisation and centralisation. Several studies also suggested that ORV could usefully be described as a barrier system in relation to the flow of work, for instance using the following five stages: (1) preventive actions during maintenance/outage, (2) post-test after completion of work, (3) pre-test before start-up, (4) the start-up sequence itself, and (5) preventive actions during power operation - possibly including automatic safety systems. In the field survey

  2. Accurate outage analysis of incremental decode-and-forward opportunistic relaying

    KAUST Repository

    Tourki, Kamel; Yang, Hongchuan; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

    2011-01-01

    In this paper, we investigate a dual-hop decode-and-forward opportunistic relaying scheme where the selected relay chooses to cooperate only if the source-destination channel is of an unacceptable quality. We first derive the exact statistics of received signal-to-noise (SNR) over each hop with co-located relays, in terms of probability density function (PDF). Then, the PDFs are used to determine very accurate closed-form expression for the outage probability for a transmission rate R. Furthermore, we perform asymptotic analysis and we deduce the diversity order of the scheme. We validate our analysis by showing that performance simulation results coincide with our analytical results over different network architectures. © 2011 IEEE.

  3. Accurate outage analysis of incremental decode-and-forward opportunistic relaying

    KAUST Repository

    Tourki, Kamel

    2011-04-01

    In this paper, we investigate a dual-hop decode-and-forward opportunistic relaying scheme where the selected relay chooses to cooperate only if the source-destination channel is of an unacceptable quality. We first derive the exact statistics of received signal-to-noise (SNR) over each hop with co-located relays, in terms of probability density function (PDF). Then, the PDFs are used to determine very accurate closed-form expression for the outage probability for a transmission rate R. Furthermore, we perform asymptotic analysis and we deduce the diversity order of the scheme. We validate our analysis by showing that performance simulation results coincide with our analytical results over different network architectures. © 2011 IEEE.

  4. Response of MV-connected Doubly-Fed Induction Generator Wind Turbines and CHP plants to Grid Disturbances

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Karaliolios, P.; Slootweg, J.G.; Kling, W.L.

    2010-01-01

    Notwithstanding the positive environmental impact, the increasing penetration of Distributed Generation (DG) units connected to the distribution network raises new topics concerning the expected response of these during outages. Grid disturbances especially at the transmission level can cause the

  5. Outage and ser performance of an opportunistic multi-user underlay cognitive network

    KAUST Repository

    Khan, Fahd Ahmed

    2012-10-01

    Consider a multi-user underlay cognitive network where multiple cognitive users concurrently share the spectrum with a primary network and a single secondary user is selected for transmission. The channel is assumed to have independent but not identical Nakagami-m fading. Closed form expressions for the outage performance and the symbol-error-rate performance of the opportunistic multi-user secondary network are derived when a peak interference power constraint is imposed on the secondary network in addition to the limited peak transmit power of each secondary user. © 2012 IEEE.

  6. Integrated services as the key to the optimisation of refueling outages

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Ortega, Juan; Gonzalez, Roberto; Gutierrez, Jose E.

    2010-01-01

    Refueling outages at nuclear power plants are subject to demanding improvement criteria in each and every one of the activities scheduled. The management of activities on the refueling floor, including the phases of opening and closing of the reactor vessel and associated tasks relating to the reactor internals, the unloading, loading and management of the irradiated fuel and activities requested for the in-service inspection of essential primary circuit components, are interventions that have an impact on the refueling critical path and whose overall integration allows for significant optimization of the entire management of this fundamental refueling activity. For several years now, ENUSA, as the company specializing in irradiated fuel services, TECNATOM as the company responsible for the in-service inspection of critical primary side components and Westinghouse as the technology provider and specialist in the supply of plant support services, have together formed a solid working team offering this integrated refueling service to the Spanish plants. Today, the new and heightened demands regarding the training and specialization of the personnel participating in refueling outages, the need to consider contingencies in the activities scheduled and the objectives relating to the ALARA concept and safe operations require that this service include new activities providing synergies and leading to higher levels of commitment to excellence. This paper will present the service model developed, the most significant activities integrated in the service and the advantages and milestones achieved and reached during this period, compared to the conventional distributed functions model. Likewise, an analysis will be made of the new challenges that are being addressed, with a view to bringing about a more global integration. (authors)

  7. Knowledge to Action - Understanding Natural Hazards-Induced Power Outage Scenarios for Actionable Disaster Responses

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kar, B.; Robinson, C.; Koch, D. B.; Omitaomu, O.

    2017-12-01

    The Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030 identified the following four priorities to prevent and reduce disaster risks: i) understanding disaster risk; ii) strengthening governance to manage disaster risk; iii) investing in disaster risk reduction for resilience and; iv) enhancing disaster preparedness for effective response, and to "Build Back Better" in recovery, rehabilitation and reconstruction. While forecasting and decision making tools are in place to predict and understand future impacts of natural hazards, the knowledge to action approach that currently exists fails to provide updated information needed by decision makers to undertake response and recovery efforts following a hazard event. For instance, during a tropical storm event advisories are released every two to three hours, but manual analysis of geospatial data to determine potential impacts of the event tends to be time-consuming and a post-event process. Researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory have developed a Spatial Decision Support System that enables real-time analysis of storm impact based on updated advisory. A prototype of the tool that focuses on determining projected power outage areas and projected duration of outages demonstrates the feasibility of integrating science with decision making for emergency management personnel to act in real time to protect communities and reduce risk.

  8. Exploiting Outage and Error Probability of Cooperative Incremental Relaying in Underwater Wireless Sensor Networks

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Hina Nasir

    2016-07-01

    Full Text Available This paper embeds a bi-fold contribution for Underwater Wireless Sensor Networks (UWSNs; performance analysis of incremental relaying in terms of outage and error probability, and based on the analysis proposition of two new cooperative routing protocols. Subject to the first contribution, a three step procedure is carried out; a system model is presented, the number of available relays are determined, and based on cooperative incremental retransmission methodology, closed-form expressions for outage and error probability are derived. Subject to the second contribution, Adaptive Cooperation in Energy (ACE efficient depth based routing and Enhanced-ACE (E-ACE are presented. In the proposed model, feedback mechanism indicates success or failure of data transmission. If direct transmission is successful, there is no need for relaying by cooperative relay nodes. In case of failure, all the available relays retransmit the data one by one till the desired signal quality is achieved at destination. Simulation results show that the ACE and E-ACE significantly improves network performance, i.e., throughput, when compared with other incremental relaying protocols like Cooperative Automatic Repeat reQuest (CARQ. E-ACE and ACE achieve 69% and 63% more throughput respectively as compared to CARQ in hard underwater environment.

  9. Key Issues for the control of refueling outage duration and costs in PWR Nuclear Power Plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Degrave, Claude

    2002-01-01

    For several years, EDF, within the framework of the CIDEM1 project and in collaboration with some German Utilities, has undertaken a detailed review of the operating experience both of its own NPP and of foreign units, in order to improve the performances of future units under design, particularly the French-German European Pressurized Reactor (EPR) project. This review made it possible to identify the key issues allowing to decrease the duration of refueling and maintenance outages. These key issues can be classified in 3 categories Design, Maintenance and Logistic Support, Outage Management. Most of the key issues in the design field and some in the logistic support field have been studied and could be integrated into the design of any future PWR unit, as for the EPR project. Some of them could also be adapted to current plants, provided they are feasible and profitable. The organization must be tailored to each country, utility or period: it widely depends on the power production environment, particularly in a deregulation context. (author)

  10. Spatial generalized linear mixed models of electric power outages due to hurricanes and ice storms

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Liu Haibin; Davidson, Rachel A.; Apanasovich, Tatiyana V.

