Thermal-hydraulics aspects of key nuclear accidents

Galassi, G. M.; D'Auria, F.

doi:10.1016/b978-0-08-100662-7.00016-6

Cited by 2 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 24 publications

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“…We are where we are today partly because unexpected nuclear accidents strongly affected the nuclear era. The description of major accidents is well beyond the purposes of this paper: details of the technological conditions that brought to the accidents as well as the concerned system performances before the loss of core geometric integrity core is given in [22]. Here a few notes are outlined.…”

Section: Accidents Actually Happenedmentioning

confidence: 99%

Nuclear Energy and Its History: Past Consequences, Present Inadequacies and a Perspective for Success

Duffey¹,

D'Auria²

2020

EPE

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An attempt is made to locate nuclear technology within a logical context considering history, risks, societal catastrophes and perspectives: the need is identified for a new direction in the exploitation in order to restore the role in energy production. We depict the situation coming from a marvelous history of discoveries started at the beginning of the XX century; heroes are recalled who made possible something that is inconceivable today: design, construction and production of electricity in a few years; that history was tainted by intentional nuclear explosions, i.e. the original sin that we are now paying.Then, we attempt to show that the societal risk is an inherent part of the civilization. Restoring the public trust (towards nuclear fission technology) by matching nuclear safety with the current technological status and advancers in risk assessment is the key objective. The "independent assessment", or a principle for the exploitation of nuclear energy already stated in the 50's of the previous century, shall then re-appear. This is used to erect the signpost for a "dynamic barricade" to further reduce the risk of operation of nuclear reactors and to match the design with current technological capabilities and with the frontiers of the research.

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Section: Accidents Actually Happenedmentioning

confidence: 99%

Nuclear Energy and Its History: Past Consequences, Present Inadequacies and a Perspective for Success

Duffey¹,

D'Auria²

2020

EPE

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“…The established technological picture has been rusted (a) by the nuclear tragedies involving [now] conceivable accidents outside the DBA envelope, like Three Mile Island Unit 2, 1979, Chernobyl Unit 4, 1986, and Fukushima Units 1-4, 2011, Galassi and D'Auria 2017, in an elusive way, by the evidence collected in the last two or three decades, of the weakness of what is still considered a safety barrier, i.e. the clad of nuclear fuel rods.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The technological challenge for current generation nuclear reactors

D'Auria¹,

Debrecin²,

Glaeser³

2019

NUCET

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The present paper deals with the proposal of an additional safety barrier for the class of large (1000 MWe or more) Light Water Reactors (LWR) now in operation, in construction, or under design. Emphasis is given to the motivations or the needs for the barrier. Two main parts of the paper can be distinguished. The following topics are discussed in the former part (section 2): (a) the weakness of the barrier constituted by the current design of nuclear fuel; (b) the continuously increasing complexity of the system, with main reference to the Instrumentation and Control (I&C); (c) the role that the Large Break Loss of Coolant Accident (LBLOCA) had for arriving at the current layout of the Reactor Coolant System (RCS). Furthermore avoiding the severe accidents in 1979, 1987 and 2011, is at the basis of the proposal. In the latter part (sections 3 and 4), the elements of the proposed technological safety barrier are discussed: the As-Low-As-Reasonably-Achievable (ALARA) principle, the Best Estimate Plus Uncertainty (BEPU) approach, the Extended Safety Margin Detection (E-SMD) hardware, the Emergency Rescue Team (ERT) strategy (or a virtual entity for the reactor) and the Independent Assessment (IA) concept. The additional safety barrier, although not demonstrated in the paper, is expected to reduce for a factor in the range 10–1000 the probability of core melt and to have a cost in the order of 1% the cost of a nuclear reactor unit.

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Thermal-hydraulics aspects of key nuclear accidents

Cited by 2 publications

References 24 publications

Nuclear Energy and Its History: Past Consequences, Present Inadequacies and a Perspective for Success

Nuclear Energy and Its History: Past Consequences, Present Inadequacies and a Perspective for Success

The technological challenge for current generation nuclear reactors

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