State Scientific and Technical Center for Nuclear and Radiation Safety (SSTC NRS)

Safety Improvement of Ukrainian NPPs in the Light of the Fukushima Daiichi Accident
Yuriy Zinchenko, Head of NPPs Thermal-Hydraulic and Probabilistic Safety Analysis Department

International Experts' Meeting on Reactor and Spent Fuel Safety in the Light of the Accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant 19-22 March 2012, Vienna

SSTC NRS I. Introduction - Nuclear Power Plants of Ukraine

Rivno NPP 2 VVER-440 2 VVER-1000

Khmelnitskya NPP 2 VVER -1000 Zaporizhzhya NPP 6 VVER-1000

South-Ukraine NPP 3 VVER-1000

SSTC NRS II. Enhancement of Safety

SSTC NRS II. Enhancement of Safety

The implementation of the Comprehensive Program of activities was aimed to address a number of challenges, major of it were addressed to: elimination of available nuclear power plant safety issues, deviations from the requirements of national laws and regulations, which came into force after the introduction of the units; Ukraine's fulfillment of the obligations of the Convention on Nuclear Safety and the implementation of the recommendations of the IAEA to improve the safety of NPPs with VVER reactor plants; conducting safety analysis of NPP and developing Safety Analysis Reports for all Units.
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SSTC NRS III Safety reassessment and safety improvement in the light of the Fukushima Daiichi Accident Ukraine took an active part in the European stress test program. According to ENSREG specifications the national report was developed for sites of the operating Ukrainian NPPs.

In the framework of the stress tests, the operating organization analysed in detail: external extreme natural events (earthquakes, flooding, fires, tornadoes, extremely high/low temperatures, extreme precipitations, strong winds, combinations of events); loss of electrical power and/or loss of ultimate heat sink; severe accident management.
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SSTC NRS III Safety reassessment and safety improvement in the light of the Fukushima Daiichi Accident III. 1 Assessment of plants robustness to external extreme natural events Design ensures the NPP robustness to external natural hazards or their combinations confirmed by the stress-test results No new crucial external natural hazards or combinations of hazards additional to those considered in NPP Design and analyzed in detail in NPP Safety Analysis Reports

SSTC NRS III Safety reassessment and safety improvement in the light of the Fukushima Daiichi Accident III. 1 Assessment of plants robustness to external extreme natural events Main safety improvement measures - completion of the on-going seismic qualification of the SSC performing safety functions to increased seismic impacts - completion of the NPP sites seismic re-evaluations and implementation of the seismic monitoring - increase NPPs robustness against extreme natural events such as twister, whirlwind (using mobile pumps to compensate potential loss of essential service water)
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SSTC NRS III Safety reassessment and safety improvement in the light of the Fukushima Daiichi Accident III. 2 Assessment of plants robustness to loss of electrical power and/or loss of ultimate heat sink Robustness of power supply is inherent in the plant design (three independent power emergency supply trains (3x100%), common-unit DGs at each site, several alternative options to power the safety bus-bar)

SSTC NRS III Safety reassessment and safety improvement in the light of the Fukushima Daiichi Accident III. 2 Assessment of plants robustness to loss of electrical power and/or loss of ultimate heat sink Robustness of the heat removal has been increased by following implemented upgrades: WWER-440 (Rivne-1,2) - new additional fully independent emergency SG feedwater system with own aircooled diesel-pumping facilities - WWER-1000 - long-term makeup of emergency feedwater storage tanks and SGs in case of the SBO using fire hoses and mobile pumping units (fire engines)
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SSTC NRS III Safety reassessment and safety improvement in the light of the Fukushima Daiichi Accident III. 2 Assessment of plants robustness to loss of electrical power and/or loss of ultimate heat sink Additional means for long-term decay heat removal from the core (and spent fuel pools) under SBO and/or UHS are foreseen (mobile DGs and pumps )

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III. Overview of the Topic 2

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SSTC NRS III. 2 Assessment of plants robustness to loss of electrical power and/or loss of ultimate heat sink
Loss of off-site power and failure of all emergency DGs of EPSS (SBO).

Example: Available power connections to energize a unit houseload of Zaporizhzhya NPP:

External connections Zaporizhzhya Thermal Power Plant Dnipro Hydroelectric Plant (two independent high-voltage lines) Kakhovka Hydroelectric Plant High-voltage line 750 kV (Yuzhnodonbass, Dnipro or Zaporizhzhya). Internal interconnections Any of DGs of any other ZNPP unit. Any of common-unit DGs.

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SSTC NRS III. 2 Assessment of plants robustness to loss of electrical power and/or loss of ultimate heat sink
Combination of SBO + loss of UHS Additional emergency steam generator feedwater system (AEFS) has been commissioned in 2010 at RNPP Units 1&2.
The system is designed to:

provide feedwater into SGs to ensure heat removal from the reactor core, provide emergency shutdown of units 1 and 2 in case of failure of main and emergency feedwater supply systems.

Design features 2 main trains: - air cooled diesel-operated pump with auxiliary generators; - feedwater tank (1000 m3) with possibility to fill up the tanks additional diesel-operated pump specially constructed separate building .
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Combination of SBO + loss of UHS

AEFS (Rivno 1&2)

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EOPs (WWER-1000) recommend to apply any available alternative Mobile Diesel Generator and Pumping Unit (MDGPU) for emergency makeup of SGs. Mobile pumping units (fire engines) are available at each NPP:
PNS-110, flow rate of 110 l/s, pump head of 0.9 MPa, can take water from:
- EFWS tanks (3500 3); - demineralized water tanks (3x630 m3); - any water sources within 200 m (inlet channels, cooling ponds, tanks, etc.)