    2008-01-01

    This paper presents new statistical models that predict the number of hurricane- and ice storm-related electric power outages likely to occur in each 3 kmx3 km grid cell in a region. The models are based on a large database of recent outages experienced by three major East Coast power companies in six hurricanes and eight ice storms. A spatial generalized linear mixed modeling (GLMM) approach was used in which spatial correlation is incorporated through random effects. Models were fitted using a composite likelihood approach and the covariance matrix was estimated empirically. A simulation study was conducted to test the model estimation procedure, and model training, validation, and testing were done to select the best models and assess their predictive power. The final hurricane model includes number of protective devices, maximum gust wind speed, hurricane indicator, and company indicator covariates. The final ice storm model includes number of protective devices, ice thickness, and ice storm indicator covariates. The models should be useful for power companies as they plan for future storms. The statistical modeling approach offers a new way to assess the reliability of electric power and other infrastructure systems in extreme events

  11. Energy markets : refinery outages can have varying gasoline price impacts, but gaps in federal data limit understanding of impacts.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2009-07-01

    In 2008, GAO reported that, with : the exception of the period : following Hurricanes Katrina and : Rita, refinery outages in the United : States did not show discernible : trends in reduced production : capacity, frequency, and location : from 2002 ...

  12. CANDU-PHW fuel channel replacement experience

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Dunn, J.T.; Kakaria, B.K.

    1982-09-01

    One of the main characteristics of the CANDU pressurized heavy water reactor is the use of pressure tubes rather than one large pressure vessel to contain the fuel and coolant. This provides an inherent design capability to permit their replacement in an expeditious manner, without seriously affecting the high capacity factors of the reactor units. Of th eight Ontario Hydro commercial nuclear generating units, the lifetime performance places seven of them (including two that have had some of their fuel channels replaced), in the top ten positions in the world's large nuclear-electric unit performance ranking. Pressure tube cracks in the rolled joint region have resulted in 70 fuel channels being replaced in three reactor units, the latest being at the Bruce Nuclear Generating Station 'A', Unit 2 in February 1982. The rolled joint design and rolling procedures have been modified to eliminate this problem on CANDU units subsequent to Bruce 'A'. This paper describes the CANDU pressure tube performance history and expectations, and the tooling and procedures used to carry out the fuel channel replacement

  13. Electrosleeve process for in-situ nuclear steam generator repair

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Barton, R.A.; Moran, T.E.; Renaud, E.

    1997-01-01

    Degradation of steam generator (SG) tubing by localized corrosion is a widespread problem in the nuclear industry that can lead to costly forced out-ages, unit de-rating, SG replacement or even the permanent shutdown of a reactor. In response to the onset of SG tubing degradation at Ontario Hydro's Pickering Nuclear Generating Station (PNGS) Unit 5, and the determined unsuitability of conventional repair methods (mechanically expanded or welded sleeves) for Alloy 400, an alternative repair technology was developed. Electrosleeve is a non-intrusive, low-temperature process that involves the electrodeposition of a nanocrystalline nickel microalloy forming a continuously bonded, structural layer over the internal diameter of the degraded region. This technology is designed to provide a long-term pressure boundary repair, fully restoring the structural integrity of the damaged region to its original state. This paper describes the Electrosleeve process for SG tubing repair and the unique properties of the advanced sleeve material. The successful installation of Electrosleeves that have been in service for more than three years in Alloy 400 SG tubing at the Pickering-5 CANDU unit, the more recent extension of the technology to Alloy 600 and its demonstration in a U.S. pressurized water reactor (PWR), is presented. A number of PWR operators have requested plant operating technical specification changes to permit Electrosleeve SG tube repair. Licensing of the Electrosleeve by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is expected imminently. (author)

  14. Blown by the wind. Replacing nuclear power in German electricity generation

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Lechtenböhmer, Stefan; Samadi, Sascha

    2013-01-01

    Only three days after the beginning of the nuclear catastrophe in Fukushima, Japan, on 11 March 2011, the German government ordered 8 of the country's 17 existing nuclear power plants (NPPs) to stop operating within a few days. In summer 2011 the government put forward a law – passed in parliament by a large majority – that calls for a complete nuclear phase-out by the end of 2022. These government actions were in contrast to its initial plans, laid out in fall 2010, to expand the lifetimes of the country's NPPs. The immediate closure of 8 NPPs and the plans for a complete nuclear phase-out within little more than a decade, raised concerns about Germany's ability to secure a stable supply of electricity. Some observers feared power supply shortages, increasing CO 2 -emissions and a need for Germany to become a net importer of electricity. Now – a little more than a year after the phase-out law entered into force – this paper examines these concerns using (a) recent statistical data on electricity production and demand in the first 15 months after the German government's immediate reaction to the Fukushima accident and (b) reviews the most recent projections and scenarios by different stakeholders on how the German electricity system may develop until 2025, when NPPs will no longer be in operation. The paper finds that Germany has a realistic chance of fully replacing nuclear power with additional renewable electricity generation on an annual basis by 2025 or earlier, provided that several related challenges, e.g. expansion of the grids and provision of balancing power, can be solved successfully. Already in 2012 additional electricity generation from renewable energy sources in combination with a reduced domestic demand for electricity will likely fully compensate for the reduced power generation from the NPPs shut down in March 2011. If current political targets will be realised, Germany neither has to become a net electricity importer, nor will be unable

  15. Hoist motor replacements. Help slash downtime, unplanned outages

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Elliott, J.

    2004-11-01

    The article describes the design and retrofitting of a 'Dynamic Field Control' system to a P & H 4100 shovel. Designed by Drives and Controls Services Inc., this is a control system operated with a programmable logic control that enhances the performance of the hoist motor on the shovel. Flanders Electric Motor Service fitted prototype M22 motors with these control to P & H 4100 shovels in February 2001. Since then they have been retrofitted successfully to other shovels, in operation in India and Australia. 4 figs.

  16. Failure analysis of fire resistant fluid (FRF piping used in hydraulic control system at oil-fired thermal power generation plant

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Muhammad Akram

    2017-04-01

    Full Text Available This is a case study regarding frequent forced outages in an oil-fired power generating station due to failure of fire resistant fluid (FRF piping of material ASTM A-304. This analysis was done to find out the most probable cause of failure and to rectify the problem. Methods for finding and analyzing the cracks include nondestructive testing techniques such as visual testing (VT and dye penetrant testing (PT along with that periodic monitoring after rectification of problem. The study revealed that pitting and pit to crack transitions were formed in stainless steel piping containing high pressure (system pressure 115 bars fire resistant fluid. However, after replacement of piping the pitting and cracking reoccurred. It was observed that due to possible exposure to chlorinated moisture in surrounding environment pitting was formed which then transformed into cracks. The research work discussed in this paper illustrates the procedure used in detection of the problem and measures taken to solve the problem.

  17. Exposure control during high maintenance jobs

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hinson, C.S.; Wigginton, J.E.

