Periodic Safety Review 2022, Leibstadt Nuclear Power Plant, Switzerland
Revision of mechanical and electrical system status reports for safety-relevant systems and components
In the framework of the Periodic Safety Review (PSR), Swiss power plant operators must subject the current condition of the plant components in all important areas of safety to intensive internal inspections and assessments at regular intervals, as stipulated by the ENSI-A03 guideline. AFRY provided active support in processing system status reports and in the preparation of the PSR documentation.
The Leibstadt Nuclear Power Plant (KKL) is the youngest and most powerful nuclear power plant in Switzerland. The PSR of the KKL represents a comprehensive review of the safety of the power plant, taking into account all relevant aspects and using various methods. AFRY primarily provided support in the preparation of reports that present and evaluate the safety of systems and components.
The requirements for the PSR reports are derived on the one hand from the ENSI-A03 guideline and on the other hand from knowledge management. In particular, the operating behaviour and changes to the individual systems were summarised, as well as fault reports, operating restrictions, maintenance orders and investigations that occurred during the review period. Ageing monitoring carried out and assessments of relevant external events and findings in comparable systems ultimately led to an overall assessment of the system status.
Nuclear safety concepts
Where possible and appropriate, the safety issues were explained and evaluated in connection with the defence-in-depth concept:
- A concept for the main safety functions
- Various levels of defence
- Barrier concept
One of the objectives was to cover a wide range of system parameters with trend analyses in the system status reports. Therefore, in addition to system function parameters, other relevant system performance parameters were also monitored where available.
Thanks to the excellent collaboration during the PSR 2022, further projects have already been initiated together with KKL and are currently being implemented.
I am confident that our collaboration will be just as good as it was for the PSR 2022 and wish everyone involved a very enjoyable time working on the next project!
– Ralf Wohlstein, Project Manager at KKL