ATs-40/4, flow rate of 40 l/s, pump head of 0.9 MPa

The total namber of ATs: 16 at ZNPP 9 at SUNPP 8 at RNPP 9 at KhNPP
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Combination of SBO + loss of UHS

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SSTC NRS III. 3 Assessment of severe accident management The assessment of severe accident management addressed to: - adequacy of the current organizational structure for accident management at one and several units - harmful factors for accident management - main severe accident phenomena: containment overpressure, hydrogen detonation - severe accident management for spent fuel pools - measures for continuous safety improvement Set of the severe accident calculations were performed using MELCOR code (e.g. containment venting, dedicated modeling of spent fuel pool accident progression)
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SSTC NRS III. 3 Assessment of severe accident management Organization of the Licensee to Manage Accident
- Adequate management of accident at one or several units (sufficient staffing and operating shift management, EOPs and emergency plans foresee the accident management on several units at site) - Effective off-site technical support (mobilization of additional technical means and resources of other NPPs, Subsidiary Emergency Technical Center (ETC) and AtomRemontService (ARS)) - Symptom-based emergency procedures and comprehensive emergency plans (SAMG under development) - Regular training and exercises (special emergency exercises on Fukushima related scenarios were performed at each site) - Special mechanisms for clearing access roads in case of hazards

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SSTC NRS III. 3 Assessment of severe accident management Evaluation of Harmful Factors
- Different possibilities to reach the sites exist in case of destruction of infrastructure or flooding around the installation - NPP Emergency Plans consider the high local dose rates and radioactive contamination (accident radiation monitoring in on-site buildings and off-site; optimal routes for transfer of operating personnel to the accident site, conditions and duration of activities, and protective measures for personnel are determined) - Measures on increasing the MCR and ECR and crisis center habitability are on-going (additional detailed assessments of the dose rates at site during severe accident are planned) - Qualification of the I&C system is on-going. Special diesel generator for I&C system is foreseen - Additional technical resources and manpower are envisaged by Emergency Response system for multi-unit accident management

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SSTC NRS III. 3 Assessment of severe accident management Measures - Completion of the SAMG development. Additional improvements should be foreseen to cope with accidents similar to Fukushima. - Measures on the improvement of Emergency Response System following outcomes of Fukushima-related emergency exercises

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SSTC NRS III. 3 Assessment of severe accident management Before Occurrence of Fuel Damage in the RPV
Actions according to EOPs: - RZ-0.0 Loss of AC power (in a case of LOOP and SBO as well, personnel will attempt to supply power to safety system buses from alternative sources) - VFT-1.1 Loss of secondary heat removal (actions on F&B by secondary side, SG feedwater supply from turbine hall deaerators for WWER-1000 or additional fully independent emergency SG feedwater system for WWER-440, emergency SG feedwater supply by fire engines) - VFZ-1.1 Reactor core overheating (actions on F&B by primary side) - VFG-1.1 High pressure in containment (actions on spray system operation) In addition to EOP means, the special mobile equipment for longterm decay heat removal from the core and spent fuel pools under SBO and/or UHS are suggested by the stress tests
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SSTC NRS III. 3 Assessment of severe accident management After Severe Core Damage before Failure of the RPV
- primary coolant injection (HPIS pumps, LPIS pumps, makeup system pumps, mobile equipments ) - primary pressure decrease (PORV and/or valves of the emergency gas evacuation system) - SG makeup (auxiliary feedwater pump and/or emergency feedwater pump (WWER-1000); auxiliary feedwater pump, emergency feedwater pump or additional emergency power supply system (WWER-440); pump of the condensate storage tank; fire pumps; fire engines) - SG pressure decrease (BRU-A, SG safety valves, BRU-K) - external cooling of RPV (detailed analysis is planned; the strategy will require modification of reactor cavity and provisions for steam removal)

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SSTC NRS III. 3 Assessment of severe accident management After Failure of the RPV - Elimination of melt ejections under high pressure (PORVs, emergency gas evacuation system and by means of secondary cooldown) - Management of hydrogen risks inside the containment - Prevention of containment overpressure - Prevention of Basemat Melt-through (strategy of corium cooling in the reactor cavity, on-going under the Upgrade Package)

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SSTC NRS III. 3 Assessment of severe accident management Stress-test results confirmed the filtered containment venting relevance for WWER-1000 MELCOR calculations for SBO and UHS show that conservative (design) limit for containment pressure (5 kgf/cm2 (abs) (0.49 MPa)) can be reached: - for small-series WWER-1000 in 41 hours after accident - for WWER-1000/V-320 in 27 hours after accident, and timely initiation of the venting allows keeping the pressure below this limit

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SSTC NRS III. 3 Assessment of severe accident management

Passive autocatalytic hydrogen recombiners for design-basis accidents are installed at RNPP units 1,2, 4 and KhNPP unit 2 Hydrogen amounts during SBO and UHS estimated in stress-tests: - for WWER-1000 vary from 2.5 to 3.0 t (depends on the composition of cavity concrete) - for WWER-440 is about 2 t Implementation of hydrogen recombiners for BDBA (for all operating units) - on-going

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SSTC NRS III. 3 Assessment of severe accident management Conclusions:

- measures on severe accident management are underway and cover all relevant Fukushima-Daiichi phenomena

Measures:
- urgent implementation of SAMGs - implementation of filtered containment venting in case of severe accidents for WWER-1000 plants - implementation of measures for hydrogen concentration reduction in the containment under BDBA - implementation of hydrogen concentration monitoring system under BDBA - maintaining of the containment integrity in case of interaction with corium at the ex-vessel phase of severe accident - implementation of measures for diagnostics in case of severe accident

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SSTC NRS

Thank you for your attention

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