    1991-01-01

    Occupational radiation doses at US light-water-cooled reactors (LWRs) have been decreasing every year since 1983. In 1989, the LWR average dose per reactor reached its lowest point since 1973. Historically, maintenance-related activities have accounted for between 70 and 75% of the total occupational doses at US LWRs, and most of this maintenance-related dose is accrued during plant outages. This paper will focus on high dose maintenance jobs such as steam generator replacement, recirculation pipe replacement/crack repair, induction heating stress improvement, and steam generator tube plugging/sleeving and will discuss how the doses associated with these jobs have declined over the past several years through the implementation of various ALARA techniques

  18. Recent developments in plugging of steam generator tubes

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Buhay, S.; Abucay, R.C.

    1995-01-01

    Mechanical Plugging capability has been developed for Bruce Nuclear Generating Station (BNGS) steam generator (SG) tubes and Darlington Nuclear Generating Station (DNGS) SG tubes and tubesheet holes. The plug concept was a modified ABB/Combustion Engineering Inconel 690 plug with a nickel band, rolled into the tube or tubesheet hole from the primary side of the tubesheet. The qualification program included analytical justification of the plug body and experimental testing to verify the leak tightness of the rolled joint under conditions which meet or exceed all service or design requirements. Tools and procedures were developed and tested for manual and remote/robotic installation and removal of the mechanical plugs. Additionally, tools and procedures were developed to plug tubes/tubesheet holes at DNGS in the event the steam generator is recalled to service to act as a heat sink. A crew of Ontario Hydro personnel were trained and qualified for the installation of mechanical plugs for permanent and recall applications. During the DNGS Unit 4 spring 1995 outage, 6 tubes were plugged and the 'Recall Plugging Capability' was deployed and ready for use during a primary side SG tube removal. The mechanical plugs were installed manually with a typical 3 minute/plug in-bowl duration time with an average radiation dose of 12.5 mrem per plug. This compares favourably with manual plug welding during the same outage in the same SG bowl at approximately 15-30 minutes/plug in-bowl duration with an average radiation dose of 117 mrem/plug. (author)

  19. Replacement energy, capacity, and reliability costs for permanent nuclear reactor shutdowns

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    VanKuiken, J.C., Buehring, W.A.; Hamilton, S.; Kavicky, J.A.; Cavallo, J.D.; Veselka, T.D.; Willing, D.L.

    1993-10-01

    Average replacement power costs are estimated for potential permanent shutdowns of nuclear electricity-generating units. Replacement power costs are considered to include replacement energy, capacity, and reliability cost components. These estimates were developed to assist the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission in evaluating regulatory issues that potentially affect changes in serious reactor accident frequencies. Cost estimates were derived from long-term production-cost and capacity expansion simulations of pooled utility-system operations. Factors that affect replacement power cost, such as load growth, replacement sources of generation, and capital costs for replacement capacity, were treated in the analysis. Costs are presented for a representative reactor and for selected subcategories of reactors, based on estimates for 112 individual reactors

  20. Outage and BER analysis for ultrawideband-based WPAN in Nakagami-m fading channels

    KAUST Repository

    Mehbodniya, Abolfazl

    2011-09-01

    This paper presents a performance analysis of multiband orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (MB-OFDM) in ultra wideband (UWB)-based personal area networks (UPANs). A UPAN consists of devices with different UWB technologies at the physical layer. Approximate expressions for the outage probability and average bit error rate (BER) are derived in closed form for the MB-OFDM target receiver, taking into account multi-user interference (MUI), as well as external interference in the form of time-hopping (TH) and direct-sequence (DS) UWB signals. © 2010 IEEE.

  1. Asset management program

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Wison, P.; Newman, G.

    2013-01-01

    In order to understand our assets we have been assessing the condition of the units in our nuclear power plants developing asset life management options on a component by component basis. We have concluded that with the right work and planning we will be able to manage the units in a way that balances capacity requirements over the long term and at the same time manage the demand on critical resources. Major component replacement outages include Installing/removing bulkheads, pressure tube and calandria tube replacement, feeder replacement, steam generator replacement, supporting facilities and infrastructure, reactor inspections and maintenance including tooling enhancements, additional non reactor systems inspection & testing and continued research and analysis. These plans will have to take into account cost, resource and capacity requirements.

  2. Exact closed form expressions for outage probability of GSC receivers over Rayleigh fading channel subject to self-interference

    KAUST Repository

    Nam, Sungsik

    2010-11-01

    Previous work on performance analyses of generalized selection combining (GSC) RAKE receivers based on the signal to noise ratio focused on the development of methodologies to derive exact closed-form expressions for various performance measures. However, some open problems related to the performance evaluation of GSC RAKE receivers still remain to be solved such that an assessment of the impact of self-interference on the performance of GSC RAKE receivers. To have a full and exact understanding of the performance of GSC RAKE receivers, the outage probability of GSC RAKE receivers needs to be analyzed as closed-form expressions. The major difficulty in this problem is to derive some joint statistics of ordered exponential variates. With this motivation in mind, we capitalize in this paper on some new order statistics results to derive exact closed-form expressions for outage probability of GSC RAKE receivers subject to self-interference over independent and identically distributed Rayleigh fading channels. © 2010 IEEE.

  3. Using Rapid Improvement Events for Disaster After-Action Reviews: Experience in a Hospital Information Technology Outage and Response.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Little, Charles M; McStay, Christopher; Oeth, Justin; Koehler, April; Bookman, Kelly

    2018-02-01

    The use of after-action reviews (AARs) following major emergency events, such as a disaster, is common and mandated for hospitals and similar organizations. There is a recurrent challenge of identified problems not being resolved and repeated in subsequent events. A process improvement technique called a rapid improvement event (RIE) was used to conduct an AAR following a complete information technology (IT) outage at a large urban hospital. Using RIE methodology to conduct the AAR allowed for the rapid development and implementation of major process improvements to prepare for future IT downtime events. Thus, process improvement methodology, particularly the RIE, is suited for conducting AARs following disasters and holds promise for improving outcomes in emergency management. Little CM , McStay C , Oeth J , Koehler A , Bookman K . Using rapid improvement events for disaster after-action reviews: experience in a hospital information technology outage and response. Prehosp Disaster Med. 2018;33(1):98-100.

  4. Final Remediation Report for the K-Area Bingham Pump Outage Pit (643-1G); FINAL

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Morganstern, M.

    2002-01-01

    The K-Area Bingham Pump Outage Pit (K BPOP) Building Number 643-1G, is situated immediately south and outside the K-Reactor fence line and is approximately 400 feet in length and 60 feet in width. For the K BPOP operable unit, the Land Use Control (LUC) objectives are to prevent contact, removal, or excavation of buried waste in the area and to preclude residential use of the area

  5. Steam generator waterlancing at DNGS

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Seppala, D.; Malaugh, J.

    1995-01-01

    Darlington Nuclear Generating Station (DNGS) is a four 900 MW Unit nuclear station forming part of the Ontario Hydro East System. There are four identical steam generators(SGs) per reactor unit. The Darlington SGs are vertical heat exchangers with an inverted U-tube bundle in a cylindrical shell. The DNGS Nuclear Plant Life Assurance Group , a department of DNGS Engineering Services have taken a Proactive Approach to ensure long term SG integrity. Instead of waiting until the tubesheets are covered by a substantial and established hard deposit; DNGS plan to clean each steam generator's tubesheet, first half lattice tube support assembly and bottom of the thermal plate every four years. The ten year business plan provides for cleaning and inspection to be conducted on all four SGs in each unit during maintenance outages (currently scheduled for every four years)

  6. Electrical Discharge Machining A responsive process for component repair and replacement

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Liekens-Massazza, I.

