EU Clearinghouse on Operational Events for Nuclear Power Plants - Analysis of Fuel Related Events

A detailed report on fuel related events reported to the IRS database operated by the IAEA has been prepared in the IE-JRC under the European Network on Nuclear Power Plant Operational Experience Feedback (Eu Clearninghouse on NPP OEF) activity established by several European Nuclear Safety Regulatory Authorities. The aim of the work was to analyze the main phenomena causing actual or potential fuel failure during in-core operation fuel handling, or during storage; to identify the remedial actions taken and the significant lessons learned. The most recurrent causes of fuel related events were design deficiencies and human errors. In spite of the great effort put to improve the design and manufacture of the fuel assemblies, which has allowed for a better performance and higher operational margins, more demanding operational conditions for the fuel, or singular interventions like system decontamination or fuel cleaning have risen concerns on fuel performance. The result of these counteracting trends is that fuel performance has improved significantly over the years, but there are still some issues which need to be addressed, like fretting, corrosion, fuel handling, and in storage events. Actions to reduce the incidence of fuel related events are recommended, like improving the design and fabrication methods for the fuel assemblies; improved operation and maintenance practices, specially with regard to foreign material exclusion practices and water chemistry control; adding monitoring and surveillance means for fuel handling, and implementing organizational changes, to ensure that adequate checks are carried out specially in simple, heavily procedurized and repetitive activities to preclude human errors potentially caused by indolence. Operational Experience exchanges have spread a number of actions now broadly and systematically applied in nuclear power plants and have allowed to solve fully some types of issues that were reported in the past

MARTIN RAMOS Manuel;  NOEL Marc;  BRUYNOOGHE Christiane;  ZERGER Benoît; 

2011-07-21

IAEA

JRC56741