Effects of Severe Accident Conditions on Integrity of RPV Pedestal of Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant
Source abstract
Abstract
The Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant lost its core cooling function due to the massive tsunami generated by the 2011 off the Pacific coast of Tohoku Earthquake, which caused core meltdown, resulting in high temperature inside the containment vessel and exposing the RPV pedestal, a reinforced concrete structure, to an unusually high temperature environment. After the earthquake, water was poured into the containment vessel to cool the molten core, and the con-crete structure was gradually cooled in the process. Since it will take at least 40 years to remove the fuel from the core, the integrity of the RPV pedestal is a major concern for the decommissioning of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant. In order to assess the long-term integrity of the RPV pedestal, a horizontal loading test was conducted using a 1/6 scaled model of the RPV pedestal of Unit 1 considering the effect of the high temperature heating and subsequent wet conditions. And then, the static stress analysis of the RPV pedestal was performed considering the degradation phenomena revealed by the experiments. As a result, it was confirmed that the RPV pedestal of Unit 1 would be structurally sound for 40 years against the current design basis earthquake even if the material degradation due to severe accident and aging was considered.
Source: openalex_inverted_index · Quality: baseline
Research context
OpenAlex topics: Graphite, nuclear technology, radiation studies · Nuclear and radioactivity studies · Nuclear materials and radiation effects
SciVX discovery tags are terminology-based. OpenAlex topics are source-provided classifications.
Affiliations
Nuclear Power Department, Kajima Corporation, Tokyo, Japan.
Kajima Technical Research Institute, Tokyo, Japan.
System Design & Engineering Department, Toshiba Energy Systems & Solutions Corporation, Yokohama, Japan, and International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning, Tokyo, Japan.
Mechanical System Design & Engineering Department, Toshiba Energy Systems & Solutions Corporation, Yokohama, Japan, and International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning, Tokyo, Japan.
Nuclear Equipment Design Department, Hitachi-GE Nuclear Energy, Ltd., Hitachi, Japan, and International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning, Tokyo, Japan.
Nuclear Plant Engineering Department, Hitachi-GE Nuclear Energy, Ltd., Hitachi, Japan, and International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning, Tokyo, Japan.
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