    2014-07-01

    The Nuclear Industry is continually challenged to decrease accumulated dose during planned outages whereas the associated maintenance work required in these harsh environments is becoming more complex. In order to bridge these divergent trends, the ALARA principals must be applied during the development phase of any new tooling. Steps must also be included to qualify the specific maintenance equipment and train the site personnel, both on representative mock-ups. The goal is to ensure that the site maintenance work conforms to the customers requirements with regards to dose, quality and the outage schedule. (Author)

  7. Proposed plan for the K-Area Bingham Pump Outage Pit (643-1G)

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Palmer, E.

    1997-06-01

    This Proposed Plan is issued by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), which functions as the lead agency for SRS remedial activities, and with concurrence by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control (SCDHEC). The purpose of this Proposed Plan is to describe the preferred remedial alternative for addressing the K-Area Bingham Pump Outage Pit (643-1G) (K BPOP) located at the Savannah River Site (SRS) in Aiken, South Carolina and to solicit public comments on the preferred alternative

  8. Surry Power Station secondary water chemistry improvement since steam generator replacement and the unit two feedwater pipe rupture

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Swindell, E.T.

    1988-01-01

    Surry Power Station has two Westinghouse-designed three-loop PWRs of 811 MWe design rating. The start of commercial operation was in July, 1972 in No.1 plant, and May, 1973 in No.2 plant. Both plants began the operation using controlled phosphate chemistry for the steam generators. In 1975, both plants were converted to all volatile treatment on the secondary side due to the tube wall thinning corrosion in the steam generators, which was associated with the phosphate sludge that was building up on the tube sheets and created acidic condition. Thereafter, condenser and air leakage and steam generator denting occurred, and after the operation of 8 years 2 month of No.1 plant and 5 years 9 months of No.2 plant, the steam generators were replaced. A major plant improvement program was designed and implemented from 1979 to 1980. The improvement in new steam generators, the modification for preventing corrosion, the addition of a steam generator blowdown recovery system, the reconstruction of condensers, the installation of full flow, deep bed condensate polishers, the addition of Dionex 8,000 on-line ion chromatograph, a long term maintenance agreement with Westinghouse and so on are reported. (Kako, I.)

  9. Digital computers' cable replacement at the Hydro-Quebec Gentilly 2 nuclear power station

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Gour, N.; Rivest, J.-M.

    1992-01-01

    During the 1990 annual outage of Gentilly-2, inspection of the digital control computers revealed signs of degradation in about 20% of the cable connector assemblies. This raised concern of increased risk of signal failure by short circuit. The degradation of the insulation was traced to a material incompatibility problem originating during manufacture of the cables. Migration of the plasticizer contained in the PVC of the transparent sheaths surrounding many of the conductors resulted in chemical attack on the insulation. All the cable assemblies were replaced during 1991-1992. The new cable assemblies were manufactured using the Raychem process, which lacked the faulty material. Also, the opportunity was taken to modify the ground network while the computer systems were stripped of their main components. Although the work cost over C$900,000, nevertheless planning and execution were nearly flawless, and the project a complete success. Integrity of cable insulation should not be a concern for the rest of the plant's life. 5 refs

  10. Managing nuclear predominant generating capacity

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Bouget, Y.H.; Carbonnier, D.

    1999-01-01

    The most common believe, associated with nuclear power plant, leads to the conclusion that it can only operate, as a base load plant. This observation can be reversed, by just looking at large generating capacity, using an important nuclear generation mix. Nuclear plants may certainly load follow and contribute to the grid frequency control. The French example illustrates these possibilities. The reactor control of French units has been customized to accommodate the grid requests. Managing such a large nuclear plant fleet requires to take various actions, ranging from a daily basis to a multi-annual prospective standpoint. The paper describes the various contributions leading to safe, reliable, well accepted and cost competitive nuclear plants in France. The combination of all aspects related to operations, maintenance scheduling, nuclear safety management, are presented. The use of PWR units carries considerable weight in economic terms, with several hundred million francs tied in with outage scheduling every year. This necessitates a global view of the entire generating system which can be mobilized to meet demand. There is considerable interaction between units as, on the one hand, they are competing to satisfy the same need, and, on the other hand, reducing maintenance costs means sharing the necessary resources, and thus a coordinated staggering of outages. In addition, nuclear fuel is an energy reserve which remains in the reactor for 3 or 4 years, with some of the fuel renewed each year. Due to the memory effect, the fuel retains a memory of past use, so that today's choices impact upon the future. A medium-term view of fuel management is also necessary. The coordination systems implemented by EDF aim to control these parameters for the benefit of electricity consumers. (author)

  11. Acceptance test for 900 MWe PWR unit replacement steam generators; Essai de reception des generateurs de vapeur de remplacement des tranches REP 900

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Gourguechon, B.

    1993-12-31

    During the first half of 1994, the Gravelines 1 steam generators will be replaced (SG replacement procedure). The new SG`s differ from the former components notably by the alloy used for the tube bundle, in this case, the high chromium content Inconel 690. So, from this standpoint, they are to be considered as PWR 900 replacement SG first models and their thermal efficiency has consequently to be assessed. This will provide an opportunity of ensuring that the performance of the components delivered is in compliance with requirements and of making the necessary provisions if significant deviations are observed. The EFMT branch, which has been in charge of the instrumentation and acceptance of the different SG first models since the first PWR plants were commissioned, will be responsible for the acceptance tests and the ultimate validation of a performance assessment procedure applicable to the future replacement steam generators. The methods and tests proposed for SG expert appraisal are based on consideration of the importance of primary measurement quality for satisfactory SG assessment and of the new test facilities with which the 900 and 1 300 PWR plants are gradually being equipped. These facilities provide an on-site computer environment for tests compatible with the tools (PATTERN, etc.) used at EFMT and in other departments. This test is the first of this kind performed by EFMT and the test facility of a nuclear power plant. (author). 6 figs.

  12. Dynamic voltage stability of a distribution system with high penetration of grid-connected photovoltaic type solar generators

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Zetty Adibah Kamaruzzaman

    2016-06-01

    Full Text Available This paper presents the impact of grid-connected photovoltaic (PV generator on dynamic voltage stability of a power distribution system by considering solar intermittency, PV penetration level, and contingencies such as line outage and load increase. The IEEE 13 node test feeder is used as a test system, and a solar PV of 0.48 kV/0.5 MVA is integrated into the test system. Test results show that system voltage is stable at high PV penetration levels. Increase in load causes voltage instability, in which voltage drops below its allowable operating limit. Thus, increase in PV penetration level does not improve system voltage stability because the system experiences voltage collapse during line outage.

  13. Replacement energy costs for nuclear electricity-generating units in the United States: 1997--2001. Volume 4

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    VanKuiken, J.C.; Guziel, K.A.; Tompkins, M.M.; Buehring, W.A.

