METHODOLOGY TO ACCOUNT FOR LOAD FACTOR AND AVAILABILITY DURING CONCEPTUAL DESIGN PHASE OF A GEN IV NUCLEAR POWER PLANT

摘要

Increasing availability is a permanent objective of the nuclear plant designers and operators. For ASTRID SFR project, this consideration was taken into account at the very beginning of the reactor conceptual design. The parameters on which the plant designer can focus their action are : 1. The increase of the power production cycles duration, 2. The reduce of the refueling & inspection outages, 3. The increase of equipment reliability and parts availabilities. This overall work is conducted progressively and iteratively on all the ASTRID SFR reactor equipment and functions. This original work has led to : 1. identify the functions or equipment on which it was necessary to focus in priority. 2. Question on equipment or function failure consequences (and the solution to avoid being a "Driver"). 3. Set reliability targets by system or function and to assess gap between the target and the current design.