    1997-09-01

    This report updates previous estimates of replacement energy costs for potential short-term shutdowns of 109 US nuclear electricity-generating units. This information was developed to assist the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) in its regulatory impact analyses, specifically those that examine the impacts of proposed regulations requiring retrofitting of or safety modifications to nuclear reactors. Such actions might necessitate shutdowns of nuclear power plants while these changes are being implemented. The change in energy cost represents one factor that the NRC must consider when deciding to require a particular modification. Cost estimates were derived from probabilistic production cost simulations of pooled utility system operations. Factors affecting replacement energy costs, such as random unit failures, maintenance and refueling requirements, and load variations, are treated in the analysis. This report describes an abbreviated analytical approach as it was adopted to update the cost estimates published in NUREG/CR-4012, Vol. 3. The updates were made to extend the time frame of cost estimates and to account for recent changes in utility system conditions, such as change in fuel prices, construction and retirement schedules, and system demand projects

  14. Braess's paradox in oscillator networks, desynchronization and power outage

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Witthaut, Dirk; Timme, Marc

    2012-01-01

    Robust synchronization is essential to ensure the stable operation of many complex networked systems such as electric power grids. Increasing energy demands and more strongly distributing power sources raise the question of where to add new connection lines to the already existing grid. Here we study how the addition of individual links impacts the emergence of synchrony in oscillator networks that model power grids on coarse scales. We reveal that adding new links may not only promote but also destroy synchrony and link this counter-intuitive phenomenon to Braess's paradox known for traffic networks. We analytically uncover its underlying mechanism in an elementary grid example, trace its origin to geometric frustration in phase oscillators, and show that it generically occurs across a wide range of systems. As an important consequence, upgrading the grid requires particular care when adding new connections because some may destabilize the synchronization of the grid—and thus induce power outages. (paper)

  15. On the Required Number of Antennas in a Point-to-Point Large-but-Finite MIMO System: Outage-Limited Scenario

    KAUST Repository

    Makki, Behrooz

    2016-03-22

    This paper investigates the performance of the point-To-point multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) systems in the presence of a large but finite numbers of antennas at the transmitters and/or receivers. Considering the cases with and without hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) feedback, we determine the minimum numbers of the transmit/receive antennas, which are required to satisfy different outage probability constraints. Our results are obtained for different fading conditions and the effect of the power amplifiers efficiency/feedback error probability on the performance of the MIMO-HARQ systems is analyzed. Then, we use some recent results on the achievable rates of finite block-length codes, to analyze the effect of the codewords lengths on the system performance. Moreover, we derive closed-form expressions for the asymptotic performance of the MIMO-HARQ systems when the number of antennas increases. Our analytical and numerical results show that different outage requirements can be satisfied with relatively few transmit/receive antennas. © 1972-2012 IEEE.

  16. Insurance for replacement power costs

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Cleaver, A.

    1980-01-01

    Although careful consideration is given to insurance against physical damage to plant and equipment, little thought is given to the costs that will be incurred in replacing the power that is lost while a relatively efficient system is out of action. The results of an investigation carried out for a generating authority with an installed capacity of about 3000 MW is given. Replacement power costs for different cases of severity of damage range from Pound1.17m per month for damage to central services taking out all four units. (author)

  17. Outage performance of two-way DF relaying systems with a new relay selection metric

    KAUST Repository

    Hyadi, Amal

    2012-04-01

    This paper investigates a new constrained relay selection scheme for two-way relaying systems where two end terminals communicate simultaneously via a relay. The introduced technique is based on the maximization of the weighted sum rate of both users. To evaluate the performance of the proposed system, the outage probability is derived in a general case (where an arbitrary channel is considered), and then over independently but not necessarily identically distributed (i.n.i.d.) Rayleigh fading channels. The analytical results are verified through simulations. © 2012 IEEE.

  18. Understanding the Benefits of Dispersed Grid-Connected Photovoltaics: From Avoiding the Next Major Outage to Taming Wholesale Power Markets

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Letendre, Steven E.; Perez, Richard

    2006-01-01

    Thanks to new solar resource assessment techniques using cloud cover data available from geostationary satellites, it is apparent that grid-connected PV installations can serve to enhance electric grid reliability, preventing or hastening recovery from major power outages and serving to mitigate extreme price spikes in wholesale energy markets. (author)

  19. Sample Results from MCU Solids Outage

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Peters, T.; Washington, A.; Oji, L.; Coleman, C.; Poirier, M.

    2014-09-22

    Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) has received several solid and liquid samples from MCU in an effort to understand and recover from the system outage starting on April 6, 2014. SRNL concludes that the presence of solids in the Salt Solution Feed Tank (SSFT) is the likely root cause for the outage, based upon the following discoveries: A solids sample from the extraction contactor #1 proved to be mostly sodium oxalate; A solids sample from the scrub contactor#1 proved to be mostly sodium oxalate; A solids sample from the Salt Solution Feed Tank (SSFT) proved to be mostly sodium oxalate; An archived sample from Tank 49H taken last year was shown to contain a fine precipitate of sodium oxalate; A solids sample from ; A liquid sample from the SSFT was shown to have elevated levels of oxalate anion compared to the expected concentration in the feed. Visual inspection of the SSFT indicated the presence of precipitated or transferred solids, which were likely also in the Salt Solution Receipt Tank (SSRT). The presence of the solids coupled with agitation performed to maintain feed temperature resulted in oxalate solids migration through the MCU system and caused hydraulic issues that resulted in unplanned phase carryover from the extraction into the scrub, and ultimately the strip contactors. Not only did this carryover result in the Strip Effluent (SE) being pushed out of waste acceptance specification, but it resulted in the deposition of solids into several of the contactors. At the same time, extensive deposits of aluminosilicates were found in the drain tube in the extraction contactor #1. However it is not known at this time how the aluminosilicate solids are related to the oxalate solids. The solids were successfully cleaned out of the MCU system. However, future consideration must be given to the exclusion of oxalate solids into the MCU system. There were 53 recommendations for improving operations recently identified. Some additional considerations or

  20. Nuclear facilities: repair and replacement technologies

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2005-01-01

    The oldest operating reactors are more than 35 years old and are now facing major maintenance operations. The first replacement of a pressurizer took place in autumn 2005 at the St-Lucie plant (Usa) while steam generators have been currently replaced since 1983. Nuclear industry has to adapt to this new market by proposing innovative technological solutions in the reactor maintenance field. This document gathers the 9 papers presented at the conference. The main improvements concern repair works on internal components of PWR-type reactors, the replacement of major components of the primary coolant circuit and surface treatments to limit the propagation of damages. The first paper shows that adequate design and feedback experience are good assets to manage the ageing of a nuclear unit. Another paper shows that a new repair method of a relief valve can avoid its replacement. (A.C.)

  1. Condition Monitoring of the SSE Generation Fleet

    Science.gov (United States)

    Twiddle, J.; Muthuraman, S.; Connolly, N.

    2012-05-01

    SSE (previously known as Scottish and Southern Energy) operates a diverse portfolio of generation plant, including coal, gas and renewable plant with a total generation capacity of 11,375MW (Sept 2011). In recent years a group of specialists dedicated to providing condition monitoring services has been established at the Equipment Performance Centre (EPC) based at Knottingley, West Yorkshire. We aim to illustrate the role of the EPC and the methods used for monitoring the generation fleet with the objective of maintaining asset integrity, reducing risk of plant failure and unplanned outages and describe the challenges which have been overcome in establishing the EPC. This paper describes methods including vibration and process data analysis, model-based techniques and on-site testing used for monitoring of generation plant, including gas turbines, steam turbines, generators and steam raising plant. These condition monitoring processes utilise available data, adding value to the business, by bringing services in-house and capturing knowledge of plant operation for the benefit of the whole fleet.

  2. Outage probability of dual-hop FSO fixed gain relay transmission systems

    KAUST Repository

    Zedini, Emna

    2016-12-24

    In this paper, we analyze the end-to-end performance of dual-hop free-space optical (FSO) fixed gain relaying systems in the presence of atmospheric turbulence as well as pointing errors. More specifically, an exact closed-form expression for the outage probability is presented in terms of the bivariate Fox\\'s H function that accounts for both heterodyne detection as well as intensity modulation with direct detection. At high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) regime, we provide very tight asymptotic result for this performance metric in terms of simple elementary functions. By using dual-hop FSO relaying, we demonstrate a better system performance as compared to the single FSO link. Numerical and Monte-Carlo simulation results are provided to verify the accuracy of the newly proposed results, and a perfect agreement is observed.

  3. Signal Quality Outage Analysis for Ultra-Reliable Communications in Cellular Networks

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Gerardino, Guillermo Andrés Pocovi; Alvarez, Beatriz Soret; Lauridsen, Mads

    2015-01-01

    Ultra-reliable communications over wireless will open the possibility for a wide range of novel use cases and applications. In cellular networks, achieving reliable communication is challenging due to many factors, particularly the fading of the desired signal and the interference. In this regard......, we investigate the potential of several techniques to combat these main threats. The analysis shows that traditional microscopic multiple-input multiple-output schemes with 2x2 or 4x4 antenna configurations are not enough to fulfil stringent reliability requirements. It is revealed how such antenna...... schemes must be complemented with macroscopic diversity as well as interference management techniques in order to ensure the necessary SINR outage performance. Based on the obtained performance results, it is discussed which of the feasible options fulfilling the ultra-reliable criteria are most promising...

  4. On the Efficient Simulation of the Distribution of the Sum of Gamma-Gamma Variates with Application to the Outage Probability Evaluation Over Fading Channels

    KAUST Repository

    Ben Issaid, Chaouki

    2017-01-26

    The Gamma-Gamma distribution has recently emerged in a number of applications ranging from modeling scattering and reverberation in sonar and radar systems to modeling atmospheric turbulence in wireless optical channels. In this respect, assessing the outage probability achieved by some diversity techniques over this kind of channels is of major practical importance. In many circumstances, this is related to the difficult question of analyzing the statistics of a sum of Gamma- Gamma random variables. Answering this question is not a simple matter. This is essentially because outage probabilities encountered in practice are often very small, and hence the use of classical Monte Carlo methods is not a reasonable choice. This lies behind the main motivation of the present work. In particular, this paper proposes a new approach to estimate the left tail of the sum of Gamma-Gamma variates. More specifically, we propose robust importance sampling schemes that efficiently evaluates the outage probability of diversity receivers over Gamma-Gamma fading channels. The proposed estimators satisfy the well-known bounded relative error criterion for both maximum ratio combining and equal gain combining cases. We show the accuracy and the efficiency of our approach compared to naive Monte Carlo via some selected numerical simulations.

  5. Replacement of major nuclear power plant components for service life extension

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Novak, S.

    1987-01-01

    Problems are discussed associated with replacement of nuclear power plant components with the aim to extend their original scheduled life. The existing foreign experience shows that it is technically feasible to replace practically all basic components for which the necessity of replacement is established. Data is summed up on the replacement of steam generators in US and West German nuclear power plants showing the duration of the job, the total consumption of manhours, the collective dose equivalent and the cost. Attention is also focused on implemented and projected replacements of circulation pipes in nuclear power plants abroad. Based on these figures, the cost is estimated of the replacement of the reactor vessel and the steam generators for WWER-440 nuclear power plants. The conclusion is arrived at that even based on a conservative estimate, the extension by 20 years of the service life of a nuclear power plant is economically more effective than the construction of a new plant. (Z.M.) 2 tabs., 15 refs., 3 figs

  6. A study on assessment methodology of surveillance test interval and allowed outage time

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Che, Moo Seong; Cheong, Chang Hyeon; Lee, Byeong Cheol

    1996-07-01

    The objectives of this study is the development of methodology by which assessing the optimizes Surveillance Test Interval(STI) and Allowed Outage Time(AOT) using PSA method that can supplement the current deterministic methods and the improvement of Korea nuclear power plants safety. In the first year of this study, the survey about the assessment methodologies, modeling and results performed by domestic and international researches is performed as the basic step before developing the assessment methodology of this study. The assessment methodology that supplement the revealed problems in many other studies is presented and the application of new methodology into the example system assures the feasibility of this method

  7. A study on assessment methodology of surveillance test interval and allowed outage time

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Che, Moo Seong; Cheong, Chang Hyeon; Lee, Byeong Cheol [Seoul Nationl Univ., Seoul (Korea, Republic of)] (and others)

    1996-07-15

    The objectives of this study is the development of methodology by which assessing the optimizes Surveillance Test Interval(STI) and Allowed Outage Time(AOT) using PSA method that can supplement the current deterministic methods and the improvement of Korea nuclear power plants safety. In the first year of this study, the survey about the assessment methodologies, modeling and results performed by domestic and international researches is performed as the basic step before developing the assessment methodology of this study. The assessment methodology that supplement the revealed problems in many other studies is presented and the application of new methodology into the example system assures the feasibility of this method.

  8. Management of functional Sprint Fidelis leads at cardiac resynchronization therapy-defibrillator generator replacement: a novel option for preventing inappropriate shocks from lead failure in fragile patients with high risk of sudden death.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zhu, Dennis W X; Chu, Matthew M; House, Chad M

    2017-12-01

    In patients with a functional Sprint Fidelis lead at generator replacement, the manufacturer recommended to either continue to use the existing lead or replace it with a new lead. For those patients who continue to use a functional Fidelis lead, the risk of inappropriate shocks remains present if the lead fails in the future. We evaluated the feasibility of an alternative approach at the time of cardiac resynchronization therapy-defibrillator (CRT-D) generator replacement in patients with a functional bipolar left ventricular (LV) lead for prevention of inappropriate shocks from future Fidelis lead failure. During the procedure, the pace/sense IS-1 connection pin of the functional Fidelis lead was intentionally inserted into the LV port of the new CRT-D generator, while the existing bipolar LV lead IS-1 connection pin was inserted into the right ventricular (RV) pace/sense port. After such switching, the existing bipolar LV lead was used for functional LV pacing/sensing, while the Fidelis lead was used for functional RV pacing and high voltage shock only and could no longer be used for the purpose of sensing and detecting. This approach precluded oversensing and inappropriate shocks should the functional Fidelis lead fail in the future. Six fragile patients, who were not considered suitable candidates for lead replacement, underwent the alternative approach. During a follow-up of 35 ± 23 months, the CRT-D system functioned normally in five patients. The Fidelis lead fractured in one patient 7 months after generator replacement. The malfunction was detected promptly and the defected lead was replaced. No inappropriate detections or shock was triggered. In CRT-D patients with a functional Fidelis lead and a bipolar LV lead, switching of the Fidelis lead pace/sense IS-1 pin with the bipolar LV lead IS-1 pin at generator replacement did not affect normal system function. This novel approach may be valuable in fragile patients with high risk of sudden death for

  9. Strategy for success in maintenance management at Point Lepreau nuclear generating station

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    White, R.M.

    1987-01-01

    Improvements in availability of the station and in productivity of workers were achieved at Point Lepreau Nuclear Generating Station through implementation of a Maintenance Management System, which incorporates work planning and outage management techniques. Eight software systems on a VAX 11/70 minicomputer control work orders, temporary and permanent design changes, parts and material inventories, time keeping, and project management. All maintenance is coordinated through a regular planning meeting

  10. R and D proposals to improve outages operation. Methods, practices and tools

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Dionis, Francois

    2014-01-01

    This paper deals with outage operation improvement. It offers a number of tracks on the interactions between the operation activities and maintenance, with a methodological perspective and proposals concerning the Information System. On the methodological point of view, a clever plant systems modeling may allow representing the needed characteristics in order to optimize tagouts, alignment procedures and the schedule. Tools must be taken n into account for new tagout practices such as tags sharing. It is possible to take advantage of 2D drawings integrated into the information system in order to improve the data controls and to visualize operation activities. An integrated set of mobile applications should allow field operators to join the information system for a better and safer performance. (author)

  11. Asymmetric Hardware Distortions in Receive Diversity Systems: Outage Performance Analysis

    KAUST Repository

    Javed, Sidrah; Amin, Osama; Ikki, Salama S.; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

    2017-01-01

    This paper studies the impact of asymmetric hardware distortion (HWD) on the performance of receive diversity systems using linear and switched combining receivers. The asymmetric attribute of the proposed model motivates the employment of improper Gaussian signaling (IGS) scheme rather than the traditional proper Gaussian signaling (PGS) scheme. The achievable rate performance is analyzed for the ideal and non-ideal hardware scenarios using PGS and IGS transmission schemes for different combining receivers. In addition, the IGS statistical characteristics are optimized to maximize the achievable rate performance. Moreover, the outage probability performance of the receive diversity systems is analyzed yielding closed form expressions for both PGS and IGS based transmission schemes. HWD systems that employ IGS is proven to efficiently combat the self interference caused by the HWD. Furthermore, the obtained analytic expressions are validated through Monte-Carlo simulations. Eventually, non-ideal hardware transceivers degradation and IGS scheme acquired compensation are quantified through suitable numerical results.

  12. Asymmetric Hardware Distortions in Receive Diversity Systems: Outage Performance Analysis

    KAUST Repository

    Javed, Sidrah

    2017-02-22

    This paper studies the impact of asymmetric hardware distortion (HWD) on the performance of receive diversity systems using linear and switched combining receivers. The asymmetric attribute of the proposed model motivates the employment of improper Gaussian signaling (IGS) scheme rather than the traditional proper Gaussian signaling (PGS) scheme. The achievable rate performance is analyzed for the ideal and non-ideal hardware scenarios using PGS and IGS transmission schemes for different combining receivers. In addition, the IGS statistical characteristics are optimized to maximize the achievable rate performance. Moreover, the outage probability performance of the receive diversity systems is analyzed yielding closed form expressions for both PGS and IGS based transmission schemes. HWD systems that employ IGS is proven to efficiently combat the self interference caused by the HWD. Furthermore, the obtained analytic expressions are validated through Monte-Carlo simulations. Eventually, non-ideal hardware transceivers degradation and IGS scheme acquired compensation are quantified through suitable numerical results.

  13. Plant availability design aspects of Korean next generation reactor

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Woo Sang Lim; Ha Chung Beak

    1998-01-01

    The purpose of this paper is to describe the KNGR design concepts adopted for reducing forced outages and refueling outages, and current design changes, to assess their availability impacts compared to existing domestic nuclear power plants, and then to identify design directions for next design stage. (author)

  14. Limiting the impact of recent outage experience in a midsize university reactor environment

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Vernetson, W.G.

    1996-01-01

    The University of Florida Training Reactor (UFTR) is a light-water-cooled, graphite- and light-water-moderated, modified Argonaut-type reactor licensed to operate at steady-state power levels up to 100 kW. The UFTR continues to utilize high-enriched materials test reactor-type fuel in a piping circuit type of system versus the more familiar pool reactor design. Though somewhat limited for research and service, the UFTR is a valuable educational facility. Despite its relatively low power level, the two-slab core configuration provides a peak thermal flux near 2 x 10 12 n/cm 2 · s; in addition, other modifications and experimental adaptations have been implemented in the 36-yr history of the facility to enhance the potential of the facility for diverse types of unique educational usage. Its small physical size in a loop configuration makes it a good teaching tool, but it can also be associated with unique maintenance problems, as in this case. The mission of the UFTR is to serve regional needs for access to quality reactor usage in a variety of areas to support educational and training needs as well as research and service, including public information about nuclear energy. As the only nonpower reactor in the state of Florida in affiliation with an established and diverse nuclear and radiological engineering department, it has a strong role to play in education, training, research, and service, especially the former. As a result of its unique position, the facility has been quite successful in its mission. With so much educational usage scheduled, sometimes for classes arriving from 100 miles away, it is important to avoid unexpected outages as well as unexpectedly lengthy outages. Such planning usually is successful and has allowed the RFTR to build a clientele of more than four dozen regular educational users, although events in 1995 could have undetermined this effort

  15. Summary of Operating Experience in Swiss Nuclear Power Plants 1999

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    NONE

    2000-05-15

    The five Swiss nuclear power units produced a net total of 23.6 TWh of electricity in 1999 - not as high as the all-time record (24.45 TWh in 1998), but nonetheless a solid operational performance. The nuclear share in overall electricity production was 35.3%, again lower than the previous year's 40%. In general, plant operation in 1999 was practically as undisturbed and as reliable as in 1998, reflecting the ongoing tradition of careful maintenance that contributes so much to keeping the plants in excellent condition. However, due to exceptional outage activities at Beznau 2 (steam generator replacement) and an unplanned shut-down at Goesgen to replace a hydrogen seal on the main generator, 1999 nuclear production could not match that of the previous year. Also, record hydro power production caused the nuclear share in total electricity production to drop. With the exception of Beznau 2, all refueling and maintenance outages were once again short. The Leibstadt outage lasted 26 days, Goesgen 33 days, Beznau 1 lasted 29 days, Beznau 2 89 days and Muehleberg 27 days. At Goesgen, MOX fuel was loaded for the third time in 1999. Of the 44 freshly-loaded fuel elements, 20 were MOX elements. Non-electrical energy supplies from the Beznau and Goesgen nuclear power plants functioned flawlessly. Beznau fed 143.6 GWh of heat energy into the Refuna district heating system, while Goesgen supplied 169 GWh of process heat to the neighboring Niedergoesgen cardboard factory. At the end of 1999 and the beginning of 2000 all Swiss nuclear units continued to operate flawlessly - notwithstanding the challenges posed by the 'Lothar' storm that hit Western Europe in late December and the so-called Y2K computer bug that threatened to hit shortly afterwards, during the 'millennial' change-over. (authors)

  16. Summary of Operating Experience in Swiss Nuclear Power Plants 1999

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2000-05-01

    The five Swiss nuclear power units produced a net total of 23.6 TWh of electricity in 1999 - not as high as the all-time record (24.45 TWh in 1998), but nonetheless a solid operational performance. The nuclear share in overall electricity production was 35.3%, again lower than the previous year's 40%. In general, plant operation in 1999 was practically as undisturbed and as reliable as in 1998, reflecting the ongoing tradition of careful maintenance that contributes so much to keeping the plants in excellent condition. However, due to exceptional outage activities at Beznau 2 (steam generator replacement) and an unplanned shut-down at Goesgen to replace a hydrogen seal on the main generator, 1999 nuclear production could not match that of the previous year. Also, record hydro power production caused the nuclear share in total electricity production to drop. With the exception of Beznau 2, all refueling and maintenance outages were once again short. The Leibstadt outage lasted 26 days, Goesgen 33 days, Beznau 1 lasted 29 days, Beznau 2 89 days and Muehleberg 27 days. At Goesgen, MOX fuel was loaded for the third time in 1999. Of the 44 freshly-loaded fuel elements, 20 were MOX elements. Non-electrical energy supplies from the Beznau and Goesgen nuclear power plants functioned flawlessly. Beznau fed 143.6 GWh of heat energy into the Refuna district heating system, while Goesgen supplied 169 GWh of process heat to the neighboring Niedergoesgen cardboard factory. At the end of 1999 and the beginning of 2000 all Swiss nuclear units continued to operate flawlessly - notwithstanding the challenges posed by the 'Lothar' storm that hit Western Europe in late December and the so-called Y2K computer bug that threatened to hit shortly afterwards, during the 'millennial' change-over. (authors)

  17. On the Efficient Simulation of the Distribution of the Sum of Gamma-Gamma Variates with Application to the Outage Probability Evaluation Over Fading Channels

    KAUST Repository

    Ben Issaid, Chaouki

    2016-06-01

    The Gamma-Gamma distribution has recently emerged in a number of applications ranging from modeling scattering and reverbation in sonar and radar systems to modeling atmospheric turbulence in wireless optical channels. In this respect, assessing the outage probability achieved by some diversity techniques over this kind of channels is of major practical importance. In many circumstances, this is intimately related to the difficult question of analyzing the statistics of a sum of Gamma-Gamma random variables. Answering this question is not a simple matter. This is essentially because outage probabilities encountered in practice are often very small, and hence the use of classical Monte Carlo methods is not a reasonable choice. This lies behind the main motivation of the present work. In particular, this paper proposes a new approach to estimate the left tail of the sum of Gamma-Gamma variates. More specifically, we propose a mean-shift importance sampling scheme that efficiently evaluates the outage probability of L-branch maximum ratio combining diversity receivers over Gamma-Gamma fading channels. The proposed estimator satisfies the well-known bounded relative error criterion, a well-desired property characterizing the robustness of importance sampling schemes, for both identically and non-identically independent distributed cases. We show the accuracy and the efficiency of our approach compared to naive Monte Carlo via some selected numerical simulations.

  18. On the Efficient Simulation of the Distribution of the Sum of Gamma-Gamma Variates with Application to the Outage Probability Evaluation Over Fading Channels

    KAUST Repository

    Ben Issaid, Chaouki; Ben Rached, Nadhir; Kammoun, Abla; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim; Tempone, Raul

    2016-01-01

    The Gamma-Gamma distribution has recently emerged in a number of applications ranging from modeling scattering and reverbation in sonar and radar systems to modeling atmospheric turbulence in wireless optical channels. In this respect, assessing the outage probability achieved by some diversity techniques over this kind of channels is of major practical importance. In many circumstances, this is intimately related to the difficult question of analyzing the statistics of a sum of Gamma-Gamma random variables. Answering this question is not a simple matter. This is essentially because outage probabilities encountered in practice are often very small, and hence the use of classical Monte Carlo methods is not a reasonable choice. This lies behind the main motivation of the present work. In particular, this paper proposes a new approach to estimate the left tail of the sum of Gamma-Gamma variates. More specifically, we propose a mean-shift importance sampling scheme that efficiently evaluates the outage probability of L-branch maximum ratio combining diversity receivers over Gamma-Gamma fading channels. The proposed estimator satisfies the well-known bounded relative error criterion, a well-desired property characterizing the robustness of importance sampling schemes, for both identically and non-identically independent distributed cases. We show the accuracy and the efficiency of our approach compared to naive Monte Carlo via some selected numerical simulations.

  19. Availability analysis of United States BWR IV electrical generation plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Renick, D.H.; Li, F.; Todreas, N.E.

    1998-01-01

    Availability, as quantified by power output levels, from all active U.S. BWR IV plants were analyzed over a seven and a half year period to determine the operational characteristics of these plants throughout an operating cycle. The operational data were examined for infant mortality, end of cycle decreased availability, and seasonal availability variations. Scheduled outages were also examined to determine the industry's current approach to planning maintenance outages. The results of this study show that nuclear power plants do suffer significant infant mortality following a refueling outage. And while they do not suffer an end of cycle decrease in availability, a mid-cycle period of decreased availability is evident. This period of decreased availability is due to a combination of increased forced unavailability and seasonally scheduled maintenance and refueling outages. These findings form the start of a rational approach to increasing plant availability. (author)

  20. Solving the maintenance dilemma of ageing controls in nuclear standby generators. The decision to retro-fit the control system with 'off the shelf technology'

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Jackson, Neil [Turbine Controls Ltd Canada, 5288 General Rd, L4W 1Z8 Mississauga (Canada); Rees, Christpher [Turbine Controls Ltd UK, 52 Kenilworth Drive, LE2 5LG Leicester (United Kingdom); Yeremain, Joseph [Thermodyne, 421 Nugget Avenue Unit 3, Toronto Ontario M1S 4L8 (Canada)

    2010-07-01

    Blackouts - Are we 2 Steps away from Nuclear meltdown owing to Aging Controls? The intent of this white paper is to high-light the need to:- 1. Replace the aging control systems associated with critical safety equipment of Standby Generators in the nuclear environment. 2. Explain how 'off the shelf' standard control equipment may be suitably selected, integrated and tested for a nuclear environment. 3. High-light the lessons learned in respect of: - a. Qualification of COTS (commercial off the shelf) equipment for use in a nuclear application. b. Software quality assurance program. c. Reducing plant outage time. 4. Guide you on the selection criteria of credible partners that can implement such mission critical control systems. Causes for Concern - The control systems of some of the Standby Generators are 30+ years old and aging equipment is no longer available from the OEM's. Maintenance crews are evolving with young engineers who have no experience, or chance to be trained, on the old installed control base. The writer has no doubt that the extent of the black outs of North America, Aug 2003, and the standby generators ever reducing availability, has compromised their ability to provide essential service and communications to maintain the safety of the nuclear plant. These concerns prompted Ontario Power Generator and Bruce Power to review the reliability of their standby generators and this review prompted them to locate a suitable supplier for the task of replacing the control system. OPG's previous attempts to have the controls replaced by I and C dedicated companies weighed heavy on their minds. Worsening the dilemma was the fact that it used dedicated controls and what might be considered 'Propriety Software'. Black Outs - Not only is it possible, the probability of it happening is getting stronger The Northeast Blackout of 2003 was a massive widespread power outage that occurred throughout parts of the North-eastern and